Was reading a great article by Deek in the August 1983 edition of Runners World where he mentions that over his career (up to 1983 anyway) he only had 10 days off training due to injury.
The fascinating bit was his explanation why he was so fortunate in this regard. Deek says there’s 2 types of fitness, physiological fitness (say aerobic condition) and muscular- skeletal strength (bones and how muscles connect to them).
Deek said he was limited in natural physiological fitness so he had to train hard and consistently to build aerobic condition, this took time which gave his muscular –skeletal system the time to develop. His physiological fitness never surpassed what his muscular-skeletal system was capable of handling, hence he rarely got injured.
Hmmm. I found the above article when Googling the following words: ‘Deek’ and ‘injury’ to see how Deek use to handle what I am now handling. Needless to say what I found didn’t cheer me up, but it did help explain why I now have a muscular-skeletal injury, albeit only a small stress reaction in the upper right femur.
Coming from a swimming background as a kid, and then a triathlon background later in life I developed good aerobic ability, and never run the miles beyond what my muscles and bones could handle, mainly because large training volumes were achieved though cross training.
Enter the last 12 months where after dusting off the old V8 engine following several sedentary years, I now discover the frame isn’t actually strong enough to handle the torque the engine can still produce. 15 hrs/ wk of swimming, biking & running aren’t rapidly interchangeable with 15hrs/ wk of running.
The other interesting thing about this period is my own emotional reaction to time off and missing a big race, followed by what others expect me to be feeling.
The bizarre thing (to others maybe) is that I’m not upset at all (though disappointed my long term health was jeopardised).
The following facts outline my self-reasoning for not being upset:
• Running is risky on your body, you run you therefore gamble
• Not all gambles pay off
• When pushing the limits the risks (and rewards) are inevitably bigger
• If you win more than you lose over your career, your still ahead
• 6 weeks is a rest period, and I have no problem with resting
• Its not my job, so I can still eat
• There’s other things in life I also enjoy doing (swimming, biking)
• I love the drama & struggle of big come back
More philosophically however, leading up to each big race I always think ‘will the body hold together to get to the start line?’ Last year I got to 3 big start lines despite many things, with 6 foot 2010 just one start line I didn’t make.
But gees I'm looking forward to my first run back on April Fool’s day (that’s not a joke either)
Enjoy the running.
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6 comments:
Thanks for the update - good positive approach to an injury. I remember watching Deek in the 1980s and his strength was the key like you say to continious running.
Plu
Wow you are reading a 1983 Runner World magazine. Maybe with all this extra time you might try heading down to a place called the Newsagent and buying your second running magazine. Or if you like feel free to drop round and borrow one if you want.
hello ST I'm in the 21st century, cant believe I'm doing this, blogging and all, you display a good positive attitude to your injury, and the cross training that you developed throughout you life will help you cope with the non running situation, a vast majority of dedicated runners do not have this up there sleeve and hence struggle with inactivity, I see it as an opportunity to crank up the swimming, search for the holy grail etc.
PS Ran my 1st Marathon in 1983 did i get a mention in the magazine?
Thanks PLU, would of loved to see Deek run in the 1980s. One day in 1991 I did see him in Penrith running up Sanctuary Drive with Rod Cedaro. Gees he had big quads.
Scam, thanks, I may drop over to pick up a magazine from your alphabetically ordered and well maintained CD and magazine collections.
WLL2, I will check my 1983 magazines again, i think I did see an article with you, but it was on the Raiders of the Holy Grail section.
PS. When will we see the launch of the new WLL2-Blog Page?
Very interesting ST.
I have bene thinking about pulling out from 6' Trcak but decided seems how I am very lsow I could still do it with having a few easy weeks.
I also did a lot of races last year weird how the injury only started this year not during the 100 milers!!
Cheers
Brick
ST, you would've enjoyed the Stromlo Running Festival for the talkfest alone - Deek, Dick Telford and Shaun Creighton, doing Q & A from the floor, covered a lot about injury and resilience from a hindsight perspective, from two Aussie greats, as well as all the info in Dick's memory bank. Would recommend it to you next year if you are in running shape.
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