The Year So Far

Hey guys,

This is a somewhat sad post. But, it's been on my mind for the longest time, as we lead up to getting my screws removed later on today, actually.

In 2012, I had a successful season. I raced with the FFT triathlon team, and had good results with them. I ran around 12 triathlons that year, racing a lot, and training a lot. I was largely injury free, with a few flare ups in my knee and a sprained ankle, a few bruises and scrapes, but you know, nothing serious. I had a good season, with plenty of top 10 overall finishes and 1 overall win, my first ever. I was rounding out podiums, making friends, and living the dream triathlon lifestyle.  After the 2012 season, I was looking forward to an even better season in 2013, and that just has not been the case. I switched over from FFT to another coach, one who specializes in draft-legal triathlons, the kind they have in the Olympics. Then, hell started to break loose.

Early 2013

So, in January of 2013, I was having a pretty well rounded out life, full of training, something I was and still am completely devoted to, but I was also dating a girl who went to my school, something I had never considered doing, due to my long hours training. It was all going well, I went out and was getting good base mileage in on the bike, and getting back into running and swimming, slowly. The cold and rain that accompanied made those early days very demanding, mentally and physically, to get up out of my warm bed and ride a few hours, but it was always worth it. Around January 10th, I was biking around downtown Raleigh after a hard bike practice of hill repeats mixed in with a long ride. I was on a greenway, headed towards a bike shop to hang out at for the day. I have no idea which greenway I was on, but it was close to Centennial Parkway, right across from the Farmer's Market. So, I was just biking along, and it was one of those cold, icy mornings. I was dressed in my favorite cycling clothes, a Livestrong kit. Livestrong pants and a short sleeved Livestrong jersey, back from the RadioShack team days, a true original. Along with gloves, arm warmers, and a headband, and I was pretty well protected from the cold. I biked along, just enjoying a beautiful morning, and came up on a bridge crossing a creek on the greenway. Not thinking, I maintained speed and rode across the bridge, which made a slight left turn across the creek. The bridge was built out of black wooden planks, which had apparently iced over that night due to the creek water from under the bridge and the frigid conditions of the year. So, I went down. I was going around 23-24mph, cruising across, and as I made the turn to follow the bridge, my front wheel went out from under me so fast that I had no way of even bracing for impact, let along stop the crash from happening. My hip hit the bridge first, followed by my shoulder, then head. All hit hard. REALLY hard. As my head swam from the pain, I looked at my beloved Trek 1200, and saw that it was wedged in the fence that stopped people/bikes from falling into the creek. Concerned more for my bike than myself, I jumped up and eased the Trek out from under the fence, hoping it was OK. It definitely was, not even a scratch. Then, I looked myself over, and could tell my hip was hurt, pretty bad. I thought, "That's going to be a massive bruise." Then, I saw that my Livestrong jersey had been stained the color of the wooden planks I had fallen on! This made me very sad, and I didn't even notice the fact that my shoulder was bleeding pretty well. I suppose the cold made it numb, so I didn't feel much. My head seemed fine though. Wear helmets, guys. Forreal. Anyway, I tried to continue riding, but I couldn't go more than a few feet without my hip screaming in agony. My balance felt off, and it was difficult to stay up. So, I made my way back to the Farmer's Market, where I called my mom and waited for a pick up. She got there, we loaded my bike, and I went home. I didn't think that particular crash would lead to months of recovery and depression, and ultimately lead to the destruction of many relationships and faiths. Anyway, after a few days, my hip still hurt. I was right, there was a HUGE bruise, but that made sense, I told myself. We went to a "doctor" and got my hip checked out. The took an X-ray of my hip, and said I was fine, good to ride, and that nothing was wrong. I don't remember the doctor, but he destroyed the majority of respect I had for doctors. The following weekend, I went out to ride again, and we were just doing cornering skills around a parking lot. I was still feeling off-balance, and on one corner, I overcorrected or did something like that, and crashed once more. This was not anywhere near as bad as the first crash, but it shook me up mentally and told me to take some time off. So, I started resting. A few days here, a few days there, and it seemed to be doing the trick. We were back at school, and it was swim season, so I was doing my best to enjoy that, with my girlfriend, who was on the swim team as well. She took up most of my rest time, but a friend invited me to come and play some flag football with him and his church group one weekday afternoon. I thought, "Hey, I can't usually do that during training, what the heck, sure." So, we went out and I tried my hand at hand-eye coordination games. I was decent, and was good at grabbing flags. It was FLAG football, no one can get hurt, right? Wrong. On the very last play, an adult around age 25 tackled me into the end zone in a scramble for the ball on a fumble, landing full-force on top of me. My ankle twisted under me, and collapsed into the ground. I immediately went into experienced injured athlete mode-I told everyone what to do and when to do it, as fast as possible, even though I was the one hurt. I got a few adults to help me walk to the church, get my foot elevated, and wrapped it in ice. It was another setback, but hey, it would stop me from overtraining when I'm not healthy. But, even when I found out I tore every ligament in my right ankle, I got a boot for it and went to swim practice everyday anyway. It was difficult to swim with a dead ankle, but I managed. At this point, I was about one month past the original crash. Even though I was riding a little bit, my hip flexors started to give me an explicit, excruciating pain with every single step. The best way I can describe it is your main muscle that attaches your leg to your body is trying to burn itself out of your pelvis and just die. It was difficult to walk for many weeks, making school that much harder. So, as I made my way through that, my hip adductors started to react negatively as well. They started to cramp and spasm during class and at home, and gave me the feeling of lead weights running down the inside of my leg. Also, I forgot to mention this, but after the doctors appointment, I had started seeing other doctor's for additional opinions, and I was doing physical therapy almost every day after school. I was "strengthening" my hip flexors, but they were so weak that they could not support me lifting my leg. However, according to the PT, I was showing huge improvement, although I could tell no improvement was being made. That being said, the PT had me get on the treadmill. Immediately after getting on that treadmill, I felt a twinge in my Achilles Tendon. It didn't feel great, so I stopped and left. The next day, my Achilles didn't feel any better, so I went to see another doctor. I was diagnosed with Achilles tendinitis, which put me down for 2 weeks. I didn't like to hear that, but I was going to wait if that meant I would heal. But, after 2 weeks, I had the same/even worse pain in my Achilles. I went back to the doctor, and the same thing was said: 2 weeks, you'll be fine. Guys, doctors say 2 weeks to almost everything. I don't trust that anymore. But, I waited, and again, no results. So, I decided that I would stray from traditional, modern doctors, and go see a chiropractor, who was into holistic methods. As I arrived, he looked at me for one minute, then ordered a vertical pelvic X-ray. What did this X-ray show? A pelvic tilt of 15 degrees, overloading one hip muscle group and overstretching the other. He figured out the past 3 months of hell for me in 5 minutes, while 6 different doctors could not figure it out in the span of 3 months. Which is why I don't like doctors now. But, at least I had an actual source of my pain. Now came the painful rehabilitation of resetting my pelvis, which involved a machine similar to a torture rack in the medieval times. A harness was attached to me, and a powerful machine tugged at the harness, pulling my pelvis back to a neutral position. Very painful, no fun at all. Also, I had laser therapy as well as cupping therapy, and constant readjustments from the chiropractor himself. That all came with additional pain, and did not feel great.

April to Present

This was just as strenuous of a time for me. Although my hips were fixed, there was a ridiculous amount of scar tissue built up from 3 months of living with a tilted pelvis. So, there was definitely still pain, and new pains were surfacing. I got back into the pool for rehab/training, and as I swam, my left shoulder cracked. With each stroke after that, it would crack, and bring a new wave of pain. This quickly forced me out of the pool and back into the PT office. I was diagnosed as having a scapula weakness, and started rehab. This went somewhat better, and although I still have that same problem today, it is much less painful. Also, I was getting very concerned, because as I ran, I was starting to get a pain in my left posterior tibia area, from about midway through the tibia to the ankle joint. I was seeing an Active Release Therapist/Chiropractor, and when I asked him about it, he did some generic tests and diagnosed me with a stress fracture. This was very degrading to me, and I didn't know how much more I could take. But, that was shortly before the Fourth of July Firecracker ride. Then-boom. Near fatal crash, down for a few weeks. That gave me the rest I needed to give my leg, and I was just getting close to being done.

I'm getting pretty emotional as I write this, thinking back on this whole year. It's been depressing, hard, painful, and overall terrible. So I'm going to stop writing soon. As of now, guys, this season is probably over for me. I do not know what the future holds, but it will get better, eventually. I hope. Honestly, I'm leaving out other injuries, just due to the fact that this blog is so long. I give major respect to anyone who read this all the way through. I know that training can get hard on everybody, but for a 15 year old kid, it's been harder on me than anyone else I know.

Happy training guys, and don't ever take advantage of the fact that you can do triathlons without pain, or have had a full recovery from a injury. You should never hate training for a triathlon, because the fact that you can train is a blessing in itself. Train Happy, if I can steal Brook's catch phrase.

Happy training.

An Inspiring Comeback(Attempt)

Hey guys,

So, I haven't blogged for a few days. But, I do have a very cool story to tell.

About a week ago, August 4th rolled around. That marked the one-month anniversary of my crash. So, as a crazy triathlete, I decided to try and honor it with a bike ride. A ride that would show people that recovery is possible and that you can do well even after a mammoth crash. So, I mapped out a 152 mile route to the beach. A lofty effort, but I was ready to take on the challenge. So, after planning and resting, I set out, early, at around 6:15AM on August 4th.

 

My route took me on mostly back roads, and they were not in great condition. However, I just had to grit my teeth and take all of the bumps and holes as they were, and just try not to wreck again. As a matter of fact, at about 50 miles, the road ended and started up again in about 150 feet. So, I turned into a cylocross rider for about a minute, carrying my bike through a field. Good times, me and the road. Anyway, I continued to ride. I was at about 75 miles when I ran completely out of hydration. I had been taking gels and drinking Gatorade, but as I grew more fatigued, I started to drink more, and run out much faster. So, at 75 miles, a magic gas station appeared. I ran inside, gulped down a bottle of water, and bought 5 more Gatorades. I refilled, then got back out there. It was very nice, just being out and about, experiencing new roads and the thrill of the ride. But, even so, I had not calculated nutrition correctly. I started to become very, very tired, and started running out of water once again. So, as I continued up the road, I crossed the threshold of the legendary century distance. I went through 100 miles averaging 21.5mph, very respectable for such a distance. So, I was happy, but only momentarily. As I continued, I started to get delirious, and got very dizzy, and weak. So, I pulled over, and got under a shaded tree. As I looked myself over, I saw that there was salt on my legs and some on my arms, a sure sign of severe dehydration. I was waiting by the side of the road when a man stopped his car and asked if I was alright. He called my mom, who was riding behind me in a car, and told her where I was, and she was able to pick me up. The salt rings all over me were intense, and I was surprised I had lasted through a century. I ended up making it 108 miles, the farthest I've ever been, straight up. So, all in all, a great learning experience, and, as another plus, I was able to spend the weekend with my girlfriend at the beach.

 

Also, great news! In 4 days, I go back to surgery to get my screws removed. It is almost time to be rid of these painful things!

 

Happy training guys!