The big event this week was my trip to the Osteopath. I've never been to one before and was a little wary of what was going to happen. As his services had been recommended to me by a close friend, who claimed she had been 'fixed' by him on numerous occasions, I arrived for my appointment on Tuesday morning.
After talking to me and getting me to bend and stretch into a variety of weird and wonderful positions, he concluded that my hip was slightly out of alignment and thus was causing my back pain. The way my back muscles were being over stretched would also have been causing the tightness in my hamstrings and calf. Great, so all we had to do was fix it and I'd be back in business.
I was lulled into a serene calm by a ten minute back massage in order to loosen the muscles and allow the manipulation to occur. My arms and legs were then carefully moved into a position which I thought would be used to stretch out the problem area. It was a bit of a shock when he then told me to breathe in and literally jumped on me, thus producing a huge cracking sound from my back. After he assured me that that horrific sound was the intended outcome we swapped sides to deal with the problematic right. I was in position and ready. He jumped on me again, nothing happened so he quickly repeated the jump three times, nothing. I was moved into a new position and stretched out a bit. We then went back for a second 'crack' at it!! This time he jumped with more pressure and purpose. But still no crack. Again he tried twice more with more force. I was praying for it to crack, the position was uncomfortable to say the least, but rather than pain I was hit by a feeling of nausea. The back's a fragile and quite important thing, with all those spinal cords running up it, so to have a strange bearded man I've known five minutes messing about with it, intentionally hurting it for a greater good made me feel a little sick. I stared at his certificates to reassure myself he knew what he was doing and then, finally, there was a small but ever so pleasing crack and I was released from my contorted position.
I was reassessed and my hip had moved closer to its normal position and advised not to run for two weeks, which fits pleasingly into my end of season break. All he advised was to stretch the area and swim and cycle to keep up a bit of my cardio fitness. But I wasn't to over do it, so as to give the back time to recover and mend. Which again all fits in perfectly with me taking a break from training.
It's been a relief to have been given an explanation and something of a cure for my problem. And the Doctor's advice to not run and do minimal exercise has meant my feelings of guilt for not doing anything and losing ground on where I ultimately aim to be will not surface. I can sit back and relax under the umbrella of rehab. Happy days!
Monday 31 March 2008
Thursday 20 March 2008
9th-16th of March
Training Report:
My whole cross country season has been focused on this Saturday. I'm now confident I can make the county team so I knew I'd be able to look upon this race as the pinnacle of almost half a years work. But these last few months have been easily the most frustrating of my running career so far. Nothing has gone smoothly. I've rolled seamlessly from one problem to the next. My body's basic fitness and the speed in my legs has improved dramatically over the winter, which makes all these interruptions so annoying. Each time I start back after a set back I know I'm running well straight away, my base fitness is really good, it's just these last few months when I've wanted to really make some strides in terms of my abilities to compete well, especially at this, the last and biggest race of the season, I've not been able to move on.
As I wanted to compete at the inter counties I treated this week as I would have if I'd been in top shape. Every session was easy, and shorter than normal. Normally this would allow the body to recover from the fatigue of intense training, but for me it was more about letting my body recover from all its niggles. Tuesday was my last semi hard session, a final bit of speed work, the last piece in the puzzle, that was supposed to leave me feeling confident. Sadly I knew I was struggling. I copped well with the session as it was only half the normal amount. It wasn't as easy and flowing as I would have liked, but the main problem was my back again. The pain began to flare up towards the end, and with triple the distance covered in this session to come on Saturday I was anything but confident. During this last month my back pain has been getting progressively worse down the right hand side, especially when running at full stretch, in races or during speed sessions. I knew at the end of that run that I now needed to see a specialist about it. I just hoped I could get to Saturday in one piece and deal with getting it 'fixed' next week.
The rest of my week involved slow runs and lots of stretching. I hoped that along with a sports massage on Wednesday it would see me able to complete the 12k cross country race, and do myself some sort of justice as to how far I've improved upon this time last year. Mentally I was focused and confident that I would do ok, whether this was a sign of me becoming mentally stronger, a mind over matter thing, or weather it was some sort of blind, dissolutional insanity I'm not sure!
I was really excited come race day. The inter counties are a big event, 3000 of the best cross country runners from across the UK, and from all age groups. With loud Tannoy speakers blaring out commentary of every one of the ten races, and the cameras from Sky Sports, broadcasting each race out live, you knew you were at a big important event. The chance to represent Great Britain at the World Cross country Championships was at stake for the front runners, and the chance of a team medal was on the cards for everyone.
With the senior men's race on last I had a while to wait for my go. I got myself focused, motivated and warm by running from one side of the course to the other to encourage members of both my own running club and county. And with a number of excellent performances by friends from my club, including an inspirational individual bronze in the under 17 women from Izzy Brinsden, and I was excited and eager to get going and determined to do well.
The start is like the 'Charge of the Light brigade' as nearly 500 athletes literally sprint from the starting pens up the immediate and steep incline to get a good position. For the first lap I'd felt in control. I was placed just outside the top 50and was reasonably comfortable with it. But with three laps to go I could already feel that my body was starting to buckle. The dodgy right hand side of my back was not happy and the knock on effects on my legs would soon surface. The first thing to go was my calf. It tightened up but I was able to cope with this, but towards the end of the lap the back really stiffened up. I continued on for half a lap, but as the tightness increased my stride length decreased and I was quickly going backwards through the field. After running for an extra half lap I decided to stop. I stood watching the field pass me as I stretched and massaged my back, I half thought about joining in again, but that would have done me no good. I would definitely have been last and of no use to the team, and running was only going to have a negative impact on my back.
I stood and watched the race from the side lines. Watching runners I'd raced against do really well, and pictured where I could have come, had I been fit. I was not exactly ecstatic to have gone all the way to Nottingham, to race in the highlight race of the cross country season, just to pull out of a race for the first time ever. Something I really don't want to repeat. As I drove home talking about running with a couple of close friends and club mates we came to the conclusion that my mind and body needed a little break from running. In nearly two years since I have had a holiday from this job. And with this injury problem that only flares up whilst running, now seems like the perfect time. So for the next few weeks I'll be riding and swimming to keep up the fitness levels, but my trainers will stay in the cupboard. An emergency appointment with an osteopath has been booked for Tuesday to hopefully identify the problem in my back. I'm sure this break will give my body and mind new vigour when I tie my shoes up again, revitalising what I know I can do with my body.
My whole cross country season has been focused on this Saturday. I'm now confident I can make the county team so I knew I'd be able to look upon this race as the pinnacle of almost half a years work. But these last few months have been easily the most frustrating of my running career so far. Nothing has gone smoothly. I've rolled seamlessly from one problem to the next. My body's basic fitness and the speed in my legs has improved dramatically over the winter, which makes all these interruptions so annoying. Each time I start back after a set back I know I'm running well straight away, my base fitness is really good, it's just these last few months when I've wanted to really make some strides in terms of my abilities to compete well, especially at this, the last and biggest race of the season, I've not been able to move on.
As I wanted to compete at the inter counties I treated this week as I would have if I'd been in top shape. Every session was easy, and shorter than normal. Normally this would allow the body to recover from the fatigue of intense training, but for me it was more about letting my body recover from all its niggles. Tuesday was my last semi hard session, a final bit of speed work, the last piece in the puzzle, that was supposed to leave me feeling confident. Sadly I knew I was struggling. I copped well with the session as it was only half the normal amount. It wasn't as easy and flowing as I would have liked, but the main problem was my back again. The pain began to flare up towards the end, and with triple the distance covered in this session to come on Saturday I was anything but confident. During this last month my back pain has been getting progressively worse down the right hand side, especially when running at full stretch, in races or during speed sessions. I knew at the end of that run that I now needed to see a specialist about it. I just hoped I could get to Saturday in one piece and deal with getting it 'fixed' next week.
The rest of my week involved slow runs and lots of stretching. I hoped that along with a sports massage on Wednesday it would see me able to complete the 12k cross country race, and do myself some sort of justice as to how far I've improved upon this time last year. Mentally I was focused and confident that I would do ok, whether this was a sign of me becoming mentally stronger, a mind over matter thing, or weather it was some sort of blind, dissolutional insanity I'm not sure!
I was really excited come race day. The inter counties are a big event, 3000 of the best cross country runners from across the UK, and from all age groups. With loud Tannoy speakers blaring out commentary of every one of the ten races, and the cameras from Sky Sports, broadcasting each race out live, you knew you were at a big important event. The chance to represent Great Britain at the World Cross country Championships was at stake for the front runners, and the chance of a team medal was on the cards for everyone.
With the senior men's race on last I had a while to wait for my go. I got myself focused, motivated and warm by running from one side of the course to the other to encourage members of both my own running club and county. And with a number of excellent performances by friends from my club, including an inspirational individual bronze in the under 17 women from Izzy Brinsden, and I was excited and eager to get going and determined to do well.
The start is like the 'Charge of the Light brigade' as nearly 500 athletes literally sprint from the starting pens up the immediate and steep incline to get a good position. For the first lap I'd felt in control. I was placed just outside the top 50and was reasonably comfortable with it. But with three laps to go I could already feel that my body was starting to buckle. The dodgy right hand side of my back was not happy and the knock on effects on my legs would soon surface. The first thing to go was my calf. It tightened up but I was able to cope with this, but towards the end of the lap the back really stiffened up. I continued on for half a lap, but as the tightness increased my stride length decreased and I was quickly going backwards through the field. After running for an extra half lap I decided to stop. I stood watching the field pass me as I stretched and massaged my back, I half thought about joining in again, but that would have done me no good. I would definitely have been last and of no use to the team, and running was only going to have a negative impact on my back.
I stood and watched the race from the side lines. Watching runners I'd raced against do really well, and pictured where I could have come, had I been fit. I was not exactly ecstatic to have gone all the way to Nottingham, to race in the highlight race of the cross country season, just to pull out of a race for the first time ever. Something I really don't want to repeat. As I drove home talking about running with a couple of close friends and club mates we came to the conclusion that my mind and body needed a little break from running. In nearly two years since I have had a holiday from this job. And with this injury problem that only flares up whilst running, now seems like the perfect time. So for the next few weeks I'll be riding and swimming to keep up the fitness levels, but my trainers will stay in the cupboard. An emergency appointment with an osteopath has been booked for Tuesday to hopefully identify the problem in my back. I'm sure this break will give my body and mind new vigour when I tie my shoes up again, revitalising what I know I can do with my body.
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