Starting over after an injury

Hi everyone,

First time forum poster here so be gentle. BTW, the discussion on triathlete pick-up lines had me rolling on the floor last night. Very funny…pathetic in some cases…but funny.

I aggravated my patellar tracking problem playing soccer about two months ago and went from a marathon training plan and 16 mile long runs to no running at all. My swimming has made huge progress but even my biking has suffered because my knee has been in so much pain. Then, my other knee started up because I was compensating. Long story short, I haven’t been training like I should for the last couple months.

Now, I have my first sprint of the season coming up on 5/31. I can barely run 1.5 miles and the 25 mile bike I did 2 weeks ago left me stupid in the head and in pain. I haven’t been on my bike, Puccini, since.

I know the swim will be a breeze for me but how am I supposed to get ready for the bike and run? My A race this year is a Half Ironman in September so I need to get cracking on the training. I should also mention this is my first full season doing triathlon.

My motivation is really suffering at the hands of the pain I feel in my knees right now. My Physical Therapist is working with me but I am really frustrated that this will be something I never get rid of. I think if I can get back into the rhythm of training I will get the motivation again.

How do I start over again after an injury?

Only your physical therapist knows for sure. It sounds like you are nuts to try to train or race with that pain. Job one is to show up to the line healthy. Everything else is gravy.

I would like to echo what the other poster said…

Unless this is going to be your one and only year of triathlons you should get healthy before you go at it…

If the pain is as you describe it, it is possible that you can be doing permanent damage which could preclude you from a lifetime of fitness.

Since your problem sounds like it had not gotten better from rest it is possible that you did something a little more serious… It doesn’t soudn like something that can be relieved with a switch of pedals or other wise…

First things first, see a physician and see if a referral to a physical therapist would be appropriate…

If after you do this kind of stuff and you are still having pain, the board would be able to help you out with specific equipment changes that can help you along

I spent all of last year injuried. I tried to do too much, and I am still not 100%. In my experience, patience is the only way to go. You can really set yourself back. This upcoming sprint tri might seem like a lot, and the Half Ironman might seem like more, but are you willing to sacrifice the next couple of years, or even more, for this year? I know how hard it is to be patient, but it is the only way to go. The other thing to mention is you should really try to get a doctor and physical therapist that is used to working with real athletes who you trust. I wasted a lot of time working with doctors and PT’s that don’t have the experience necessary to heal an endurance athlete. This just exacerbated my problem. Fortunately, I was eventually able to get a referral to the PT’s that treat the scholarship athletes at the University of Michigan. I went from spending 1/2 hour 3 times a week with the PT asking me what I wanted to do, to spending 2.5 hours 3 times a week getting my butt kicked and my knees (tracking problems I might add) fixed.

So, be patient with your recovery, but be very proactive with who is helping you recover. There’s nothing wrong with asking lots of questions. Good luck, I know this is frustrating.

not going to comment on the phyiscal injury side but there’s a thread on this coming back over at Coachgordo.coms forum…on the actual starting again side…done it twice, you need to be fixed before starting again
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I tried racing all last year training through overuse injuries. I ramped up too quick, and never let it heal all the way. I had to take 3 months off during the winter to get everything to heal. And last year was the first year in many that I wasn’t doing long mileage for an Ironman. I screwed it up sprint training. Even now I have to be careful as I ramp up my mileage. It seems once you have a bad injury, it reoccurs very easily. So let the damn thing heal. Just don’t do anything that interferes with healing. If that means no training for a while, don’t train, don’t race. Don’t risk an injury that will irritate you for the rest of your life.

To mention a friend, I watched a lady battle unjuries for 3 years. She kept trying to train through it. She was seeing doctors and therapists, but just never would just stop, rest and let it heal. Again, let the damn thing heal.

I love soccer, but I have not played it for many years. I train to run very fast, for a long time, in a straight line. My legs just cannot take all the cutting, and zig zagging in soccer anymore. I keep promising that I will play again next year, and just keep putting it off.

Everyone is giving good advice. Make 100% sure you go to a Sports medical group for treatment. Too often, the treatment by non-sports medical people is to give you pills, make you stop doing anything that hurts, and see if it will get better. Rehab for sportsmen (and women) is different than rehab for pedestrians and couch potatoes.

I just trained through an achilles problem. I was very fortunate to have access to daily sport-specific medical care…it made all the difference in the world. I had a potentially season-ending injury turn out to just be a bad dream. I think I’ll be fine on my 1/2 ironman coming up next week. There is no way I could have overcome this injury so quickly without the expert care I received. (thanks goes to Dr. Ed Steel in Charlotte! I have never had a bumper sticker on my car, and I have one front and one back now, it says: “Ironman by Steel” followed by his phone number)

Get this kind of daily attention…you may be able to train through this, but, only under the watchful eye of someone experienced in the treatment of your problem.