Slightly OT, but anyone see this last night? The guy looked to be in his (to me) late 50’s or early 60’s, was training for an IM (first words out of his mouth were 2.4, 112 and marathon), and was in for an ankle replacement (I’ve never heard of that before, but I suppose they can be replaced?) from a cadaver donor. The guy talked about how he had already had 3 or 4 surgeries in the year but that this one was not going to stop him for very long. He ends up “meeting” the donor, and looks at the dead guy and assumes he’s much older, but the intern tells the guy, “He’s 2 years YOUNGER than you.”
All I could do was laugh. If there are people who think those who do IM are nuts, then this episode just added fuel to the fire.
Though I might be in line for knee replacement one of these years…
Interesting, not heard of an ankle replacement. In fact a fairly respected doctor told me, of course this wa sseveral years ago, if I came up with something to replace the ankle and it worked I’d make alot of money.
At the time there was nothing that could stand the pounding and the complexity of the joint…as far I understood. Maybe that’s changed in last couple of years.
my g/f turned around and looked at me. i’ve been having problems walking for the past month due to my ankle, and my knees are starting to go. (i’m 22…but heavy).
I watched it last night and thought it was pretty ridiculous. There is no way that that guy could have had that many surgies in that amount of time and still be competing in Ironmans. Also, that’s at least the second time that they’ve mentioned a patient that does triathlons on that show.
Anyways, I was watching it with a PT and knowing her, she went online and looked up the procedure. I think they can do something like it, but it’s pretty rare. Ah, the procedure is called an ankle allograph replacement.
Heh heh, I thought along the same lines as you, that this would have more people thinking that anyone doing an IM is crazy. Which is fine by me! I figure I can impress my friends, family, total strangers with my future IM accomplishments more if it’s viewed as a nutty, unattainable thing. Heck, who cares about finishing time, just doing it should be enough to send kudos and admiring glances my way. Grey’s Anatomy, keep it coming!
(OT - have fun with the Goofy Challenge! I did it this year - crazy stuff, but ah, the shiny medals are most excellent. :))
Saved did an episode this year with an Ironman triathlete who was hit by a car riding his bike and lost his leg. One of the docs quoted the disabled world record time for IM to him as motivation. Are we becoming mainstream???
Yeah, I am a fan of the show as well. As luck would have it, my wife was sitting right next to me at the time. The character was 55 (I’m 52), had surgery on both rotator cuffs, was expecting to do another IM within a few months of ankle replacement, to be followed by hip replacement after the race. Even by ST standards, that was a bit over the top. Also, did you notice they used fictious race names?
This was probably 3 years ago and apparently the problem was the failure rate. Not that it couldn’t be done just that they hadn’t found a “reliable” way to do it. Might be the reason they prefer to fuse it, as the artificial ones fail to often.
I took that as a mockery of sorts to the middle aged white Ironhead…super type A personality that will kill themselves to keep doing the distance. And the actor did not shave his hairy legs- that lost me right there.
To be honest, no doctor would let that guy continue running after all of those surgeries. For example an artificial hip only lasts around 10-15 years if you DON’T run on it. If you start running on it, you’ll kill that joint for sure. Basically, that whole thing seemed like pure fiction to me.
I would have liked a bit more character development like who is the guy’s coach, how much does he train, does he bike train by or just with power, what brand of bike does he ride and does he ride steep or slack seat tube angle, has he had a professional bike fitting, does he use tubulars or clinchers, and whether he has a Bento Box on his bike or not.
But yeah, I was also displeased with the unshaved legs.
hahahahaha! I didn’t even notice the non-shaved legs. But I did think it was funny how I got about 5 phone calls worrying about me since I’ve had my share of injuries…
