The fall I took on Saturday at the end of The Five Peaks race was pretty bad. I wasn't going particularly fast, but a ski is a long lever and when your binding doesn't release, it's a great way to f up a knee.
My knee was sore Saturday evening, but I was able to walk around and I applied some ice and ibuprofen to the situation. (And some beer and hottubbing of course.) Sunday morning, my knee was a little puffy and walking was considerably more difficult. I started to fear the worst and I was annoyed at myself for taking a dumb fall on an easy section of mountain. I took some more vitamin-I, did some more icing, and by the evening it was feeling better.
This morning, it was still feeling fairly decent but I wanted to get it checked out anyway. Mostly, I was afraid that there was some damage, and I'd be able to hurt it even more if I wasn't careful. I figured I'd have to wait until later in the week to get an appointment, but they had an opening at 10:50 that I took.
They took some X-rays, and the doctor did a fair amount of tugging and twisting on my knee. I kept waiting for him to find the right combination of moves that would suddenly bring the pain. Thankfully, that never happened. All of my ligaments are intact and strong. I probably strained something, but it should heal up over the next couple weeks.
I breathed a huge sigh of relief when the doc gave me that news. As much pain and twisting as I felt when I crashed, I don't really understand how I didn't destroy something. I'm extremely thankful (and lucky).
(In minor "injury" news: My lips got sunburned. That's kind of annoying.)
Showing posts with label medical. Show all posts
Showing posts with label medical. Show all posts
Monday, April 12, 2010
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
The Sickness - Part II
Saturday morning, I was finally starting to feel reasonably well. I would have loved to have raced in the Prospect crit, but there was no way my body was up to it. Total bummer. I've never been more disappointed to miss a crit (which is to say I've come a long way since my zero crit '07 season).
We drove down to the race anyway, since Christine's friend Julie lives there. It was hard to watch a race I'd rather be racing, but fun to be out nonetheless. We hung out for most of the afternoon and went home when Christine's hip was really starting to ache.
From there, the sickness went quickly downhill. I'll spare the gory details, but it became clear that I was going to need a trip to the doctor. By the time we went to bed I was feeling like I could hold off until morning and go to an urgent care facility instead of the emergency room, but around midnight I decided I needed to go sooner than that. I'm pretty tolerant of pain, but I finally got pushed over the edge.
We went over to the emergency room at the local hospital and sat in their waiting room for a while. It was freezing in there, and nothing about the place was meant for comfort. It's 1AM and there's no place in there to lay down. You couldn't even slouch on the seats to get comfortable because there was an uncomfortable bar underneath the seat. After having spent so much time at Steadman Hawkins in Vail where it was all they could do to make your stay easier, the Poudre Valley hospital was pretty rough.
Eventually they put us in a room. Long story short, the doc poked me in places and with things that I wished she wouldn't have and then prescribed me some antibiotics for a urinary tract infection. By the time we got out of there it was 6AM and the sun was out. What a night. I'm still waiting for results on some tests. Hopefully they don't need to do anything else. I'm already starting to feel better, so that's good. I'm going to finally get on my bike today for the first time in a week.
We drove down to the race anyway, since Christine's friend Julie lives there. It was hard to watch a race I'd rather be racing, but fun to be out nonetheless. We hung out for most of the afternoon and went home when Christine's hip was really starting to ache.
From there, the sickness went quickly downhill. I'll spare the gory details, but it became clear that I was going to need a trip to the doctor. By the time we went to bed I was feeling like I could hold off until morning and go to an urgent care facility instead of the emergency room, but around midnight I decided I needed to go sooner than that. I'm pretty tolerant of pain, but I finally got pushed over the edge.
We went over to the emergency room at the local hospital and sat in their waiting room for a while. It was freezing in there, and nothing about the place was meant for comfort. It's 1AM and there's no place in there to lay down. You couldn't even slouch on the seats to get comfortable because there was an uncomfortable bar underneath the seat. After having spent so much time at Steadman Hawkins in Vail where it was all they could do to make your stay easier, the Poudre Valley hospital was pretty rough.
Eventually they put us in a room. Long story short, the doc poked me in places and with things that I wished she wouldn't have and then prescribed me some antibiotics for a urinary tract infection. By the time we got out of there it was 6AM and the sun was out. What a night. I'm still waiting for results on some tests. Hopefully they don't need to do anything else. I'm already starting to feel better, so that's good. I'm going to finally get on my bike today for the first time in a week.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Bike report and bike fit
Verdict on the new bike - Love it. Prior to getting the new bike, I did some back-to-back test rides against the Felt. At the time, I wasn't sure if the bikes really felt different or if I was suffering from some placebo effect. After last Saturday's long ride, I am 100% happy that I got the Tarmac. It feels like it fits me so much better. I love it and it looks great.
I got in for a bike fit with Andy Pruitt on Monday with my new bike. I've seen him before and it really helped so I decided to go in for another evaluation to take care of some knee pain that I have been experiencing over the winter. He made some good changes. A fair amount of work went into my shoes (which sucks because my new shoes haven't arrived, so I'll probably need to go back and have them make the same adjustments on my new shoes). He also wants me to switch pedals. Again, that sucks since I just got these pedals. Other noticeable changes were my saddle height and reach (distance to the handlebars). I doubt it's helping me produce more power, but it should help prevent me from getting an overuse injury.
I got in for a bike fit with Andy Pruitt on Monday with my new bike. I've seen him before and it really helped so I decided to go in for another evaluation to take care of some knee pain that I have been experiencing over the winter. He made some good changes. A fair amount of work went into my shoes (which sucks because my new shoes haven't arrived, so I'll probably need to go back and have them make the same adjustments on my new shoes). He also wants me to switch pedals. Again, that sucks since I just got these pedals. Other noticeable changes were my saddle height and reach (distance to the handlebars). I doubt it's helping me produce more power, but it should help prevent me from getting an overuse injury.
Friday, November 10, 2006
The Bike Fit
Cyclists in Colorado are fortunate for a lot of reasons: great roads, great cycling community, great competition, great weather (70+ in November!?), etc... We're also fortunate to live close to arguably the best bike fitting facility in the world, the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine, including one of the foremost experts (if not THE foremost expert) in the field, Andy Pruitt.
I've been meaning to get a bike fit for a while, but I just recently moved it up to the top of my priority list. I'm not suffering from anything really painful on the bike, but I've noticed some abnormalities that I'm afraid could turn into long term pains (like a clicking that occurs some times in my right knee, for example). My hope with the bike fit was to make the effort to prevent overuse injuries so I don't have to nurse wounds later.
Andy Pruitt is understandably high in demand, and when I originally called last week to schedule my appointment, the first available appointment was in January. Since you're reading this, you probably figured out that I didn't have to wait until January. A couple days after I made my appointment, I got a call about an opening due to a cancellation. (Note to self: It's a good idea to be very nice with the scheduling person, so that they'll call you when there's a cancellation :) )
The first thing Andy did when he came into the exam room was have me stand there while he looked me up and down and said things like “hmmm”, “uh-huh”, and “okay”. It’s a little odd to stand around in spandex and have someone checking you out, but it’s comforting to know that he’s looked at thousands of cyclists in the same way and he knows what the heck he’s looking for.
Apparently I have a really wide forefoot and a really narrow heel. No wonder it’s so damn hard to find shoes. If my shoes fit the heel, then they’re too tight for the forefoot. If they fit the forefoot, my heels slip. I also learned about the way my foot naturally lands and how that effects my cycling shoes.
After Andy was done poking at me, he sent me to get x-rays of my knees. The results showed that my knee caps are rotated slightly out. It doesn’t sound like it’s a big deal, but it helped him decide what changes he wanted to make to my shoes.
From there, it was on to the motion capture studio where we hooked up with biomechanist Todd Carver. This is where it gets pretty cool. They set my bike up on a stationary trainer and had me ride for a little while to warm up. Then they started cranking up the resistance until I was at about 70% of my maximum perceived effort level. The goal is to put your bones and muscles under normal stress levels because they move differently than if I was soft pedaling.
After I was fully warmed up, they stuck a bunch of little globes to me. Above my head and all around my bike were 6 infrared cameras that could “see” these little globes. They had me ride some more and they took both a video and a motion capture of my movements. Then they have some fun software that puts it all together and you get to see a stick figure representation of yourself pedaling. It’s really pretty cool. The software calculates your angles at various points of you pedal stroke, and they can make adjustments based on those numbers. There was also an overhead view that allowed them to see where my knees moved in relation to my feet. They could see that my right knee was moving a little more towards the inside than my left, which matches up with what Andy expected based on what he saw with my feet.
They made some adjustments to my saddle height, saddle setback, and then added some shims to my shoes to help keep my knees in the correct alignment. After a few increments of this, they put me back on the trainer and did another motion capture so they could compare the “before” and “after” numbers. Things were looking better with the changes. Over time, my body will adjust to the changes more and I should be in good shape by next race season.
What a great experience. I’ve asked my “normal” doctor in the past about things like my knee clicking, and they said not to worry about it if it didn’t hurt. I guess that’s why I avoid going to the doctor. Just because it doesn’t hurt, doesn’t mean it’s normal or healthy. I feel like the changes Andy and Todd made to my bike are going to not only help me perform better, but also keep me from getting injured. It’s not every day you get the same type of treatment as pro riders.
(They're supposed to send me a packet of data from my visit. If it looks interesting, I'll post it up here.)
I've been meaning to get a bike fit for a while, but I just recently moved it up to the top of my priority list. I'm not suffering from anything really painful on the bike, but I've noticed some abnormalities that I'm afraid could turn into long term pains (like a clicking that occurs some times in my right knee, for example). My hope with the bike fit was to make the effort to prevent overuse injuries so I don't have to nurse wounds later.
Andy Pruitt is understandably high in demand, and when I originally called last week to schedule my appointment, the first available appointment was in January. Since you're reading this, you probably figured out that I didn't have to wait until January. A couple days after I made my appointment, I got a call about an opening due to a cancellation. (Note to self: It's a good idea to be very nice with the scheduling person, so that they'll call you when there's a cancellation :) )
The first thing Andy did when he came into the exam room was have me stand there while he looked me up and down and said things like “hmmm”, “uh-huh”, and “okay”. It’s a little odd to stand around in spandex and have someone checking you out, but it’s comforting to know that he’s looked at thousands of cyclists in the same way and he knows what the heck he’s looking for.
Apparently I have a really wide forefoot and a really narrow heel. No wonder it’s so damn hard to find shoes. If my shoes fit the heel, then they’re too tight for the forefoot. If they fit the forefoot, my heels slip. I also learned about the way my foot naturally lands and how that effects my cycling shoes.
After Andy was done poking at me, he sent me to get x-rays of my knees. The results showed that my knee caps are rotated slightly out. It doesn’t sound like it’s a big deal, but it helped him decide what changes he wanted to make to my shoes.
From there, it was on to the motion capture studio where we hooked up with biomechanist Todd Carver. This is where it gets pretty cool. They set my bike up on a stationary trainer and had me ride for a little while to warm up. Then they started cranking up the resistance until I was at about 70% of my maximum perceived effort level. The goal is to put your bones and muscles under normal stress levels because they move differently than if I was soft pedaling.
After I was fully warmed up, they stuck a bunch of little globes to me. Above my head and all around my bike were 6 infrared cameras that could “see” these little globes. They had me ride some more and they took both a video and a motion capture of my movements. Then they have some fun software that puts it all together and you get to see a stick figure representation of yourself pedaling. It’s really pretty cool. The software calculates your angles at various points of you pedal stroke, and they can make adjustments based on those numbers. There was also an overhead view that allowed them to see where my knees moved in relation to my feet. They could see that my right knee was moving a little more towards the inside than my left, which matches up with what Andy expected based on what he saw with my feet.
They made some adjustments to my saddle height, saddle setback, and then added some shims to my shoes to help keep my knees in the correct alignment. After a few increments of this, they put me back on the trainer and did another motion capture so they could compare the “before” and “after” numbers. Things were looking better with the changes. Over time, my body will adjust to the changes more and I should be in good shape by next race season.
What a great experience. I’ve asked my “normal” doctor in the past about things like my knee clicking, and they said not to worry about it if it didn’t hurt. I guess that’s why I avoid going to the doctor. Just because it doesn’t hurt, doesn’t mean it’s normal or healthy. I feel like the changes Andy and Todd made to my bike are going to not only help me perform better, but also keep me from getting injured. It’s not every day you get the same type of treatment as pro riders.
(They're supposed to send me a packet of data from my visit. If it looks interesting, I'll post it up here.)
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