Triathlon, Part Two

Yep, I fell down the stairs. Cause I'm a big klutz. My right foot slipped out from underneath me, leaving my left foot behind. Because of how I landed, I hurt my knee. After a visit to the doctor, I found that I had torn my Medial Collateral Ligament (MCL). It's the muscle that runs along the inside of your knee to stabilize it. And, in case you're wondering - tearing a muscle hurts.

At any rate, after icing and nursing my injury for a week and a half, I saw a knee specialist, who told me that I shouldn't exercise or do any sports until I had no pain, which generally takes 2 to 4 weeks. Since that would take me up to about 2 weeks before the tri, I knew I wouldn't be able to do it.

I won't go into the frustration I felt about injuring myself just when I'd started to enjoy working out or about not being able to reach the goal I had set for myself. I will say, though, that it's been a lot harder not to exercise than I would have ever thought it could be. For someone who hadn't exercised in months before this whole thing, that's saying something! And, now that I've caught the tri-bug, I wasn't satisfied with just giving up.

I hit the four-week mark last night, and I am still experiencing some pain. I see the doctor on Thursday, and I'll hopefully find out if/when I can start exercising again. I suppose I should tell him that I started swimming again about a week ago...

So, once I get the all-clear from the doc, I will start training again. I've already researched other triathlons in my area, and I've decided to sign up for one in April. It's the same as the Turkey Tri, only it's not called the Turkey Tri, cause, well, a Turkey reference in April would just be weird.

Now I just have to decide if I'm going to try the mini or go for the sprint (which is double all the lengths). Hmm... I do have four months to train this time...