Friday, January 7, 2011
There's no question that this has been a trying year for my competitive spirit and love of sports. For those of you who have NOT had the "privilege" of listening to me complain about my ankle for the last year, I'll give you a brief review.
Fast forward to seven weeks later, I wrote this post about being a patient. After 10 days of trying to heal myself, almost three weeks in a boot, a couple visits to the doctor, physical therapy, an MRI which showed some ligament and cartilage damage, and a total loss of a cycling racing season, I was frustrated
Then in May, I wrote this post about running again. We gave up on rest as the cure after about 4 months, and I was given free activity reigns (as pain allowed) to give it a trial run of being an ankle that worked for me. Fail.
Next came this post about the decision to do surgery. And then this one, and this one, the days following surgery.
6 weeks after surgery, I was allowed to slowly start impact activities again. After 9 months of restricted cardio, I'd definitely lost some fitness.
And sadly, my year of competition looked like this: 1 running race, no road or cyclocross races, and one soccer game. Disappointing.
But, as of today, nearly a year after the original injury, I am happy to report that I am pretty much as fit as I was right before the injury! Phew.
How do I know this, you might ask? Well I do this nifty little test on my trainer, where I strap on a heart rate monitor, set a HR zone of 132-149, and then ride as fast as I can for an hour staying in that zone. Then, I see how far I've gone. The theory being that if I'm in better shape, I can go faster while staying in that HR zone. It's proven to be pretty reliable. And today, my distance in that hour was the same as it was before the injury! Which it DEFINITELY has not been up until this point.
I'd stay that puts me in decent shape for the upcoming racing season, which I do NOT plan on missing.
If only it would stop snowing and warm up a touch so I could get some miles in outside!
Happily at baseline,
Kari
Somewhere around Jan. 26th of last year, I injured my ankle playing indoor soccer. 19 years of soccer, and this was the first injury that kept me out of a game. I'd say that's a pretty good track record. But track records don't mean a whole lot when you're lying in the middle of a gym floor in pain contemplating how you're going to go to work the next day and deliver a baby on one foot... that looked like this.
Then in May, I wrote this post about running again. We gave up on rest as the cure after about 4 months, and I was given free activity reigns (as pain allowed) to give it a trial run of being an ankle that worked for me. Fail.
Next came this post about the decision to do surgery. And then this one, and this one, the days following surgery.
6 weeks after surgery, I was allowed to slowly start impact activities again. After 9 months of restricted cardio, I'd definitely lost some fitness.
And sadly, my year of competition looked like this: 1 running race, no road or cyclocross races, and one soccer game. Disappointing.
But, as of today, nearly a year after the original injury, I am happy to report that I am pretty much as fit as I was right before the injury! Phew.
How do I know this, you might ask? Well I do this nifty little test on my trainer, where I strap on a heart rate monitor, set a HR zone of 132-149, and then ride as fast as I can for an hour staying in that zone. Then, I see how far I've gone. The theory being that if I'm in better shape, I can go faster while staying in that HR zone. It's proven to be pretty reliable. And today, my distance in that hour was the same as it was before the injury! Which it DEFINITELY has not been up until this point.
I'd stay that puts me in decent shape for the upcoming racing season, which I do NOT plan on missing.
If only it would stop snowing and warm up a touch so I could get some miles in outside!
Happily at baseline,
Kari
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