Starting from scratch in an elite fitness-blog-world full of expensive gear, and Personal Records she couldn't beat with a car.

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Call the waaaahmbulance!

My left hamstring tendon is super tight and grumpy today so I'm taking an extra rest day.

I don't wanna.

Tarder Sauce is one of my spirit animals.
My next run in 5k to 10k is sixty minutes, the longest of the entire training. I feel confident that I can nail this run and I was actually really looking forward to it so I'm pretty annoyed at postponing. Apparently somebody slipped the Kool Aide into my recovery chocolate milk (I blame Running on Candy).

Ultimately though I'd rather take a break today than be limping for the rest of the week. Friday's run was unpleasant enough that I almost tapped out halfway through my run because my feet and lower legs were so achy. From the determination perspective I'm glad I kept going that day, but this hamstring thing has been creeping up on me for a few days and it was especially sore and tight when I woke up today, so sometimes a day off is the better part of valor. I know my head is still fully in it and that's the part that gets you there in the long run.

img source: http://www.theknee.com/knee-pain-causes/hamstring-tendon-strain/

My body has been pretty unbalanced for the last few weeks anyway. I have this sort of recurring thing since college where my body alignment goes haywire and half of my joints tell me to take a long walk off of a short pier. Apparently it has to do with a car accident I experienced as a teen. There's this sort of cascade effect where my hips unbalance and to compensate my right leg lengthens, my ribs twist and I get a giant knot under one of my shoulder blades. My range of motion goes kaput and everything hurts.

There's a pretty straight-forward stretch that fixes it all within a few days and even a small amount of regular yoga will keep it at bay but I never do them anymore because... apparently I am stupid? I don't know what stops me. There's really no excuse.

The universe is pretty much conspiring to get me to cross-train and I am very stubbornly ignoring it. The sad part is that I actually really like yoga and so far I enjoy using kettle bells so you'd think it would be a no-brainer.

So there! Take that... um... me?

5 comments:

  1. Owie, you take it easy ok and listen to your body!

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  2. I approve of the extra rest day as it was for sure needed and I do know how you feel. I think you should maybe take a visit to Pape....he might be able to straighten you out a bit. You know how much I heart him and how much he helps me :)

    Oooooooorrrrr we can just find a yoga place somewhere in that 7 minute drive between us LOL

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    1. C. and I went out to run some errands last night and I'm SO glad I rested. Trying to move fast enough to get out of the cold made it really obvious how bad I torqued my hamstring. It's a bit better today after much stretching last night but it still kind of feels like I have a cord running from my hip to my heel that's just a skosh too short (the right is tight but not painful). Now that I feel how it connects down my leg I can tell the foot discomfort from Friday was somehow related.

      In general I'm all for chiropractors but I spent a *lot* of time in my 20s paying baffled chiros for stop-gap therapies only to have someone (admittedly he's an osteopath, but still) randomly diagnose and fix it at an SCA event after 5 minutes of poking. Chiros are definitely not my first instinct for fixing random things anymore. Though to be fair the various orthopedists I've seen were about 5x less useful than the chiropractors. :p

      I would like to get back to formal yoga classes, but right now most of my mad money is going toward my hair. :p

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  3. Sounds like you're almost finished with the program! That's awesome!

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    1. That's what makes this so annoying, I have FOUR runs left! *sigh*

      I think it's a combo of getting lazy with stretching and getting ambitious with speed which is probably not the best combination.

      I guess it's kind of good though, It's making me think about what I'm doing a little more and I have some ideas of things to change up.

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