From Injury to Opportunity

By: Taldi Walter

Does your life sound something like this? Chlorine before coffee, a run during lunch, and Happy Hour spent hammering at Hains Point? You’re starting to see the rewards of long hours training, and having the best triathlon season of your life.

Topping podiums, breaking PRs, and crushing your training plan makes it easy to ignore nagging pains from conditions like patellar tendinitis, iliotibial band syndrome, or Achilles tendinitus, that may forewarn more serious injuries. Endurance sports are based at least partly on an ability to endure discomfort. You’ve heard that pain is just “weakness leaving the body,” when in reality, it might be the sign of a muscle or ligament about to tear.

Athletes know that consistent training is the way to attain the highest possible fitness, and that extended or frequent downtime will inevitably result in a loss of fitness. It’s simple: the bigger your triathlon goals, the more things in your life that must be focused on achieving your goals.

The mere thought of an injury brings the frustration of not being able to do the thing we love most at the level we’d like. But this singular focus on training and pushing through the pain can oftentimes be counterproductive. Our bodies compensate for weaknesses by putting additional stress on other parts, which can lead to stress fractures, torn ligaments, and worse.

I learned this lesson the hard way when I allowed a minor foot injury to fester, leading to months of pain, a chronic injury and serious damage. Being injured taught some important lessons about keeping mental balance —one of the hardest and the most important aspect of recovery and well-being for a competitive athlete.

The first step is to admit you’re injured so you can move on. It sounds simple, but admitting you’re injured means accepting the uncertainty of not knowing if and when you will race again. It took me four months in a walking cast to finally accept that I was injured; however the shift in mental energy from resistance to acceptance freed me to explore other aspects of myself.

My time away from training allowed me to realize that my love of triathlon is more than just an addiction to speed, spandex, and surpassing personal limits. It’s the community of people, the competition, and the places triathlon can take you that keep me coming back. I was also forced to find creative ways to stay in shape with a hope of one day returning to the starting line.

Your heart and cardiovascular system don’t care exactly what you do to get them in shape. So find any exercise that causes an adaptive response in these systems, whether in the gym or on the roads, and it will prepare you to some to come back strong.

·         I Love to Swim.  Like most Triathletes, I didn’t believe “love” and “swim” could or should be in the same sentence. However my downtime forced — I mean, facilitated — a greater focus on my least favorite split, the swim. In order to get myself to the pool, I signed up for a challenge, swimming between the islands of the Adriatic Sea with a group of friends on a Swimtrek vacation. I had such a great time that I came home and joined a Masters Team. Masters swimming continues to feed my competitive nature; motivates me to get to the pool, and has resulted in better form and performance.

·         Bike Commute to Work. It’s not hammering at Haines Point, but you can do a lot of short all-out efforts between lights. Take advantage Washington’s bike lanes, embrace the hills in the city, and work on your bike-handling skills as you bounce off buses and avoid car doors. Depending on the length of your commute, you can rack up some pretty good mileage in a week. Check out WABA for commuter safety tips and always wear your helmet!

·         Get your Zen on. Yoga at a studio like Stroga is a great way to increase core strength, flexibility, and body balance. Core work strengthens the powerful muscles of the midsection, which help stabilize the body during all movement – think aeroposition on the bike. Meanwhile, weakness and lack of flexibility in your hips can compromise your running mechanics, putting stress on your IT band and knees, thereby leading to pain and injury. Poses like Pigeon can increase hip flexibility, and balance exercises like Tree pose challenge your proprioreceptors, the muscle-nerve connections that create an awareness of our bodies in space. It sounds odd, but close your eyes and stand on one-leg for 10 seconds. That little wiggle you’re working with highlights the importance of proprioreceptors, because they make tiny adjustments to help you from falling on your face when your body is in motion. 

·         Embrace a Lower Heart Rate. Anaerobic exercises support your multisport training and make you a healthier, more well-rounded, and less injury-prone athlete. Not being able to run means having more time to focus on the things that make you a better runner. Functional exercises strengthen the muscles that are directly involved in running, often in the same way they are used. A good resource for functional exercise is Smart Marathon Training, by Jeff Horowitz. Horowitz’s approach focuses on three runs a week and building full-body strength in a sensible approach to training in less time and with fewer injuries.

·         Give Back. Your local triathlon community keeps you going; use your downtime to help keep the community going. Volunteering for local races like Nations Triathlon is a great way to feed your desire to swim-bike-run. You can step up your game and volunteer as a coach for the next generation of multisport athletes through ACHIEVE Kids Tri.

As you start to ramp up your training this spring, resist the urge to be an overachiever. Overcome your ego, and to listen to your body. Many athletes are so used to existing on the edge of overtraining that it seems a natural state. But when you feel a twinge of pain, and not the good kind, take a day off even if it hurts to miss a workout. It will hurt worse if you miss a whole season. The idea of placing limits on training is a scary thought for most of us, but a more balanced training routine has gotten me where I want to be – off the sideline and in the race.