Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Aug22-28

S: 19,000 yds
B: 7h 58min
R: 3h 52min

Total: 16h 50min

Plenty of good news to report from last week. Most importantly, the running is coming along nicely.  I'm up to 30min at a time without any pain, so I'm hoping I'm in the clear on the injury.

Also, Saturday I drove up to Nashville for a bike fit from my coach, Dr. Paulo Sousa.  In the hope of opening up my hip angle a bit, I switched to 165mm cranks, which naturally required the fit on my bike to be adjusted.  Paulo used his unique state of the art tools and I was really pleased with the end result.  That afternoon I went for a ride with the new position and was very happy with how it felt. So after having been off the TT bike for the last six weeks, I'm really looking forward to getting back into some training.

So, hopefully I can put all the injury nonsense behind me and get back to training and (eventually) racing!

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Aug15-21

S: 29,000 yds
B: 7h 29min
R: 3h 21min

Total: 18h 28min

On the road to recovery!  I ran four times last week and thus far havent had any issues, which I'm pretty excited about.  With that having been said, though, I'm still taking things slowly, as I certainly want to avoid a regression. I'm also trying not to think about a return to racing, yet, because that would clearly jinx matters...

This weekend is the Rocketman Triathlon, an Olympic distance race over on Redstone Arsenal, where I work and do most of my bike training.  I'm not racing because of the injury, but one of friends, Eric C, wanted to do a relay so I pulled my occasional cycling buddy, Dave Z, out of retirement to do the bike leg and I offered to swim.  Yes, relays are lame, but it should be fun.


Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Aug8-14

S: 30,600 yds
B: 5h 51min
R: 3h 13min => all in the pool

Total: 17h 7min

I got back to some kind of training, which is something, but if nothing else the week was informative.  I only rode once on the TT bike, for about 30min, and quickly discovered it was the source of the problems.  So, before getting back into any serious cycling training I'm going to need to change my position.

As usual, running will be the last activity to be phased back into the mix, a process which will begin this week with a bit of treadmill time. Fun times, indeed!

Monday, August 8, 2011

Aug1-7

On the mend! Well, the leg is finally, finally getting better.  With Dr. Houssain back in town, he was able to view my MRI and see that the hamstring was looking good.  This led to the recommendation of a couple of glut stretches/exercises as well as a foam wedge to sit on at work.  I realize this sounds a bit bizarre, but hey, it works!  And if sitting on a piece of foam is what it takes to keep my butt from hurting, then so be it!

So, looking forward, this week will start the reincorporation of some legs workouts, mainly water running and road biking. I'd say I'm looking further ahead, but considering how long this injury has lingered, I'm not ready to make any assumptions about it being totally gone. With that having been said, though, I dont think it is totally out of the question to rule out racing again this year.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Jul25-31

S: 38,100 yds

More swimming, similar hamstring pain, and still no training. Things were trending better, but have now frustratingly seemed to stall. In response, I talked to a PT in the area who used to work on the training staff at USC (South Carolina, not Southern Cal).  He recommended a light warm up then light stretching then icing.  I am also trying Muscle Activation Technique (MAT) therapy, per a recommendation from a reader, Alan.  So although things are a bit stagnant at the moment, I'm cautiously optimistic that this time next week I'll have some better news!