Crossfit Endurance vs Old School: Injury

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Injury - Sort Of

I honestly made it through two paragraphs of Mike's last blog post and fell asleep. I can relate to Cross Fit Endurance when you approach the workouts as this 20 minute challenge that you intend to crush with no real thought to its intent. Just blindly go to CrossFit Endurance, find the workout and do it. But throw in all the science behind the madness and I glaze over. I think I already repeating myself.

I am in full on crisis mode. I went to do my normal 6.5 miles this morning and my lower calf slowly started tightening and it became too painful to run after 36 minutes. I've had similar pain before and my approach is to:

Definitely run through it if I can, regardless if it is smart;
Pray the 48 hours between runs is enough to semi heal
Run exclusively on the track so a) if the pain forces me to stop I am not miles from home; b) the flat and smooth surface helps prevent any strains caused by uphills, downhills or sharp turns; c) it feels easier to monitor the pain if I know exactly how long I have gone and have to go.

I also believe in the principal of callousing your mind to pain. For example, the worst part of a cold is the first few day you are sick. You aren't accustomed to being sick and you are miserable about how much worse you feel compared to 12 hours ago. After a day or two, even before you start to recover, you feel better because your mind is used to being sick. It's the same with exercise. You need to program your mind to dealing with pain. As long as an injury isn't the kind that can permanently hobble you, you learn to deal and adapt to the pain from a small injury.

We shall see if I can hobble on my calloused brain on Thursday.

Today's Workout

http://app.strava.com/activities/38332080

2 comments:

ecdsbsfJanuary 23, 2013 at 7:51 AM
Isn't fewer injuries one of the arguments in favor of CFE? I think that was in paragraph three of Mike's post.
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Members of the Data Revolution January 23, 2013 at 7:54 AM
Of course but that would go against my head in the sand approach to the science of exercise.
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CFE v. Old School Concept

Merrill (Merrill) is a 48-year-old runner addicted to a basic weight routine (some might say an incredibly powerful and impressive routine) and 30 miles each and every week.

Michael (mywrite) is a 36-year-old Crossfit devotee of nearly four years who enjoys running, but not 30 miles each and every week.

Wise (old) vs. Youngish (stupid), follow the two as they train for a half marathon in the Spring, and a full marathon in the Fall with their chosen programs.

Michael will use Crossfit Endurance (www.crossfitendurance.com/) and Crossfit as his guides, with a mix of power and Olympic weightlifting, conditioning, sprint and mid-range running workouts.

Merrill will train as he always has, running four times per week 6-7 miles at 7:30 per mile pace with a longish run thrown in once a week at pretty much the same pace, and lifting three times a week (bench, curl, upright rows, triceps, squats and military press). And oh yeah, two sets of pushups (50), pullups (15) and situps (eight minutes) everyday. Like Rainman.