They had received a referral letter from my Physio, but nothing else, so I phoned the Surgeon’s secretary. Bad news’s! The surgeon only has one day a month when he see’s patients and I wasn’t down for this month and I still wasn’t down for next month either. So, it won’t be September or October, looks like my appointment will be November!! And heavens knows when I’ll get round to surgery.
Up until now I’ve coped really well with this injury and I have kept sane with my cycling, but after getting this news I was fizzing!! I took a few minutes to calm down and work out what I was going to do next.
I decided to try and book a private appointment with the surgeon, so I phoned the secretary again, I needed a referral from my Doctor, so another call to sort that out and that’s where I’m at now.
I always think that one of the things that makes the difference between a good runner and a lesser runner isn’t how hard you train when you’re fit but how hard you train when things go wrong. The first thing I do is to find out what’s wrong, what caused it, how do I get over it and what can I do to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
I use the time out to try and keep myself fit and work on fine tuning things like core stability. I also have to find out what exercise I can get away with. In the past I’ve aqua jogged, Nordic tracked and now cycled.
Given the choice I’d be Nordic tracking (cross country skiing) because that is the closest to running, but unfortunately this aggravates my injury as does aqua jogging, the cycling works as the riding position takes the pressure off.
I also use the time to do a bit of research on my injury; I have become an expert on it. I also look at ways of improving myself as an athlete. Years ago I had a hamstring injury and had a lucky break in bumping into an old friend who now a partner in Accapi clothing, he gave me some Nexus pro tights, these emit infra red and help speed up recovery and reduce fatigue. They sorted out my injury pretty quick and over the last couple of years I can’t think of a single day when I haven’t worn some of their products, my sessions improve when I wear them and if I sleep in them post session then I’m ready to go again in the morning.
During this injury I’ve been reading a lot about barefoot running, now I don’t think I’ll be going completely 100% barefoot, but sessions in racing flats and spikes, long miles in cushioned shoes and easy runs on the grass and woods in barefoot shoes. I’m wearing barefoot shoes for work and leisure at the minute. I can’t believe the difference in my feet from wearing these shoes. My feet have a lot more flexibility and feel stronger.
I’ve also been reading about The Chimp Paradox. This is a book by Dr Steve Peters and is about how to control your inner Chimp. I know how crazy this sounds but I strongly recommend the book.
Steve Peters is a Masters sprint champion but as a job he is the resident Psychiatrist with the British cycling team and now he also looks after the Sky pro cycling team. He has been credited with transforming the athletes he’s worked with; these include Sir Chris Hoy, Bradley Wiggins and Victoria Pendleton.
In the book he has a simple way of explaining how the brain works. I’m not going to try and explain it all here, but basically the brain can be broken into seven parts but he deals with three sections in the book. He call’s these, the computer, the Chimp and the human.
The computer assesses a situation, if a basic response is needed then it processes it. If there is a threat then the monkey responds and if there is no threat then the human takes control.
So what the hell does this mean? Well The chimp part of the brain is irrational, emotional, paranoid and responds on feelings. The chimp is stronger and responds faster than the human. The Chimp is the fight or flight part of the brain and the Human rational part of our brain needs to learn how to control the Chimp and “keep it in it’s box”.
I haven’t finished the book yet, but I’m really enjoying it. I’ve read about the computer, Chimp and Human and he’s now talking about the stone of life, goblins and gremlins!! I know this sounds like some kind of crazy novel, but it is explained in a fun and easy to understand way.
I’ve had a mixed week on my bike this week, the rain put a bit of a halt to my mileage and I used my heavy winter bike for the early part of the week (not fun at all). Then as the weather improved I got back on my good bike.