BLOG: I had to face something that in my 29 years of life and playing sport I have never had to deal with: injury.
BLOG: Lucy Chaffer is a skeleton athlete aiming to make her Olympic debut at the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia. To read her previous blog click here.
Injuries and their silver lining
I had to face something that in my 29 years of life and playing sport I have never had to deal with: injury. I’m very fortunate that it has taken me this long to have any sort of injury that has inhibited my ability to train or compete. I could always sympathise with others when I heard they were injured but could never really fully comprehend how annoying and frustrating injuries could be.
I knew I had some sort of injury throughout all of last season, but because of the nature of the sport and competition schedule it meant that I could not get it fully treated or give it the rest it needed. It was diagnosed by our physio on tour as tendonitis of both hamstring origins. In short, this meant it was very painful to run and ended up changing my running style so it did not hurt so much.
As the season finished and I came home, it gave me the opportunity to have a proper rest and get the injury under control. I booked in to see the doctor and was in having an ultrasound within week of being home. I had mostly good news coming my way and even the not-so-good news had a silver lining. On my right leg they found a healed tear in my hamstring origin (top of the leg), that I probably sustained at the beginning of the season, and a buildup of scar tissue and other stuff that meant it was becoming inflamed every time I used it. However, they did not find any problem with the sciatic nerve and how the muscles move over it, so that was an upside.
The left side was considerably better, they found no scar tissue and while there were signs that there was inflammation, there was not anything any longer. To treat the right side I had cortisone put into where the tendon attached to the bone and have lots of rest and rehabilitation activities in the gym. So what was the silver lining? Being a northern hemisphere winter sport I had time to do rehab and get my body right before I get back into the heavy training load.
For the last two months I have been in the gym pretty much every day doing a wide range of exercises to strengthen the muscles that were not working properly- mainly glutes and hamstrings. If anyone has had to do any sort of rehab you will know that it means lots of exercises that look simple but usually are very hard for the muscles that have decided to go on holiday. As frustrating as it was and still can be, I can feel myself getting stronger everyday and I know that doing this now will mean that I will better equipped when I start to step up the weights and sprinting.
As with everything we go through in life, there is always something to learn from it. This has taught me patience with my body and making sure that I work every muscle- the machine works well when every part does its job. My body is my machine and I need to make sure that every part does its job otherwise it is too easy to break down. I feel this injury came at a good time- well, not during the season- but it forced me to rest and give my body the rest it needed. I have a renewed hunger to train, and I can’t wait for the next months of hard training as I prepare to qualify for Sochi.
Until next time,
Lucy @LucyChaffer
