No, not some new dance
craze, but a catalogue of last year’s injuries, which saw me spending far more
time in waiting rooms than pounding out the miles. After a promising start – that is I actually rejoined the club
after rather a long absence, was seen on the odd (I use the word advisedly)
training run and even managed to run the Alsager 5 – things (myself included)
started to go pear-shaped in February.
February 15th I fell off my mountain bike and, with unerring
accuracy and breathtaking (literally) precision, I hit the only rock on the
track with my rib cage. A trip to
Bolton A&E revealed a broken rib for which, despite being excruciating,
they don’t give painkillers – fine apart from having to manhandle a bike into a
van and drive back to Crewe!
By April I could
breathe deeply enough to try running again and it felt good – great in fact –
until I stopped; then my left hip seized up and I was left hobbling and could
barely get up the stairs. This saw the
start of a long series of trips to the physio and an increasingly large number
of stretches incorporated into my daily routine. This continued throughout the summer with little discernable
effect, the low point of which was definitely the acupuncture. Happily, I could still ride a bike, and
riding across the Alps from Geneva to Nice in a week seemed like a good idea –
no idea why, but it did. The first week
in August saw me doing just that - I
was the only woman on the trip – I suppose that should have given me some idea
of how foolish I was about to be – but it was too late by then. A total of four hundred miles (which
included the equivalent of 10 vertical miles of climbing) and one ice cream
later I was in Nice with only a raw bottom, a missing toe nail and medal to
show for my efforts (I didn’t even loose any weight!). OK, so I could ride a bike but why couldn’t
I run?
Drastic action was
called for and in the middle of August I raided my piggy bank and went to visit
Clifton Bradley (of sub 4 minute mile fame), a podiatrist specialising in
biomechanical assessment in Stoke.
Well, it turns out I have hypermobile feet, excessive internal rotation
of the hips and a leg length discrepancy, oh yes and I mildly overpronate! This wasn’t particularly good for the ego
but I was fixable. I am now the proud
owner of a pair of orthotics and, when I am wearing them, legs of the same
length! As with all these things,
however, it wasn’t an instant fix and running for the first few times left me
with seriously disgruntled calf muscles – but, with an uncharacteristic level
of patience, I got there and I am now running up to three times a week and have
managed the heady distance of 5 miles and still been able to climb the stairs
afterwards. Who knows – next thing I
might be out on the odd training run …..