Getting stuck in a cycle of injuries is one of the most frustrating things for any athlete, but it happens to many of us. Why does it happen and how do you get out of it?
The why of it is often overtraining/lack of rest and recovery time. We love our sport and we want to do it as much as we can and we want to get better. The thing we forget is rest is part of the getting better process. It’s also essential in preventing injuries.
When an injury occurs and we don’t give ourselves enough time to recover and slowly/gently come back to our regular training routine, we increase the chances of getting another/different injury along the kinetic chain or on the opposite side of the body.
Allowing the body time to heal and regain its strength to be able to tolerate the load we are going to put on it takes time and it takes a gradual increase in training. Even when we are resting enough and are strong, our body goes through a cycle of training stimulus to fatigue/minor damage to recovery/building. If we push hard during the fatigue/minor damage phase, we risk injury. This is why we alternate intense days with easy days in our training programs. It’s why we take a rest week every fourth week.
The bottom line here, is realize your body is not a machine. It has to recover before you can build. Patience is a virtue in these matters.
One of the best things you can do to prevent injuries and stop the cycle is to add strength training to your training schedule. This will help get injured muscles back to pre-injury status and it helps improve the strength of supportive muscles.
I cannot stress enough how important strengthening your core, including your hips, is for runners. These are your stabilizing muscles. Strength in this area will prevent injuries both up and down the kinetic chain. Add a routine three days a week to work on this area and if things get easy, increase the repetitions or change your program. You don’t need a gym membership to do many of these workouts. Your own body weight is enough. My routine requires some home equipment. You can also add in a short arm routine if you’d like.
Here is my routine:
I do them in super sets and repeat each superset three times. It takes me about one hour.
Super set one:
Inner thigh lift one minute
Front plank one minute
Side planks one minute
Leg lowers with or without weight 15 times
15 burpees
Fifteen clams with a band
Single leg bridge on a swiss ball, lift and lower 15 times hold at the top for five seconds
Super set two:
Kettle bell swings 15 times
Kettle bell gobble squats 15 times
15 jump squats
15 piston squats each leg
Super set three:
15 wall ball toss with squats
15 Ball toss sit ups
15 Box jumps
15 Jane fondas
15 fire hydrants
ultrarunningmom 