Monday, November 24, 2008

Bony Oedema!

1 is an MR image of my leg, the other the 128km BOM radar for brissie from 2am thursday.
i will let you guess which is which.




so for people who havent seen an MRI piccie before its the side-on view of my left leg.
the lightish grey bits are my muscles: up the top - quads in the front and hammies the back.
the femur is the darker grey (almost black) looking thing below and in the middle of these with my tibia below.
the tibia should be the same color as the femur ie. almost black.
the white stuff is the fluid/bony oedema and shouldnt be there.

so the physio says i need 6 weeks completely off.
well actually its 4 weeks and 2 days now :)
allowed to swim and kayak.
no bike - maybe start that when i have 1 week to go.
then build up 'slowly' over 4-6 weeks.
at least it doesnt hurt to walk now.

wednesday: nothing
thursday: massage, pilates and physio. 1200m swim
friday: nothing
saturday: nothing
sunday: 1500m swim
monday: 1hr kayak in my own kayak.

yep i finally bought myself a kayak.
photos to come :)

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

multi-sport man

i like spud.
when i am running he makes up names for me like mountain man and quad man.
and when i am injured he makes up new ones.

shouldn't have jinxed myself poopooing the MRI scan report from a few weeks back.
my upper tibia/shinbone is now sore.
really sore.
its a bit of a worry because i basically had 2-3 weeks off post husky incident and after a few runs back its much more painful that it was ever before.
i presume this is the bony oedema or maybe a little crack but i dont want to think about that.
i will need some time off running somewhere between 4-8 weeks and will get some advice this week regarding a graduated return.
may need to go back and see the ortho dude.
so kepler is out and even though i only entered gobong this week that'll be out too.

basically i have cleared the calendar again with the next foreseeable run at alpine 100 miler next march: what a way to get back into it!!
karma?!?
the positive thing is that i feel really fit and healthy and the few runs i did do were suprisingly quick and effortless.
the 2:15 mr g's torture test was a real eye-opener and its a good sign for when i do get back into it fully.
TOH says i have never looked so buff which in a non kinky way is kind of frustrating.
was looking forward to tearing bogong apart this year.
and i can say that now as i will have a whole 14 months before bogong 2010 for people to forget this comment.

in the meantime i have switched to swimming and kayak.
hence the name change above.
its probably a good thing heading to the pool as i will be able to do some water running in future weeks.
TOH is also enjoying going to chandler with me.
of course when i do something i dont take it easy so my first swim was 800m then 1km the next day plus a paddle.
makes me think about grant hacketts comment (admittedly a few years ago before the 10km swim was an olympic event) about the 1500m being the 'marathon of swimming'.
so when some gump can just jump in and do a km on their second swim (admittedly a tad slower) this makes a mockery of this.
would like to see hacky have a couple of training runs then hit a road 30kmer.
kayaked maybe 8-9km yesterday.
better be careful as i have 2 rogered shoulders from previous 'incidents'.
have calmed down a bit now ;)

today i challenged whippet man to a kayak race and reved things up by calling him mr skinny arms.
considering he lives in geelong i have some time to train before kicking his arse.
bring it on!

monday: coot-tha trail loop 58.00 plus massage
tuesday: pilates
wesdnesday: 14km flat 68.00 painful++
thursday: off
friday: off
saturday: swim 800m
sunday: swim 1km and kayak
monday: nothing
tuesday: kayak 8-9km

multisport-man overNout

Thursday, November 13, 2008

VOG?


haleakala 10,000ft maui, hawaii. does the landscape remind you of anything whippet man??


running trail on hawaii. how scenic!! the tiny bit of green on the left is the $400/round golf course.



volcano rock graffiti

got back on the weekend from 10 days in lovely hawaii.
7 days on maui then 3 on hawaii ('the big island').
(all ATO people please note) official visiting reason was 'work conference'.
glad a friend of mine got me into this wilderness medicine thing: conferences in colorado (week after hardrock), hawaii/mexico (dive) and utah for those who like skiing (not me).

highlights...
* watched sunrise at haleakala (10,000ft) on maui. though at 7 degC i knew i shouldve brought more than 1 jumper with me to hawaii. this dampened the romanticism of it a tad.
* arriving at the big island in 'VOG': volcanic smog. driving to the hotel from the airport i got the impression that the whole island was a series of roads on volcanic rock. didnt see a single shrub or tree until the next day when we drove around the whole 'big island' and there is plenty of greenery elsewhere.
* the place we stayed at in TBI. absolutely fantastic. the 'hayman island' of the US. unbelievably had a pool with eagle rays (sounds like ray james) and heaps and heaps of fish in it. never snorkled at a hotel before! and turtles swam just outside the front. glad we paid for this place months ago before the dollar hit 65 US cents tho!!
* hearing the medical guy from hawaii ironman speak. he asked how many in the audience were endurance athletes - 20% put there hands up. then asked how many have done an ironman (of course he had!) - noone. then asked how many wanted to - noone. then rather cheekily started calling us pussies. i was thiiiiiiiiiiis close to putting my hand up and quoting my friend tim 'triathlon is for people who cant run the distance' but thought better of it ;)
* incidentally i was thinking what a great place the big island would be for an ultra or big AR and then found out about this: http://ultramanlive.com/
hawaii is just too nice a place to not go 'off road' on. ironman? what where they thinking?? :)
* was interesting to be there during the election. never knew that they held all elections on the one day: 1st tuesday on november. this includes state and local/council.
* also have 'referendum' type questions in most states: gay marriage, gay adoption and abortion were a few things up for voting. anna bligh should take note if this with repect to daylight savings in queensland. ...but then again maybe its too controversial ;)
* although we didnt see any 'obvious sign' of a recession hotel occupancy rates were apparently down 15-20% as are local sales (from last year). US unemployment is 6.5% as it tipped to top 10%. general motors is going broke. when the US stop buying fricking huge cars you know the economy is in trouble. strap yourselves in people if you havent already.
* it still amazes me how insular americans are: they were gobsmaked when they found out australia has been metric since 'before i was born'. they playfully suggested that only the US and liberia werent metric. my response: i think liberia went metric last year. youre the only ones. wasnt in a playful mood ;) the world news in the paper has the first 2 stories on something happening in the US and the 3rd in mexico.
and yes, africa is a continent (sorry - sarah palin joke, couldnt help it).

and why do i find lying on a beach for 10 days so damn tiring? :D