Thursday 23 April 2009

Oh slackness, thy name is Rachel.

From Friday to Monday I was away at a small lovely country house and far, far too busy getting massages and mud wraps, eating as much as possible and drinking my way through Central Victoria to do any exercise at all. Today was therefore the first time I've even shown my face at the gym since some time last week.

Admittedly, I had been working through some dull roaring sciatica and the break has improved the pain in my hip somewhat (ie: it now hurts just at the front instead of all along the iliac crest), but geez Louise ...

Most of my PT session tonight was taken up with some extreme stretching. Ian, as David is away, seriously worked my calf and hip and they certainly felt much looser afterwards. As well as tight glutes, the muscle running along the outside of the calf and down the ankle is very tight, especially on the right which was my most damaged ankle (short story: ankles, twice, netball, ligaments, first time right side all ruptured, second time left side most ripped) and I really felt the pain in it. The stretching was great, especially when you get that sweet pain when something really gets worked out. For me that's in my glutes, when my right foot is raised and rotated over to my left side and my right knee is bent, and I'm pulling my shins towards my chest. Dear God, that's good pain right there.

I ran a little afterwards, and had a nasty shock when I kept checking my HRM (have I waxed lyrical about that yet? I became scarily obsessed with my own heartbeat when I first got it, and was freakily elated when I saw 37 BPM when lying down and reading in bed). I ran for 15 at 8, which I thought was a good place to start after a hiatus.

At about 12 minutes my HR was 196 BMP. Now that's not right. I'm shouldn't be working hard enough running so slow for such a short time to be pushing it that hard, nor am I so desperately unfit that my heart just can't take the exercise.

My legs were fine and not at all hurting; and I was fatigued but not so badly. I had a big bad stitch and I ended the 15 by counting in ten second sections to get through it. So am I really fit - working hard - or really unfit - working so hard to do something so easy? Neither really, but I'd like to know what's going on.

Monday 13 April 2009

Although I hate sounding like a whinger, the fact is that I am one. Perhaps with some justification, but I am.

Today I had every intention of running at the gym, and went for a walk with Buzz and Sam the puppy first. My hip was feeling sore, and at some stage I noticed that I was also getting sciatica pain. It's like having a nerve twisting and turning deep within the hip, with shoots and tingles down the thigh and sometimes to the lower leg too. Sometimes I also get a familiar pain in my lower back, but today it was all about the hip.

I ran around a footy oval once to see how it went (and let me just say that I now know beyond shadow of doubt that all my running goals are focused on a steady pace and minutes for a reason - I do not [yet] enjoy running outside where I have no speed control and especially no iPod: horror!), and it didn't go well. I felt uncomfortable and crampy, and it only got worse as we walked home. The last couple of hours have been worse, with me wriggling and stretching and whinging at the irritation in my hip and the tingling in my leg.

Although I'm sure that I would have felt fine once I'd run, I'm also sure that I would have felt a fair bit worse tomorrow. I haven't had discomfort from sciatica like this for a while, so I'm going to let it ride and see how I recover. I had a pretty heavy legs session with David yesterday (lunges are not my exercise. Just not, and my glutes will confirm this if you ask them) so I'll give in to my whinging and let them rest today. I think I should see a physio - between the hip pain, which hurts when I lie on it in bed, and the sciatica, and the damaged piriformis, I'm not prepared to let this become a regular reason not to exercise.

So I'm whinging.

Wednesday 8 April 2009

I'd love to pretend that I was over-training, but I won't embarass myself with such a porkie. I did complete a mega-workout last night (which my brand new Polar F7 tells me was worth 795 calories) and go to bed late, rising again at 6am so I could get a lift with my dad to the gym this morning so perhaps my recovery time wasn't great, but overtraining it ain't.

I did 10 at 8 last night to warm up and felt easy, positive and on good pace. This morning I felt a little less enthused but quite prepared to make it, until I started feeling the impact on my sore right hip. The pain there is present all day, and I feel it sharply when my right heel hits the ground and I roll forward to the ball of my foot. It's a strange kind of feeling - not just muscle soreness like how a good Pump class will make you unable to sit down without a gentle assisted lowering into a chair for a few days, or neuro like the tingling sciatica I get - but a pain that's hot, round, bruise-like and quite deep.

I felt it jarring hard within the first couple of minutes today, so I hopped off to do a few stretches focusing on elongating the hip to the side. This made some improvement for 30 seconds or so, but it came back unabated a couple of minutes later, and combined with my growing annoyance and unwillingness to perform yet another grumpy run, it made me stop altogether.

I was disappointed and things became even more farcical when the tready told me to slow down as I walked at 7, and then proceeded to trap my iPod under its belt when it dropped on the floor. I could really only roll my eyes and pound out some steep inclines with my heart rate high, noting that the hip pain wasn't there when I walked, even at 6 with an incline of 8.5%.

So it was a nearly-grumpy session today; I'm keen to run again soon but I would like to do some desktop research about this hip pain - I'm happy to live with some soreness and injury, but not one that stops me running and has me getting out of bed doubled up in the mornings. That kind of injury territory is reserved for serious runners, not dilettante joggers!

Fascinatingly (for me), my heart rate when running at 8 is about 176bpm after ten minutes, which is the same or even less than when I perform the hideous weight movements that David makes me do with painful regularity. I'm barely working at all in the150s; working very comfortably in the 160s; a bit out of breath and working moderately but sustainably hard in the 170s; and working very hard in the 180s (190s? I'd better be furiously angry to pump that out). This discovery really just encouraged me to start thinking of running as an activity I can just do - perhaps it's boring or I'm tired - but I can still physically do it without flogging myself. Like walking or the elliptical, the more I run the more the movement will become natural and I'll be able to focus on overcoming boredom or fatigue or having interesting daydreams rather than constantly being aware of the movement as an unusual thing for my body to be doing.

I'll aim for another 20 at 8 on Friday or Saturday.

PS: I am now completely and utterly obsessed with the Polar. Yesterday while on the couch and being very very lazy my hr was between 44 and 51 - pretty low, although this is primarily due to genetics rather than a Phar Lap heart (anything below 60 is technically bradycaridia. When less fit and my hr would go below 56, I'd start getting dizzy and light-headed - so I'm definitely in better cardio shape than then!). At work today it's happily 55 - 70, although I'm a bit concerned that if it's at 50 when I stand up it shoots to 100ish, and then drops to 70-80. Is a doubling of hr normal when standing up?

Saturday 4 April 2009

What a difference. After Tuesday's grumpy, struggling run and Retch-a-Riffic Thursday, I approached today's attempt at 20 at 8 with a more positive attitude but with expectations of pain and strife. But not! I found the run relatively comfortable - good pace, wasn't obsessing about time, could probably have gone to 25 if not for my "finish early feeling good" encouragment strategy - and had no stitch or pain at all, which I just realised ten minutes ago with a sense of incredulity.

Afterwards I managed 30 minutes on the elliptical and 10 or so walking, so I was far from exhausted. I'm really pleased with how I felt during and after the run - relaxed, working hard but comfortable, ready for a bit more - and now can't wait to push on to 30 at 8: I see it now, whereas on Tuesday I saw months of miniscule improvement accompanied by mega-crankiness and bitch'n'moaning.

Since moving to 8 from 7, the muscle strain in the back of my hips, where the muscles were straining as I waddled side to side, has disappeared. I still have the neural (perhaps?) pain over my right iliac crest which makes me limp sometimes, but I really think that's something I'm just going to have to work through and treat as necessary.

The aim for the coming week is to do one more 20 at 8, or 25 if I feel good, and to then move to a 25 at 8 which I'll try to run at least once. I have two personal training sessions this week as David was away last week, so I'll probably have fewer free sessions to run in. A run during the week and one next Saturday will do it, and I'm expecting my HRM (a Polar F7) to arrive on Monday so expect some serious nerdy boring stats to be forthcoming!

Thursday 2 April 2009

A funny thing. I got up this morning at 6, got on the 6:37 train, read my book to keep awake, got off, went to the gym, and by 8:28 I was back at my local train station heading home to bed.

Before I started exercising I felt like I was going to be sick. It wasn't just nausea; it was very much about to come up. I felt like I was extremely hungry, but I'd had a banana before leaving home and I don't usually eat breakfast during the week so there was nothing unusual there.

I intended not to run this morning; the ongoing pain in my right hip (not just muscular but sharp and strong enough to make me bend like an old man when I got up yesterday morning. If I develop a permanent running injury this will be it, and I suspect it's all related to the sciatica and damaged piriformis muscle I have on my right side) led me to consider a plain non-jogging session giving me three days to recover before running again on Saturday I hopped on the elliptical hoping that a slow start would settle me down. 5 minutes later I'd already stopped twice and decided to just pack it in.

One miserable dry-retching session in the toilets later, I decided to have a shower in case I needed to go to work because I didn't think I could make it home. I eyed off the communal drain and wondered if spewing into it was bad form. Slowly, slowly I got dressed and walked back to the station. Deciding that I'd rather tough it out and go straight home, I fell asleep and actually dreamed between stations, so by 8:30 I was back home and in bed.

I ate some toast, put myself to bed, read the paper and slept for two hours. I've managed a further short doze and 1 1/2 hours of napping as well, and I feel pretty good now so I hope whatever it was was transient and that it's not coming back. I was really looking forward to this morning's session (especially after the bowl of wedges I was obliged to eat for dinner last night; some pubs' vegan options stretch no further than deep-fried potatoes). Incidentally, it's not morning sickness. So don't ask, Mum :)

So that was icky today; on to Saturday and a proper sweating run please!