Injury Update

"Rome wasn't built in a day." - unknown

So finally after 3 months of no running my knee is... still a no go.  I went to Southern Orthopedics & Sports Medicine yesterday to see exactly what was going on since my own diagnosis clearly was not correct.  After taking some x-rays the Doc came back in to the room with some good news. He told me the x-rays came back negative and that I have no ligament damage.  A major sigh of relief came over me.  Next he performed a physical exam on my knee and said it was mechanically working great.  More good news!  So what was my issue?  His response - swollen plica band. If you're like me, you're probably wondering what the hell is a plica band.  According to the definition on Sports Stars from Dr. Nirav Pandya, "The plica is a band of synoyial (joint lining) tissue which can become pinched between the femur (thigh bone) and the patella (knee cap).  Although we have multiple plicas in our knee, the plica on the inside (medial) of the knee most commonly causes discomfort to athletes."

Wow, this could not be more true.

 The doctor gave me an injection hoping to decrease the inflammation.  He told me to rest for another week and said that should help my knee feel better soon.  After a week of rest, I can resume low impact activities like biking and the elliptical for 2 weeks. I have a follow up appointment with him in 3 weeks where I hope to get the okay to start running again.

For the past 2 weeks I have been biking to and from work.  It is about a 25 mile round trip so I have been averaging about 120-130 miles a week.  Hopefully next week I can resume that plus add in some work on the elliptical.  I'm hoping this will help me gain some fitness back so when I do run I will not have to start off out of shape.  I know I will not be able to just start banging out the miles but within a few weeks I expect to be back in the full swing of things.

I'm disappointed that I won't be able to run Bad Marsh this month (which just so happens to be on my Dirty 30 birthday), but lucky for me, it looks like I may be back in time to compete in the Cremator in July. I really want to run the Double Cremator but I don't want to push my luck too quickly. I plan to  run smart and see how I'm feeling at the beginning of July before deciding on running the single or double Cremator. There is some pretty stiff competition at Cremator this year so although I will not be at the fitness level that I hoped to be at, hopefully I will be close.

Yes, I lost 3 months of running but what I gained was that itch to run again.  I do not have to worry about getting burned out in the summer months which sometimes happened to me.

I know I've been MIA with my running crowd, but I look forward to seeing you all out on the road soon!