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Ultra Marathon Training – Part One – Intro

Waiting for the Sun

February 28, 2012 Comments (3) Training

When Running Or Rest are Not Enough

Part One: When runnning is not enough.

Every time I do all the things to round off my training, I get faster and I’m injured less.  Then what do I do?  I slack and only run.

Bad idea, Mark!

Achilles tendonitis and IT pain are my bodies two favorite ways of reminding me I’m forgetting something important. Forgotten my core work taught to me by me PT.  Forgotten to go through my 10 simple stretches.

Part Two: When rest is not enough.

Does it make sense to say I’ve been fortunate enough to be injured a lot? Yes, as it’s taught me volumes about injuries and the difference between the point of pain and origin of problem.  Simply said, the point of pain is most often not the origin.  Many people treat Plantar, Achilles Tendonitis and IT Band Syndrome at the point where it hurts.  Those are the wrong places wrong places to focus.

My Orthopedic Doc, PT and multiple Google investigations have all confirmed my opinion.  I’ve traced my own injuries, listed above, to my core, hips and back.  Strengthening my core and back helps me keep me aligned. Keeping my glutes, piriformis and hip flexors loose keeps my muscular system from pulling me out of alignment as well.  And, many of my leg exercises strengthen the muscles around my knees which keeps the muscles strong and avoids undue stress on the tendons; keeping tendonitis from appearing.

Examples of points of pain vs origin include:
Waking up one morning talking a step and pow!  Plantar.  No special sock, no ice, no stretching my foot.  I worked too loosen my tight hips and glutes and the Plantar was gone in a couple of days.  
Another example is when my first Orthopedic Doc told me to stop running for 6 weeks because of patella tendonitis.  A few Google searches later and I found a specific leg extension exercise which had me running in 3 days pain free.  
Finally, IT Band kept me out of running for weeks until I saw someone using a foam roller at the gym.  Couple of torture sessions later on that puppy and I was running without a hint of pain.

So stay strong and stay loose my friends.  And if you get a hitch in your gitty up, find the origin.

3 Responses to When Running Or Rest are Not Enough

  1. Josh says:

    Hey there,

    Great article, definitely hits the nail on the head. Im currently down with a case of patella tendonitis and at the physio every other day to try and get back running on my legs. Can you let me know what specific leg extension you did that had you back running within 3 days. And how often and how many reps were you doing of it.

    Thanks,
    Josh

    • mkreuzer says:

      Hey Josh,
      Simple. At a gym I did the leg extension machine. The one where you sit and curl you’re leg up. Here’s how it works. Sit in the machine and make sure your knee is inline with the pivot point of the machine. Use only one leg at a time. Start with you’re leg fully extended… like the half way point of one rep. Slowly lower your leg to a 30 degree angle… not 45, then extend up again. Use very light weight. I use only 10 and 15 pounds per leg. I do 3 to 4 sets on each leg with 15 reps each. I’ve been having sore knees while training for the Wasatch 100 and this has been saving my butt!

  2. Eric says:

    Thanks for that bit of advice. I’m currently dealing with low-grade, keeping-it-at-bay PF, and just now having a flare-up of achilles’ tendonitis (small nodule, a bit painful to the touch but not affecting my walk/run at the moment).

    My guess is that they are coming from the same root cause, so I’m going to explore that a bit, and work on loosening up the muscles north of the achilles’. Thanks for the nudge!

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