Having avoided regular, organized exercise for most of my adult life, my cycling venture is bringing me close to many issues I've been able to avoid. Like dealing with regularly with pain. It appears that I suffer a bio-mechanical problem....I pedal bow-legged, which strains my IT Bands, particularly on the right side. Inflamed bands make staircases and lateral motion difficult and painful. So I've researched stretches specific to bands and am careful to warm up and wind down. But the trainer has become particularly important for this reason. The lack of landscape and shifting topography allows me to use trainer time for improving pedaling form: knees in, flex the foot on the down pedal. It's made a great difference.
I spent a few thousand reward points on a heart rate monitor and am anticipating its arrival shortly, so I'm looking forward to gaining greater insight into my physiology and performance.
Friday, April 20, 2007
Bands on the Run
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3 comments:
I like your approach to the pain. Feel pain, research, find information and solution, stretch, get better. Me? I also have that pain from time to time, but my solution was to buy a new pair of shoes. They work great, but I have to laugh at the fact that I never even heard of IT Bands, never even looked for the real cause of the discomfort.
Different strokes...
I am sure that different shoes would help. A cycling friend actually suggested fairly recently that the pain I was feeling was due to bands inflamed by bad pedaling form, after he had been cycling behind me and could see my bow-leggedness. I used to get the same pain, though I never knew what it was, after long day hikes, and refelcting on those episodes I am certain the boots I was wearing just weren't for me.
IT bands connect your hip bones to the bones in your knee, I think. They run down the outside of your thighs and help to keep you erect by preventing the body from buckling sideways. Who knew?
When I have post-ride pain, it usually goes away after a day. I am told that it is not a serious problem, and there is no need for surgery or any formal treatment except for TLC.
I've been thinking about this post for a few days.
I'm sorry you're feeling pain, hopefully the stretching routine helps you. I use to be really good about post-run stretches, but I'm not anymore. One of the things that I've wanted to get back into is Yoga -- not for the froofey one with the universe stuff -- but because even mellow yoga is AMAZING for flexibility and breath control, maximization of lung capacity. I'm just having trouble finding the time and a place that's convenient to me now that I'm in the 'burbs.
Another thing that has stuck with me is that you say you've spent the large part of your life avoiding regular exercise made me chuckle. Your pain, however is different than the normal work-out-associated -pain -- yours is a medical condition. I happen to take solace in the little soreness etc. that the workout brings -- it means I'm getting stronger. It's also part of the transcendence afforded by running/exercising -- freeing us from our overly-comfortable existences. It's a big them with me, I know, broken record and all but it's a key motivator of running.
I hope your stretches help and alleviate the pain of your current condition so that you can embrace the normal soreness associated with good workouts. This is not to say that I'm sore everyday (though I am a bit today after yesterday's scorcher) but I'm usually aware that I worked out, did something stressful, yet beneficial for my body.
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