Time heals (most) all (running) wounds

There was an interesting article the other day in the Wall Street Journal about how many maladies just require time to heal.  Colds, flu, back pain, etc. all just mostly require some time to let the body heal. The same is true with many common running injuries.  At some point in your running career, you’ll likely be sidelined by injury.  If you are like me it will probably be because you were looking at your shoes during a race and fell over the safety cone marking the race course.  Here are some common running injuries that mean it’s time to take a little rest.

Iliotibial Band Syndrome: A common cause of knee pain in runners is actually caused by inflammation in the iliotibial band, a ligament that runs on the outside of your leg from your hip to your shin. Women are prone to ITBS, possibly because of anatomy – our hips cause our knees to turn inward when we run which creates inflammation when the IT band rubs on your knee.  I’ve had this and it hurts but the best thing for this really is to stop running and let it heal.  Read more about ITBS here.

Stress Fracture: One reason why it’s so important to gradually increase your mileage is to avoid stress fractures.  Common in the bones of your lower leg and feet, these are repetitive stress injuries to your bones and not usually a true fracture or break.  If you have pain that you think is shin splints or a cramp but gets worse as you run, it could be something more serious like a stress fracture.  Stress fractures can be tough to diagnose and require a bone scan and simply take time to heal.

Shin splints: Pain in your shin that stays relatively constant or gets better during your run could very well be shin splints. Cutting your mileage way back, cross training, and rest are key to kicking shin splints. If you are prone to shin splints, try this exercise to help prevent them.

Overtraining Syndrome: Training for a race is hard on your body, not only are you prone to injury but your immune system is also working overtime leaving you vulnerable to illness as well. If you seem to be feeling achy and tired all the time, are getting colds and sore throats, and generally just aren’t psyched to do that run – listen to your body.  Your non-running time is just as important as your running days when you are training.  Sleep is key, this is when your body heals and rebuilds so make sure you are getting enough.  If you are feeling run-down take some time off.  You may feel guilty that you aren’t running but from experience I can tell you that a few days off is so much better for you than a few lousy days of running just to log the miles.

Runners are a motivated lot, it’s hard to not run when running is so much of who you are.  But if you are sidelined with an injury take that time to discover something new.  I had a fracture in my foot after running the Chicago Marathon one year and couldn’t run for 6 weeks.  That’s when I discovered spinning class.  I loved the workout, met some cool people in spin class, set in motion my triathlon goals, and best of all increased my cardiovascular capability and leg strength.  After I started spinning I ran my fastest 1/2 marathon.

Another good cross training activity when you can’t run is swimming. Put this one in your music mix and go out and run swim a few miles.