Monday, March 24, 2008

Well, I finally went to the doctor today. He took some X-rays and looked at my knee but really didn't know what was wrong with it. It's been feeling better the past couple days anyway, so I'm hoping the rest is all it needed. The doc said it could be caused by a lack of strength or Flexibility in my quad which causes the quad to pull something in the knee. So I am going to do some stretching and Strength training for my quads. I went to the gym to day and started off with some Leg presses and Leg extensions. I did 3 sets of 20 of both exercises with light weight. I didn't feel pain in my knee but it did feel a little weaker than the other knee. Then I set the tread mill on 20 min/mile and walked a mile, 3/10 at a 10% grade and 7/10 at a 15% grade, that felt pretty good, with only slight twinges of discomfort in my knee every so often. After that I ran one mile slowly (10 minutes) I didn't feel any discomfort in my knee at all.

I'm going to go back tomorrow and try to run two miles. If that goes OK I will run 3 miles Wednesday, 5 miles thrusday, ect. If I don't feel anymore pain in my knee I'll probably do a max of a 10 mile run before McNaughton. It's only 2.5 weeks away, so any running I do now won't help my race anyway, it will just give me confidence that my knee won't fall apart. I think I am going to try and walk the 150, with small amount of running. I do have 54 hours.

6 comments:

Kim said...

When you do leg presses, are you doing one legged presses? When I do these, I do one leg at a time (as Scott Jurek recommended) because one leg or the other will be weaker.

Just rest up. You'll be fine for McNaughton.

tony said...

Good to hear and know nothing is seriously wrong. You are being so smart to ramp it up a little at a time...baby steps, Josh. Of course,
"one small step for Josh, one GIANT LEAP for mankind!" Since that quote is way older than Josh, someone will have to tell him:-)

Anonymous said...

I agree with mostly walking MPTR - but my walking experience tells me you will have to mix in running bursts to keep things loose. When OPod and i walked for 24 hours, my hips, legs, joints were miserable and it felt better toward the end to run some.

Just primarily walk, and run a little every hour to stay loose. I had figured that you only need to do like 3 miles per hour to finish the 100, so it must be even slight slower to do the 150.

It is going to make filming you easier!

Unknown said...

I had that problem when I ran High School Track. If I remember correct it didn't take much to straighten things out.
Once I was balanced in my quads, I had no more knee problems.

Still today, I am lucky to just have knee pain when I have put in too much road running or downhill trail running.

Josh said...

Kim,

I read that article where Jurek talked about one legged lifts. I was thinking about do it that way but I was using the lowest weight I could use on the machines and I didn't want to try it with just my bad knee.

Tony,

Funny, Tony :) I may be a youngin, but I did pass the second grade.

Mike,

Yeah, I know walking will pose it's own set of issues to overcome. I'm really going to have to take care of my feet. Let me know if you have any other walking tips. With editing tricks, you can make it look like I ran the whole way, right?

Nick,

Glad to hear your problem wasn't hard to clear up, hopefully mine is the same.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, I will speed you up like my Cabo video a few weeks back. You will be sprinting the whole way when I am done.

I think foot care will be pretty much the number one issue outside of fatigue...I walked only 6.25 miles yesterday on a flat track, and was getting a hot spot. Gotta get the bodyglide or lube of choice just right. With the wool socks of course! You know your feet. I just wouldn't count on any foot toughness getting you through...