Injury Update (and a few Weekend Photos)

The 2 big issues on my body right now are my ELBOW and my ACHILLES. I'll first talk about my ELBOW:

I first mentioned my elbow issues in this post in early August. It's basically a bad case of "golfers elbow" from being a summer-time stay-at-home-dad. After the North Mankato Triathlon on the 9th, I've stopped swimming. This is my longest stretch out of the pool since last October, and it soon may be my longest stretch ever since I got into the pool in 2005. But for current training, I'm OK with that. I'm just trying to get my running healthy for the upcoming TC 10 Mile. I'm doing the "Loony Challenge" again this year: the TC 10K and 5K on Saturday October 3rd, and then the TC 10 Mile on Sunday the 4th.

There are 2 slight problems with this elbow injury and my goals for running. First, some good long swims can help keep the endurance up when not running at 100%, and those are now gone. Second, because it hurts to hold any weight with my right arm, I can't hold up my body and foam roll my calves properly, which I need to do to stay healthy when running so much. (I can't do my physical therapy stretches properly either, because I have to pull on up my toes and that hurts my arm.) Oh, and if you say "well, at least you can bike for some cross training and endurance," I really have to watch it with that because it gets sore on bike rides. I can be in aero just fine, but as soon as I come up to turn or to brake, it hurts. So I might be doing a lot of trainer rides where I can either be down in aero or sitting upright (no-handed) with no arm pain.

I'm getting some graston technique "massage" for it, and some acupuncture. Both are meant to loosen up my forearm muscle to help the tendon at the elbow relax. Here's an Instagram from Friday:

Caption: "Trying everything to fix my 'Daddy elbow' - 28 needles in me. Done swimming for a
few months. Doorknobs, drinking fountains, washing my face, putting my car
in drive, using a knife, and a million other daily tasks cause it pain. Time for rest!"

The doc I was seeing said this is a pretty extreme case. I've got some exercises I'm doing, I'm not supposed to sleep on that arm, and this could take some time to heal up. If nothing progresses, I'll either have to immobilize it, or have some sort of tendon surgery. But that's a long ways off.


ON TO MY HEEL/CALF:

I saw Dr. Folske (the chiropractor who does A.R.T. on me and has done WONDERS with previous heel issues) for the first time in about 2 years. I had pain on a few runs leading up to the North Mankato Triathlon, and my final run 4 days before the race was painful at 0.25 miles, and it only got a little worse until I finally stopped just after 1 mile. Yikes. I saw Folske a week and a half ago on Friday, 2 days before my race:

From my Instagram: "Here to get some answers for my broken body. Testing it
at a tri this weekend. Then need to get things healed up ASAP for
the TC Loony Challenge in 8 weeks! It's time to start building distance!"

It felt OK for the race! It was only a 3 mile run at the end of the North Mankato Tri, and it just felt a little tight. I mentioned in my race report that I even felt good enough to run a bit as a cool down. I saw Folske the next day, and he worked out my calf. It's a "hurt so good" sort of feeling.

I didn't run again until this past Thursday (4 days post-race), and those 3 miles felt PERFECT. Two days later (Saturday), I was told to go 5 miles. And they felt perfect as well. (Hot AF, but my legs felt perfect.) Today (again 2 days since my last run), I hit the treadmill for 4 miles, and there was just the SLIGHTEST tightness at the end of it, but that could have all been in my mind. Time to hopefully start SAFELY building some distance! I'm taking tomorrow completely off, and just going to ride on Wednesday. Then run again on Thursday. I think that might be my schedule for a few weeks: run every-other-day for 3 runs, then take 2 days off (run Thurs, Sat, and Mon each week).

So my goal for the TC Loony Challenge in LESS THAN SEVEN WEEKS is survival. I'm hoping I can start "training" shortly, but I know I can't push myself too hard right now or I won't even make it to the starting line. I need to up my mileage so I can race 19.3 miles over about 25 hours and not totally destroy myself. Here's to hoping!

On a happier note, here are a few cute weekend photos (some from my Instagram and some that haven't been posted):

Peeling apples outside. I originally posted that the big canner
in the lower right was 1/4 of our apples, but it was more like 1/3.


Mama loves weekends with the boys! Charlie's got some more teeth coming in, so he was pretty chill.


Backyard fun!


Another batch of applesauce in the works in the back,
and some curry with fresh garden veggies in the front.