Baseball, blues, gadgets, and technology
The Cardinals got a solid outing from lefty Jaime Garcia and smacked two home runs en route to a 9-1 victory over the Pirates in front of 39,102 fans on Saturday night at PNC Park.
Via MLB.com
You’d have to be completely ignoring baseball to have missed the Lance Berkman ’11 story. It’s been fun to watch, and I’m very glad it’s unfolding with the Cardinals rather than seeing his comeback happen with a division rival.
Manager Tony La Russa is letting his lineup card do his talking for him. While he declines to call Jon Jay the team’s starting center fielder, his recent lineup suggests that is the new reality.
Via Stl Today
Johnny Shines performs “Sweet Home Chicago.”
So, the past few months have been mostly about recovery from what I think was a stress fracture in my left shin. I’ve taken things pretty slowly, but am back to running regularly outdoors.
The worst of the injury was on January 6. I’m sure I’d probably already done the damage, but that run (just 16 minutes) was excruciating. Actually, the run was only tough – the walk home from the end of the run was the excruciating part. It was a full-out limping, “I’m not sure I can make it the three blocks” experience. I iced the shin when I got home but, somehow, that only made it feel worse. And, for four days afterward, I could still barely walk.
I’m not ready to start running again, just yet, but today holds some hope. This is the first day that the pain in my left shin has been only a twinge rather than something I notice with every step. That’s promising. The plan is still to wait until I’ve been completely pain-free for two weeks before I start a limited running regimen again, but today it feels like I’m actually on that path.
I really intended for this running log to be about more than my shins, but that’s been the primary issue for the past couple of months.
It’s been since Jan 8 since I ran. I took a couple of weeks off from running during the holidays, then backed off to a time target of 18 minutes. The shins were still extremely sore at that so, for the second run in 2011, I targeted 16 minutes. I ran it, but limped home from the finish in pretty sharp pain. My right shin just felt fatigued, but the left one just plain hurt.
Three weeks later, the right shin is fine. There’s still some pain in the left shin. It’s pretty clear to me that I’ve incurred a stress fracture in that shin. The pain is worst when twisting the leg.
So, the plan is pretty simple. I’ll wait to run at all until I’ve been two weeks pain-free. I’m doing some daily stretching and toe taps to build the muscles around the shin in the meantime, and am staying on the stationary bike to maintain “active rest.” When I do start running again, it’ll be primarily on the treadmill to rebuild endurance on a surface with some give. I’ll move back out onto pavement as the endurance increases, with shorter runs than on the treadmill.
Most importantly, I need to be sure to listen to my legs. When there’s pain, I need to back off and let the healing happen.
With some diligence and patience, I should be able to heal and be better off on the other side.
I had a reasonably good run this afternoon (Runkeeper activity), but am a bit discouraged by the state of my shins. They hurt, even after trying some new stretches.
I’ve seen some suggestions online that strengthening the shin muscles will alleviate shin splints. I’ve started doing those nightly. I’ll continue to run, but the fun is waning a bit. If history is any indication, tonight they’ll be fairly calm. Tomorrow they’ll just be painful and I’ll be hobbling around like an old man.
I ran on Sunday evening (Runkeeper activity), in 18-degree weather. That’s the first winter run ever and the first time I’d had the opportunity to test out the Under Armour Cold Gear stuff I purchased a week or so ago. It’s amazing stuff, to say the least. After the first few minutes, I was comfortable. Not too warm, not cold at all. It’s pretty remarkable that clothing so thin can retain heat so well and still keep me dry.
The real upside is that I don’t have to run on the treadmill for most of the winter. I really dislike running on the treadmill. I’ll probably still use it when the streets are slick, but I think I can make most of my winter runs outdoors.
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