Running to Think

I'm gonna skip week 02, for the reasons I explained in a previous post. I deliberately planned for a break between two intense training blocks. Anyway my body anticipated me with a stressed posterior tibial tendon that needed to be fixed any time soon.
Week 02 has been dedicated to resting, specifically active resting which consisted of a bit of cycling at the gym and loads of repetitions of the exercise you can see in the picture above.
According to my physiotherapist, I could have started running again on monday of week 03, after 7 days of no running. That's exactly what I did.

13/01/2014
20' run and the usual exercises. I headed to the gym a number of times to strengthen some muscular groups that needed some intervention, such as hamstrings and shoulders, upper back and abs. Running, running, running is not exactly what every runner should do. Sometimes we have to plan some workout sessions at the gym or, if you feel more like Rocky Balboa at the steps of a stadium in the suburbs of your city ;)

14/01/2014
30' trail in Sart Tilman in Liege, wearing trail running shoes. This session was characterised by the usual amount of hills and irregular terrain which made it a tough and quite stiff experience. At some point I was scared that the tendon would have collapsed again. I was really waiting for the running session to finish as soon as possible. Not fun, at all.

15/01/2014
Of course my physiotherapist kicked in, discouraging me from running on irregular terrain for at least one more week. She was quite diplomatic by avoiding the more appropriate "you are an idiot" conclusion.
I proceeded as requested by wearing softer road running shoes for about 40', finishing on the track and field. I still felt a bit of stiffness in both the ankles and mainly on the injured tendon. Way less than the day before, though.

16/01/2014
52' easy run with no pain whatsoever and much less stiffness. I felt like I could have been running for 3 hours more, which I didn't do. This time, I would have really deserved to be called an idiot.

17/01/2014
again 50' easy run in the city of Bruxelles. Sore calves and both tibial tendons quite tired are probably the result of a week of training and exercising. I better close week 2 here, with a saturday of rest.

18/01/2014
Rest


I wish I could say "the gipsy is back". But I still don't feel that comfortable.
Yet.

Hello folks!
I remember the days when I was running like crazy as they were last week.
Wait, it *was* last week!!
Well, here I am, dealing with the first injury of 2014, even though whatever happens in my life is pretty much the first of the year, for the obvious reasons.
The day I was kind of pushing myself to the limits, coming from a 31 km trail and a lot of hills, then running a 10 km at the consistent pace of 3'50" per km I forgot about one important thing: the body does have limits.
Yeah yeah the mind can probably ignore them and most of the times it does that greatly. But sooner or later we have to face the physical limits of joints, tendons, sore legs and bones.

Long story short, at the end of the running session of the 1st January I felt a very acute pain somewhere in the left foot, just when I was running back home which means at the end of the training.
I stopped with the usual teeth-grinding face. Looked at the foot, touched it and I got the same irritating feeling I got in the last mile of the 32-mile run back in November 2013.
As usual I underrated the thing as "just stress", since the previous week had been quite stressful indeed.
The day before, the last day of the year, I felt quite tired even on a relatively slow pace. In retrospect I can say that was an alarm raised by one of those subtle safety mechanisms embedded in our body. Exactly, in retrospect...
So many years of running experience and I am still committing the same old mistake of ignoring the signs of the body and keep going. When I feel great I just go for it and push it to the limit, usually going beyond and paying the costly price of breaking, stressing, fracturing and disrupting. So wrong!!! So stupid!!! Bad Francesco, very bad boy!

It comes without saying that the 2nd of January it was a no running day for the reasons that I might have explained so far.
Resting and then resting again and again.
While by the end of the third day God had created a foundational environment of light, heavens, seas and earth, I instead did something of which God would just be rolling and laughing, such as running for 7 min and feeling that acute pain I am so used to.

The schedule had been made. Doctor working at the Sport Medical Advice Center of Leuven checked my foot and concluded that, with great fortune, it was not an inflamed tendon.
He found two main problems instead. It turns out that my left foot is less stable than the right one. This instability is what is letting the bones knock at each other with a terrifying and disgusting clacking noise whenever they are moved in the (un)proper way.
On longer distances this small instability- which might sound cute out of context - becomes a monster to deal with and usually to get kicked from very badly.

We already planned some sessions with the physiotherapist who will fix this instability with some specific exercises for the plantar fascia and posterior tibial tendon. Strengthening these bad boys should give me the stability I need to start training again and, hopefully, to participate to the ultra marathon next March.

Fingers crossed!