With the sound of my alarm this morning, my two-week transition period came to an end. It's back to regularly scheduled training after two weeks "off." While the last two weeks did include some rest days, I got some runs in as well.

The first week I babied my hip a bit, taking three days off after my final snowshoe race then did a strength workout meant to target the left glute, but I actually ended up aggravating the glute med and TFL more. So I took five more days off from running, while I hit the gym and rode the bike.

A trip to see my massage therapist and chiropractor ended up doing wonders for my hip. My massage therapist was able to target the some of the attachments of the hip/leg muscles. She seemed to think it was the vastus lateralis, the chiro thought it was deep TFL (tensor fasciae latae...or as my hubby calls it the "Starbucks Muscle"). Whatever it was there was some painful trigger point massage and noticeable release, and then when I got the chiro he did a lot of ART on the area and broke up some scar tissue and then there was a big "pop" when he adjusted my hip. Since then I haven't really noticed it when running.

I've also been really diligent with my stretching and strengthening routine. I think if I'd been more diligent with this routine in the weeks between snowshoe races, I probably wouldn't have had any issues in the first place. But I have a tendency to slack off and then when a tweak or discomfort presents itself, get super paranoid of getting injured and get back to it.

Stretch:

This stretching routine is a dynamic routine I've been doing after each run:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PvkrOH32MWw

Strength:

I've been doing this quick routine only on the left side. In the past I was told by PT's to do equal reps on both sides, but recently listened to podcast with the Gait Guys where they mentioned that performing the same exercises on both the weak side and the strong side perpetuates the imbalance. So I've simply been targeting the weak side. I haven't run this one by my PT yet, but it makes sense to me so I've adopted it as my norm.

Here are my left side strengthening moves:

2 x 15 reps each side

Single leg bridge lift, with band above the knee

Clamshell with band above knee

Side lying tabletops with band above knee

I've been doing this 3-4 times a week.

All of this enabled me to get in four runs at the end of this week that felt pretty good. Here's how last week shaped up:

I'm looking forward to a challenging week ahead!

-Sarah

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Training Update: scenic miles and stretch routines

Stretch:

Strength:

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