An athlete usually can remain competitive for around 6-8 months every year. They will have a build-up training for maybe 3-4 months, reach their peak for 2-3 months, then they will have an off-season where they scale down on competition or dun compete at all. For me, my off-season is usually during the fasting month. This month is usually a period where I take a break from serious training. I'll just run lightly, maybe 2-3 times a week, just to remain active. This is the period where I'll try to recover from any injury that I have & plan ahead for the next year.
After setting my personal best during the Setia Alam about 3 weeks ago, I was on such a high spirit & I felt so strong that I'd skipped my usual one-week post-race recovery period. I continued training at high intensity becoz I felt strong. Then I had to take a 5-day break from training to go back to Tganu for my sister-in-law's wedding. So during that period, I didn't train at all. When I came back, thinking that it was okay, I did an 11km run at mid-tempo intensity, using the Taman Wawasan lap, which is quite tough. The result was an injury to my right calf. Now it's very likely that I'm gonna miss both PSP & PSKK.
I thought it was just a cramp. At KM 9, after coming down the hill for my 3rd lap, I began to feel pain in my right calf. So I stopped & stretched, & I continued running. But then I felt that the pain didn't go away. So I stopped running at KM10.5 & finished the lap walking. When I got back to my room I stretched as usual. I applied ice pack immediately when I got home.
The next day I went to UPM to train on the track. That was when I realized the injury was serious. I could only run for about 50m, then the pain came back. This time even with my calf sleeves on. & even using that couldn't prevent the pain. So I stopped running & went home. I only did weights during the weekend & continued the RICE treatment. Last Monday I tried running on the treadmill. It was as if the pain never even been treated. It was still painful. Now THAT is serious. I fear the worse, maybe muscle tear. If that is so there is no way I can run the 10,000m. Dun even think of running 1,500m, which is much, much faster than the 10K. I can only do the javelin, even that require some running. That is a bummer indeed, becoz I heard the 10K winner last year won't be competing this year, & this could be my best chance of winning an event. Bummer...
This should be a lesson to me. A painful lesson indeed. The best I can do now is to prevent this from happening again. & not to overreact that might cause it to become even worse & takes longer to recover. I've got the Seremban Half on 11/7 on my schedule, I dunno if I can make that one. I haven't registered for that yet. On the 31/7 there's the Men's Health run, maybe I can still do that. That would be my last race before I take a break during fasting month.
Haih. From an all-time high to an all-time low, in a blink of an eye. & all due to my own stupidity.
Livestrong.
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