rogue leader...

I’ve had soreness on the outside of my knee before and I’ve found that it’s usually a result of calf tightness. I found that foam rolling them and endeavoring to release and relax them as much as possible (my calves) yields excellent results.

thursday
SL burgarian squat - 1:6 each 26kg, 3:1 left 52kg
back extensions - 1:10 BW, 1:6 10kg

you may be right about that. I just had a feel around and my left calf does seem as though there may be a bit of deep soreness. I have located general soreness in the quad/itb/hamstring tendon area as well, though. a bit of general massage seems to have helped, along with the ice treatment.

I’ve been feeling really weak coming out of the blocks, especially the first movement, so I’m going to try and get a bit of strength and power back into my left quad.

I was talking to a mate the other day, and he was telling me about some training videos he watched on youtube. in particular he was mentioning the way American Football players yell at each other to get fired up and achieve more in their training. today, my first attempt at lifting 52kg failed. I huffed and I puffed, but I couldn’t blow the house down (I know, I’m as weak as shit!). I then spent a few minutes breathing deeply, pumping my arms and slapping my legs to get things going a bit. my next three attempts lifted it easily.

I’ll have to remember to try to get a bit more animal caveman into my training, rather than just dorky nerd…

There are two kinds of trainers
1 - the accountant
2 - the animal

is anyone ever both? can an accountant learn to become an animal?

I think I should train while I’m watching the footy. that usually makes me pretty mad. whenever my team loses a close match I deal with it by smashing myself with weights until I can hardly move…

sunday
sled, 10kg - 4x30m
block starts - 3x30m

the sled is working for me. I felt more powerful after each rep, then the block starts felt effortless. I’m feeling a bit bunched up, though. I might have to tinker with my settings a little bit before pan pacs…

tuesday
muscle therapy - back and shoulder

wednesday
1x120, 1x80, 1x60 (flat out)

ran really well today. I always run well the day after a lot of therapy (I’m starting to really consider the role of the fascia in the big picture). the 80 felt particularly good.

had a chat with the coach. he is encouraging me to get my own coaching qualifications. I might consider it.

my right butt is still quite sore. it’s not really stopping me from running but it is stopping me from doing a lot of strength work that I would otherwise be doing. I think I will get it looked at in the holidays…

I hope you do get your own coaching qualifications. You train yourself, plus you seem to have really high interest levels in how to put a sensible training program together. You could help a LOT of young athletes!

thanks, T. I will certainly consider it.

saturday
SL bulgarian squat (left only) - 1:5 26kg, 5:1 52kg

I decided to give my right leg a break this weekend. I suspect it is the quadratus femoris muscle that is playing up. whatever it is, it’s only leg adduction that it’s used for, so it actually hasn’t really stopped me running, because once I warm up I can’t feel it anymore. however, it is stopping me from doing my strength work, so I want it to get fixed. it has gradually been receding into the background (today I could hardly feel it), so a bit of rest right now might pretty much make it gone.

I’ll be having my first race on tuesday evening. it’s been a while, so I have no idea what sort of time I am going to post. unfortunately, the race will be hand timed, so I still won’t have any idea. it’ll be good to get some competitive action again, though. I’m looking forward to it…

Sorry Rogue

Can someone explain this to me?

PS - be nice to accountants, it pays my way to coach :wink:

I think he means that the accountant style will carefully count and measure every aspect of their training, while the animal just blasts everything as hard as they can…

Cheers :slight_smile:

Would have thought that was more an Actuary :wink: but it makes sense

I find i’m an Animal when it comes to being an accountant…
eg
If i want to do say 6 x 200’s in Sub 25sec each with 2min recovery’s - That’s very accountant - but, I’ll pass out attempting it as it’s currently out of reach.
If i find it gets easy, or if somebody passes me - screw the planned 25sec… I’ll go faster :slight_smile: - Even if it means I lactate out and only finish 4 reps…

I see accountants in the Gym all the time - their plan says, 3 sets of 10… 6 months later, they still suck…

tuesday
afternoon
slow jog
2x20m accel

evening
warm up + accels
100m - 12.12h
ice/heat

reasonably happy with my first outing, although the blocks sort of rolled back when I pushed off them. it nearly made me fall over and would have cost me a fair bit of power. I went back and looked at them later andif you put pressure on the top edge of the foot pad it just lifts and flops backwards. seems like a pretty ordinary design, if you ask me. I’ll have to make sure I use a different model next time.

still getting that butt soreness. I can feel it at the start of the warm up and once I’ve cooled down, but any time in between it’s fine. I’m not too sure how concerned I should be about it. I’ve started doing hot/cold treatment on it. hopefully that will help it out a bit…

wednesday morning
back ext (left leg only) - 2:5 BW
hip thrust - 2:30 30

wednesday evening
6x20/40
10x15m reactive starts

I remember years ago reading an article written by a body builder. he said that one of the key components of his success was learning how to train whilst injured. I have found that the hip thrusts are something that I can do at the moment without aggravating (what I currently believe to be) my hammy tendonitis. in fact, the only time it’s not feeling sore is when I’m training, so why not keep training?

I had a brilliant session in the evening. ran really well. the flying 40’s were pretty much standard, but the reactive starts went really well. still going on the animal vs accountant theme, so I decided to go animal on them by getting angry and aggressive (didn’t charlie say that ben was extremely aggressive?). the difference was remarkable and extremely encouraging. I felt like I was tearing up the track like I haven’t done for years.

discussed tuesday’s race with an onlooker. the winner had a time of 22.44 and I was only a little bit behind him with a time of 12.12. on the other hand, the onlooker said his dad (who was in the race) finished well behind me and got a time of 12.2! I’m guessing that the first guy, who is apparently quite a good athlete, probably ran about 11.6-11.8 and I was more like 11.8-12.0, according to the feedback. still, the moral of the story is that you just can’t put any stock what-so-ever in handtimed results…

friday morning
accupuncture

friday evening
bulgarian squats (left only) - 5:5 26

had some accupuncture done on my right hamstring tendon. this time around she put an electric current through which nearly knocked my head off it was so painful. seems to have had a pretty good impact, though. I can barely feel any soreness there at all…

Sunday
6x100 @ 75%

I’ve been taking my 5 year old to the track with me a few times. She has been running a few lots of 100m as well as joining me in my drills. Last week I thought I’d track her progress, so I timed her for 20m. I will make an effort record her results alongside mine. Last week she did 7.1s and today was 6.9s.

I’ve got a 60 and a 200 coming up on Tuesday. I’ll be meeting up with a mate of mine who is going to the gold coast with me next month…

Monday
Hip thrusts - 2:20 40

Tuesday
60m - 7.49h
200m - 27.1h

Ran really well in the 60, but waited around for ages for the 200. I had cooled down and stiffened up a fair bit, and I didn’t get much of a chance to get ready. Still, pretty happy…

Wednesday
4x150 - 26, 22, 23, 24
Stairs, high knees - 6x32
Eccentric back extensions - 5:3

Done a bit of reading and it seems I have hamstring tendonosis. As far as I can tell, the best remedy for this is eccentric exercises. I was dubious at first, assuming it would just make it much worse, because my instinct is to protect the area. However, a few sets and I actually feel a lot better.

Suits me better than rest, ice, heat. I’m still hitting the track…

Hard to explain,
1, use a 1:25kg weight disk
2, sit on either a hard chair or on the floor against a wall
3, holding disk upright on floor, place leg ontop of said disk.
4, move leg side to side over disk, looking for tight / sore spots
5, hold position once found until pain subsides
6, repeat till hammie feels pain free
7, 30-60 sec stretch
8, do other leg.
9, can take 10-15+ min per leg
10, its easy to add leverage n increase weight on disk and get in very deep.
11, you can use 2.5 or even 5kg disk, see which works best for you.

I have not come across anything better. Even a massage doesnt get in this deep (unless they are really good, but, where are they…)
Afterwards, you can use your Cups to help things along.
Normally, if a tendon is sore, its due to excessive muscle tension over a long time. The short periods you train wont do it.

I remember when I did it. I made a sudden increase to the load in my hamstring exercises. Afterwards I could feel a sore spot right up in the origin. So high I thought it was my glutes. Since then it has been the first thing I felt every morning. However, after just one session of eccentrics, this morning I woke up and was almost entirely pain free.

It’s almost like the problem was caused by a hard concentric contraction that bunched up the fibres, but the eccentric stress has stretched them out again.

I can’t believe how well and quickly it has worked…