Post 86 - Getting my back back

The first part of this week was horrendous. The lower left area of my back was really sore. Normally I’m flexible enough to touch my toes and get the palms of my hands flat on the ground. But with my back the way it was, with the pulled muscle and pain that came with it, I could barely bend over and get my hands past my knees, never mind touch my toes. Not what I wanted, a few weeks out from Ironman. I had no idea how it was going to pan out. Maybe it would be fine in a few days. Maybe it would take weeks. Maybe it would happen again, but worse, if I wasn’t careful. I just didn’t want to have to deal with it, and wished it hadn’t happened. But happen it had, and deal with it I had to.

Des at Phases Sports Therapy was very good and agreed to see me on Monday night after work. So, after work, I went home, made food for the week, ate, and got to his place by 8:45pm. Des worked and worked and worked on my back. Everything was tight, and all this tightness probably contributed to pulling the muscle. The tightness, combined with the unusual rotation when I went to grab my heart rate monitor strap, was enough to overstretch a muscle in my back and make it go “twang”. 

The physio treatment was pretty sore, but Des worked all over my back, right up to my neck, trying to loosen things out as best he could. I just lay there grunting and gritting my teeth, dealing with the pain, trying to ask questions when I could. And that was my Monday night. Usually Mondays are rest days and early-to-bed days, but by the time I had finished with the physio work, waited for trains, got home and got to bed, it was after midnight. Normally I’m in bed for at least 8 hours per night. Getting up at the normal time the next day would have meant only 6 hours. I decided I’d go into work an hour later (fortunately I can arrive to work any time before 9am), so it meant that I got 7 hours.

Except I didn’t really get 7 hours. I barely slept on Sunday night, the first night with the sore back. Monday wasn’t much better. I like to sleep well. I need to sleep well. And I’d just had two nights of bad sleep, and two stressful days. I was really not happy, wondering if my year was falling apart, wondering if the wheels were coming off. This week was supposed to be the first week of my final tough 2-week training block. I wasn’t sure what to do. I could walk, I could move around, I could still turn my head and look behind me, I just could not bend over at all. I didn’t want to not train, but I also didn’t want to make my back worse by training. I talked to Des, and his feeling was that I could try to cycle as long as I didn’t bend over in the aero position. Any pain, any issues, and I should stop. So I tried, and I sat upright on the bike, and I seemed to get away with it. I did 2 x 20 minute intervals and my back didn’t really restrict me when pedalling. So that was positive.

 

"Nutrition Corner" in my room is getting bigger, but I couldn't bend over to reach it this week

When I got off the bike, my back felt a bit tighter and I struggled to get my shoes and socks off. Really struggled. I couldn’t bend over and reach down that far. I had a long, hot shower. This helped. But I couldn’t properly dry my feet. Again I didn’t sleep too well as any movement would trigger pain, and I’d wake up. That was 3 nights in a row of terrible sleep.

I normally do a short fartlek run on Wednesday evening. Cycling is one thing: I seemed to have gotten away with the bike on Tuesday night. But cycling is low impact. Running is different. There’s a lot of impact that goes through the body when running. I usually do my Wednesday evening runs on grass. I decided to try. It was quite a tentative run. But, I seemed to get away with it. I seemed to be able to bend over a bit further. Then I made another trip to see Des.

This time, he got really deep into my back. It was bloody hard to take. Really clenching the teeth. He went all over my back, shoulders and neck, starting gently, warming the muscles up, then getting in deeper and deeper. Ouch. He found a couple of knots in my shoulder muscles, and tried to get rid of them. Ouch again. He seemed quite optimistic that the problem would heal quickly enough to allow me to get some more quality training done before the Ironman. But it’s not an exact science, I guess no-one can say for sure. After the treatment, I was wrecked. I really had to peel myself off that treatment table. 

Des showed me a few exercises and stretches to do in my own time, to help to stretch out my back and glutes. One exercise involved putting a tennis ball under my backside, and putting all my weight through one ass cheek, and thus through the tennis ball. I’d support myself with my arms, which would control the amount of weight going through the tennis ball. Then I’d roll the tennis ball all around my glute. Des told me to try it. “This will feel like sticking a big hot knife into your arse…” Ouch. Again, it was midnight before I got to bed. The next day, Garmin finally agreed to replace the faulty watch, which caused me to twist around to try to sort out my heart rate monitor strap, which caused the whole problem in the first place.

Also, the next day, I had a serious headache. I felt pretty rough. I texted Des – is this normal? He thought I’d be suffering today, because it had been a tough treatment session the night before. I’m not used to massage anyway, and deep massage flushes out all sorts of toxins from the muscles and into the bloodstream for processing by the liver and kidneys. So, my body was dealing with a lot, and also diverting energy to the offending area of my back to repair it. A sore head and dehydrated feeling were temporary side-effects from the massage. A reminder of what a hangover feels like – I haven’t had one of those for a long, long time…

I questioned whether or not to do anything on Thursday evening after my rough day, or whether to just go straight to bed. In the end, I did some repeats on the turbo trainer, still in an upright position. I got away with it. By Friday, the hung-over feeling had gone away and I felt better. My back felt like it was moving in the right direction too. I had a tentative swim on Friday evening, got away with it, and then had an early night.

A good Friday night, and a good Saturday morning... living the dream...

On Saturday I did 3 hours on the turbo trainer, with about half the time spent in the aero position, bent over. I followed this with a jog. On Sunday, I was feeling like I was going to get away with everything, and that my back wasn’t going to get worse. I was able to bend over almost as far as I usually can, there wasn’t much pain, and I wasn’t really having to restrict my training, apart from weights and core work. I didn’t dare to lift a weight or try a squat. Next week, I’ll try to get back to my core work, but for now I’m holding off on it, I don’t want to risk it just yet.

I got through a 4.1km swim on Sunday morning, and an easy 11 mile run at 7:10/mile, mostly on grass. My mood was lifted by some “juice”, thanks to Steve…

 

Bike fuel, awesome stuff, secret recipe, could sell for lots of money

 My mood was also lifted by final confirmation that I have passed my engineering Chartership qualification, which I have been working towards for years. I’m glad it’s over, it has been a lot of work. Also, when I travel with work to various factories and fabrication yards, I am responsible for filling out safety cards and then handing them in on my return to the office. The following safety card found its way into my pie of safety cards, written by someone who noticed that I kept refusing the cake part of the lunches we are provided… Good thing I checked the pile of safety cards before submitting them, as it was signed as if written by me...

 

SET stands for Safe, Effective, Trouble-free.
Not eating piles of cake helps triathlon training to be SET.
To the amusement of colleagues, I cracked on day 3 of a site visit,
and ate two bits of cake. I was very, very hungry...

After training on Sunday, I then went back to see Des for more physio work. We were both pleased with progress, and my back had loosened a lot. Thank goodness for that. I’ll continue to be careful and hope for the best. But I feel much more positive now than I did 7 days ago, it really was a low couple of days, in pain, not knowing how bad it was and how quickly or slowly my back would get better. I’ll hope for one final normal unrestricted week of training and then a 2-week taper. I'm still extremely wary of my back, but if I can get through one more tough week without any issues or twinges, then it'll help to build up come confidence in my back again, ad then that's time up, the Ironman is looming large. No more margin left. The Tour de France, is looming large too, it starts next week. It’s shaping up to be an exciting race, and when the Tour is all over, the Ironman will be all over too. There are no yellow jerseys in Ironman racing, but I’ll settle for a trip to Hawaii…

Training done this week:

Mon 22 June: Rest
Tue 23 June: 1:05 turbo (2 x 20mins: 301W/163bpm, 303W/171bpm, 4 min recovery)
Wed 24 June: 30 minute fartlek run
Thu 25 June: 1:05 turbo (20 x 1min hard/1 min easy, up to 400 watts)
Fri 26 June: Swim 3km (10 x 200m in 3:00-3:04, 20 second recovery)
Sat 27 June: 3 hour turbo, 25 min run
Sun 28 June: Swim 4.1km, 80 minute run

Totals: Swim 7.1km, Bike 115 miles, Run 20 miles