Injuries Suck

Being injured is probably one of the worst things that can happen to an elite athlete. I’ve come to the realization that as long as I continue to pursue triathlon I’m going to have to deal with injuries. Despite having a near perfect diet and incorporating strength training and mobility work into my daily routine I somehow managed to get a body that tends to have a high injury risk. Not only is it prone to injuries, it is prone to weird, non-textbook injuries that never have an easy solution. Instead, they require a room full of professionals bouncing ideas off of each other, trying to decipher my poor, broken body. I’m the kid all the physiotherapists talk about at lunch break. To all the people who have crap diets, never stretch, ignore strengthening their muscular imbalances and still somehow manage to never get injured - you suck.

What brings about this rant? About 6 weeks ago I went for a run and experienced some knee pain afterwards. After a couple more runs the pain progressed to occurring during the workout. Coming to terms with that fact that I was facing a legit injury, I took a couple weeks off and the pain disappeared. For the past month I’ve been doing shorter runs (30-45min) and the knee was feeling better and better. That is until my most recent run where it decided to betray me and give out. Damn you knee. Thankfully, walking, swimming, cycling, strength training (including heavy squats) and pretty much every other activity besides running result in zero pain. Looks like I’ll be doing a major bike focus (which is probably a good thing as my weakest component in triathlon is the bike - silver lining).

As this is probably close to the 100th injury I’ve experienced in my sporting career, I’ve noticed that injuries tend to involve stages.

Stage 1: Denial

This is the stage where you start to notice a bit of a nagging ache/pain but completely ignore it. Silly you couldn’t be bothered with such a slight inconvenience and being the tough athlete you are you push through it. You tell yourself you’ll do some foam rolling after training and wake up the next day feeling great and be back to normal.

Stage 2: Anger

This is the stage where you start to realize that you may actually have a legit injury - and you are not happy. The pain is getting worse and it is starting to effect your training. Athletes do not like anything effecting their training. One of the worst things for an athlete is having to modify a workout or - heaven forbid - have a yellow or red workout on training peaks.

Stage 3: Panic

This is the stage where you turn to trusty old google to solve all your problems. You type in your symptoms and frantically digest every single piece of literature on injuries that effect that anatomical area. What does wise google have to offer? You’ve probably sustained a career ending injury that requires surgery and will needs months to heal. You might as well just retire and take up knitting. Cue a major panic attack.

Stage 4: Accepting Help

This is the stage where you call in the professionals. Physio, chiro, sports doctors, coaches, anyone with any sport background. The first question you ask everyone - what do I do? The answer - rest (which is always the same regardless of the injury, and for some reason we always tend to think it is going to be a different answer and act shocked upon hearing it). Take x amount of weeks off and cross train. Rest? The horror. What kind of badass elite athlete rests? Probably the worst news you have ever heard in your life.

Stage 5: Initial Recovery

This is the stage where you start to get better. You are going to physio, doing your exercises every morning/night, potentially starting to run again. Life is good. Your moving in the right direction, slower than you would like but hey progress is progress. If your lucky this is the final stage and you will soon be able to go back to normal training and your once again a happy triathlete - spending all your free time training and loving it.

Stage 6: The Setback

This is the stage where out of the blue your recovery starts to take a slide backwards. The pain increases for what appears to be no reason and you have to once again back off from running.

Stage 7: The Spiral

This is the stage where you literally fall apart. A minor problem somehow puts you on the tracks for a major identity crisis. For example: I can’t run for at least one week. I am going to get slow nd lose all my fitness. Race season is 6 months away. I won’t be able to race this season. I might never race again. My athletic career is over and I’m never going to get a good job. I’ll never be able to afford to move out of my parents' basement. I am going to die alone, single and childless. What is the point of life.

The aftermath of this downward spiral? Searching the house for copious amounts of junk food because if you’re going to die alone you might as well be fat and happy. For people like me who don’t have any junk food lying around, it means making a literal tub of spaghetti, eating it in bed while balling my eyes out and watching A Christmas Prince on Netflix (which is actually a horrible movie - I have no idea why it is so popular).

Stage 8: Acceptance

This is the stage where you have come to terms with your injury, are focused on the recovery process and are at peace with the time it will take it heal. You do what needs to be done and realize that worrying about the recovery time is pointless. You focus on all the things you can still do. In a perfect world, stage 8 moves nicely into the final stage. Unfortunately, in real life, stage 8 tends to involve several backslides into stage 7, just without the spaghetti as I cleaned out the house. I’ll have to move onto the macaronis.

Stage 9: Full Steam Ahead

Your healed! You went to physio, you did your exercises, you returned to training slowly and all your patience has paid off! Your back in the game! You laugh at how silly past you was for freaking out so much. Your so much smarter and stronger now. This experience has really toughened you up and made you ready to face basically any obstacle in the future. Nothing can stop you now. Your invincible and never going to get injured again!

Unfortunately for elite athletes instead of these stages being linear they are more of a circle. Constantly repeating. Normal people would say that going through this emotional rollercoaster isn’t worth it, but who said triathletes are normal? We love waking up before the sun rises to get in to a freezing pool and swimming lap after lap. We count down the hours until the second and sometimes third workout of the day, giddy like a child on Christmas. We are constantly thinking about training, refreshing our training peaks throughout the day to see if more workouts have been added. We love to push our bodies to the brink of failure. We love going to bed before early (sometimes right after supper) so we will have enough energy to complete the next day’s training. Normal? Definitely not. But at least we aren’t alone in our craziness.