To catch everyone up to speed, I began having minor knee pain about two weeks ago following a pretty hilly 10k race I ran. I recall several runs where I complained about my knee and considered dropping the workout or cutting my run short; but, confident that it was not a bone injury, I pressed on. I'm not familiar with knee injuries or knee pain, so I really had nothing to compare it to. All I knew is it hurt, but it did not affect my stride... there was no limping necessary! :) I completed the full week of training (with some pretty awesome workouts) and then knocked out a great 9M steady run the next Saturday without knee pain; only some minor hip flexor pain which had actually started the same time as my knee pain.
Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, however, got progressively worse. On Tuesday, I joined the DBU girls for some sub-pace work on the grass track. I planned to stop if at any point the pain forced me to alter my stride, but rep after rep, I finished feeling completely normal. The recovery jogs, though, were absolutely brutal! I felt significant pain during those. After my last rep, I was told to get in 7' easy for a cool down... I eeked out 5' but was limping by the end of the first lap (for some reason easy running made everything more magnified). Ever since then, I've been completely unable to run. I can do jumping jacks, partial squats, and knee lifts, just fine, but ask me to start running or walk downhill or down stairs and it gives out entirely. My left knee and hip are the two pain points keeping from running right now, but the time off has shown me how little my right ankle has healed since spraining it. The worst pain is when I first wake in the morning, but it really doesn't get much better during the day. Just lucked out that it doesn't stop me from running properly.
Needless to say, I'm a mess right now. I need my left hip, left knee, and right ankle all doctored up, but there's always one pain over-powering the rest so each doctor only treats one of them. (AKA, I can't get them all taken care of in one appointment and I don't need to miss work or pay for three separate MRI's and doctor appointments, so I'm really up a creek!)
This week I will hopefully get some good news from my knee MRI, but that's about all I can expect. Most likely there won't be any running, lower body strength, or cross training for the week, so I won't be writing the days out unless something changes.
Best wishes to those of you training right now! It's the BEST weather you'll get all year! :)
**Got in a light shuffle on Thursday morning and again with Jake in Chicago... very painful, but nice to run. Only 5 to 10 minutes each.
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