Everyone, I need a little help understanding if I’m causing harm, or just getting stronger so to speak and going through “growing pains”. Since my first triathlon in August, I have discovered that I need to work on the cycling aspect of the sport much more than the other parts. So I’ve stepped up the off season training on the bike and have been hitting the leg press. I’ve made a lot of progress on the press, but because of a previous knee injury, I had quite a bit of quad atrophy in the left leg and this seems to make the connective tissue around the knee very, very tight. And now the piriformis is getting invloved. I’ve had that massaged out a couple of times, but keeps coming back. Stretching the quads like crazy, including IT band and piriformis and this helps only a tiny bit. Now the other knee feels the same…tight, almost a “full” feeling, getting difficult to walk downstairs. I’m not on the leg press because I can feel everything squeeze like crazy (area around the knee), but I continue to cycle.
There is no swelling, but it does tend to ache. No area in particular hurts when poked or manipulated. I’m not running at all…that just sends everything through the roof. Have I strained or am I straining something?? Unfortunately, I will have to try to treat at home because my daughter was in the hospital for a few days recently and we have bad insurance ( in other words, I cannot afford to see the ortho right now). I wear an Ace support on the knee because of the old injury.
Any ideas?