Early stress reaction recovery.

Week 9 (7 August)

Monday

I hit the pool for a swim. I’ve started doing swimming workouts from Speedo to mix it up a bit. Today’s workout consisted of 200m warm up, a main set of 8 x 25m (moderate) and 2 x 100m (moderate), and 100m cool down for a total of 700m.

Tuesday

No workouts today. I completed my current physio exercises of 10 x 30 second hip hip a and lunge hip flexor stretch which I’m doing daily. Every second day I’m completing 3 x 10 resisted hip adductions with a band.

Wednesday

Wednesday I had my weekly gym session run by Brigitte. I arrived a little early so I was able to do 15 minutes on the spin bike, followed by a 30 min strength session. The strength session focussed on upper body, avoiding loading the legs at the moment.

Thursday

Not too much to report. I managed to get out for a decent walk in the afternoon (47 minutes). It was dual purpose.. walk for exercise and to grab a coffee!

Friday

Friday I got back to the pool for another Speedo swim workout. This one consisted of a 200m warm up, main set of 8 x 25m moderate, 2 x 100m steady, 4 x 25m moderate and 100m cool down. 800m total for the swim. My average swim pace was 2:22sec/100m which as a below average swimmer I’m really happy with.

Saturday

An afternoon walk with the dogs (Peaches and Millie). A little bit of excitement when Elisha spotted a snake pop it’s head out of a hole at one of the vacant blocks in the neighbourhood. I’ve never seen Brigitte disappear so quickly! Check our her HR spike!

Sunday

Sunday I’m trying to get a longer aerobic session in. I completed 70 minutes on the spin bike and later on a 50 minute walk with Elisha. So while not close to matching a long run, at least 2 hours of activity if reasonable.

Week 10 (14 August)

Monday

I had a follow up physio appointment today. The advice from the sports doctor was that I could start walk / jogging by now but from my perspective I’m still noticing the leg and didn’t feel ready to try jogging on it just yet. My physio found that my left leg hip flexor motion is poor, he completed release work on my left adductor and hip flexor.

I have some new exercises including lateral slides, heel raises and bridges. We’ll meet again next week and will get me on the treadmill to have a look and most likely start walk/jogs from then. Overall pretty positive progress.

In the evening I completed a home strength session including upper body and core strength plus my physio exercises.

• Seated triceps press 3 x 12
• Dumbbell lat row 3 x 12 per arm
• Weighted crunch 3 x 20
• Alternate shoulder press 3 x 12
• Isometric hip adduction 10 x 30 sec
• Resisted hip adduction standing with band 3 x 12
• Lateral slide with sock 3 x 12
• Heel raise single leg 3 x 12
• Single leg bridge 3 x 12

Tuesday

Nothing to report here. It’s been a busy week with work so unfortunately have a couple days where I didn’t do anything!

Wednesday

I worked in the city today and caught the train. Which has the benefit of getting more steps in including walking up a lot of stairs, most notably the parliament street station escalators! By the time I walked from the train station to gym in the afternoon my leg felt a little bit off, so perhaps all of the stairs was a bit too much at this stage. I completed a 40 minute gym session which included my physio exercises and that went well.

Thursday

Another day of no exercise. Whoops.

Friday

Yet another busy work day, but I was able to get out late afternoon to take Peaches for a walk. We walked around some newer parts of the estate with no one around for a little bit of off leash time. 47 mins for a 3.8km walk.

Saturday

Saturday we headed out to St Anne’s Winery in Myrniong for the Cross Country Ekiden Relays. The club needed to provide a few helpers, so I’m happy to help out for the afternoon while I can’t run.

Western Athletics had some great results with the Premier Men finishing 2nd, Premier Women 5th, Division 3 Men 3rd, Division 3 Women 3rd, U18 boys 3rd and U14 girls 1st.

Sunday

Sunday I jumped on the spin bike. I really don’t mind the spin bike because I can sit there and watch tv. So an hour and a half on the spin bike while flicking through youtube videos. I’m not pushing hard just keeping the legs spinning for a longer low aerobic effort.

Song of the Week

Bringing back song of the week with Beartooth’s new song “Might Love Myself”. Feels like hard rock / hardcore therapy to me with the breakdown “I’m exactly who I want to be”.

Coming up

I’m back to see the physio on Monday where we’ll check my form on the treadmill and discuss commencing some walk / jogs.

Summary