december update

December 09, 2010

i'm taking a look at my blog just now and realizing it's approaching three months since my last update.  at first the time that's passed since my last update surprised me, but now that i've thought about it more it doesn't surprise me at all because there's been little to report.  for the purpose of this blog, these past few months have been about recovery and maintenance.  after my crash at the worlds and subsequent injuries, my training slowed down, practically coming to a halt.  the torn AC joint in my left shoulder progressed quickly and healed, but because i was favouring my right arm, trying to speed up the healing of my left, i subsequently injured my right shoulder worse than my left.  the root of the problem was the trauma my right shoulder sustained when i crashed in edinborough, and several weeks later, after many rounds of physiotherapy, i discovered that my rotator cuff was causing the pain.  most movement was agonizing, and anything involving lifting or raising my shoulder shot white lightning through my body.  something as simple as putting on or taking off my shirt required a moment to stop to breath through the pain.  i fumbled through weeks of trying to teach myself how to brush my teeth with my left hand.  even now, more than three months since my crash, my right shoulder is still causing problems and is painful at some point throughout each day.

running was difficult because of the pain, and the only riding i could do was indoors with a delicate upper body.  i made it through september, missing several races because of the injuries, and was hoping to do a half marathon at some point this fall but that didn't happen either.  october turned into a maintenance month, doing what i could to keep my strength up.  i took most of november off of work and tried to get one or two workouts in each week, and even that was difficult.

but for the past two weeks training has been much better and i'm finally starting to feel like things are back on track.  next year will be much different from 2010 and, to be perfectly honest, i have no idea at this point how things will pan out for me, but right now i'm very excited with some of the changes on the horizon.  no big races chosen yet or ambitions settled, but feeling good about 2011 nonetheless.