Tag Archives: recovery

Technology

Media centre saga continues

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SAMSUNG SSDAfter much chasing, the saga of my media centre PC continues. SSD failure. Who thought that happened, ever? Well… I know it happens, theoretically. I just never thought it’d happen to me. Wonderful as these devices are I guess they’re not necessarily as durable as I thought, despite the lack of moving parts.

I have been distinctly unimpressed by Tranquil PC’s response times; despite promising to return the machine within 10 working days, they’ve had it for the best part of three weeks and I’ve had to write to the company MD to get an update on where it is. I know how long it takes to swap out a drive… so not sure what they’re doing with it.

The failure is going to prompt me to accelerate my "personal cloud" strategy and choose one of the cloud providers out there to mirror my filing system. Dropbox is too expensive for the volume of data I have (50GB music, 40GB pictures, 2GB docs etc), but given that most of that data lived on the secondary SATA drive (which I’m hoping is intact) – with luck I won’t have lost anything too substantial.

What I will invariably have to do is go through the unique displeasure of reconfiguring a Windows install from scratch, including setting up the fiddly and frustrating Windows Media Centre software to receive HD, something that took a not insignificant amount of fiddly hackery to begin with. Google Chrome being the hub of a lot of what I do, and the fact it syncs stuff, will make it marginally easier, but there are other bits and pieces that need sorting too.

LSR, Running

LSR: back to business

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First post-physio semi-substantial run – 10k this morning, in about 64 minutes with a 2 minute rest in the middle. Runkeeper tells me that my pace was pretty consistent, my body (so far) tells me that I haven’t exacerbated any injuries. Rolling etc., was pretty standard afterwards, although with the diet going simultaneously I feel a bit drained!

My hamstrings are pretty tight, which I knew, but that’s the one bit that pulls when I run. Need to keep stretching them out until I have something resembling a normal person’s stride!

Must make sure I take it gently now – tomorrow I’m off running and I might do a gentle 5-6k on Monday, and then build to another longer run next Sunday – maybe jump to 12-13k as I bypassed my first initial target for myself of 7k this weekend.

Running

The ‘litmus run’

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For those of us who don’t remember our primary school chemistry, the litmus test uses a special bit of  paper  which contains a chemical extracted from lichen to indicate if a solution is acid or alkaline – turning red for acid and blue for alkaline.

My ‘litmus run,’ as Sudhir put it, was designed to gauge how effectively the physio exercises have been at treating my injury and if I’ve learned to run in a ‘good’ way – with the right muscles activating and my poor battered IT band left well alone.

Well, I’ve done two runs in the last couple of days – in intervals of 4 minutes of running to two minutes of walking with four running intervals yesterday and five today. And I feel OK in the IT band (although the foam rolling is more painful post-run). The total distance covered – a rather pitiful 7.5k or so – isn’t indicative of much but the fact that totally different muscles to usual are feeling it – my calves and hamstrings, mainly – makes me think that I’m doing something better.

Not 100% convinced I’ve completely sorted it out, however, so the run not as effective as litmus paper. I’m going to go back to physio early Tuesday morning – but at least I’m once again blogging about running, and not, erm, not running.

The worrying thing is my fitness seems a bit poorer (probably not helped by running on diet) after the interval of not running. Hoping that I can get enough roadtime in ahead of the half in a few weeks time to make it through non stop, without injury – all the achievement I can hope for at this point.

Wish me luck!

Injuries, Running

VICTORY IS MINE

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At least, a kind of fleeting victory over this ITBS injury. Today, I jumped for Sudhir. First horizontally in some kind of monstrous modern-age torture-rack-pilates equipment-type thing, then for realz… then I ran on a treadmill… and it all seemed to be OK! Yes, the right leg is still a little unsteady but strength is building, I’m pain-free in the knee (so far), and tonight’s rolling was only slightly painful!

Which means… I’m ready for a “litmus test” run – 15 minuter with gaps – to see how I hold up. The foam roller unfortunately must be a constant companion for me, but the fact that — come Saturday, anyway — I could be jogging it up again fills me with excitement and not a little satisfaction that the pain and tedium of the various physio exercises is paying off.

And Sudhir does seem to be earning his keep, yay for good physios!

Anyway, wish me luck.

Injuries

ITBS treatment: phase 2

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I had really hoped that when I saw Sudhir today that I would be given a running and schedule and sent back to resume my training. Such was not to be.

Instead, I underwent:

  • Acupuncture – which apparently works by stimulating blood flow to damaged areas that your body may have ‘forgotten’ is damaged. The 1.5 cm length of needles going into my skin didn’t hurt, surprisingly, but when Sudhir twisted them, making an analogy about slicing through a steak with a knife, the combination of the pain and the disconcerting metaphor shook me somewhat
  • Cupping – which isn’t a thing that dirty tailors do when they’re measuring you up for a suit, but a chinese massage theraphy involving the creation of suction in a cup, and then pulling that over your skin. It looks a bit bizarre but wasn’t too bad an experience.
  • A couple of other types of massage on the IT-band on my right leg.
  • Being taped up with kiniesthiotape (or something: essentially long strips of sports tape) which will stay on for a week in its bright blue splendour. The idea is to provide a passive reminder of which muscles are overtight and which are underused.

Sudhir helps sell me on this stuff by explaining in more scientific detail than I can absorb how each of these therapies is having a bio-mechanical impact on my recovery.

Tonight, I did my own remedial work at home, having received the polystyrene roller from the store I found on Amazon. It involved:

  • Rolling around on the roller, putting my weight on the IT-band. OUCH, goddamn that thing hurts. I mean really, like you wouldn’t believe.
  • Clams – to strengthen my glutes.
  • Leg raises – to loosen my hamstrings and work my quads.

And that was it. Having to do this on a daily basis will be substantially less satisfying than running, but as Sensei Paul said to me tonight, I need to shift my targets and expectations and take it at a sensible pace or I’ll risk further injury.

Next visit to Sudhir is on Tuesday; will see what comes next. First I have a weekend down the South Coast, where it will take all my will to keep the exercises up…

Injuries, Juneathon, Running

Pounding the tarmac once more

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After a week of doctor mandated non-running, two days of warm up work and back bike rides, and a large number of sit-ups, I was back out running this morning. A beautiful day, I took off at pace, feeling the warm rush of satisfaction at enjoying a form of physical exertion. The pace, needless to say, didn’t sustain itself the whole way through the run but my 5k circuit went OK, completed in about 31 minutes, a couple of minutes off my best time for the distance but by no means slow.

The knee feels OK – slightly tentative and I’m clearly going to need to take it a lot easier than I have been – but hopefully after a week or two of relatively gentle 5k routes I’ll be able to build up to a more substantial LSR. Juneathon stats all here.

Racing, Running

The day after the run before

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I can walk again! Only took a day’s rest from yesterday’s ridiculous run.

I will probably run again tomorrow after the mammoth 20-ker yesterday, taking on a gentle-ish 5k as I consider entering for Thursday’s race. Should I run against banana-man in my first ever race event?

I don’t know how I’ve got to a point where I think of a 5k race as a ‘short run’ but it is definitely a good feeling. That said, the banana I’m told finishes in under 24 minutes, and my best ever time for a 5k is about 28… so the run for me will be more along the lines of “defeated by the banana…”

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NuR1u0pjR3s]

Shake and bake…