Quick Run & PT

    This week actually went by pretty quickly and unfortunately didn't give me a good chance to get in very many workouts.  Monday was essentially a recovery day that was filled with lots of ice and rest.  Tuesday also turned out to be a recovery day since the IT band was still a little bit irritated.  Unfortunately for my training, this week at work has been pretty hectic.  As there are three chief residents at Tufts, normally there are at least 2 of us around to get all of our daily duties done.  For the most part, these consist of doling out admissions to the medical services, dealing with any issues that arise with the residents and setting up for conferences.  What made this week so crazy was that both of the other chiefs were away this week as Kevin was on vacation and Eugene was the attending on the Gen Med Service.  This meant that my days were crazy and hectic.  In addition to an already crazy schedule at Tufts, I was also moonlighting on Tuesday night at Shattuck Hospital.  Basically, this meant I was getting to Tufts at 6:45 am on Tuesday, working until 5 pm at which point I took the T to Shattuck Hospital, working at Shattuck Hospital from 6pm until 7:30 am on Wednesday and then taking the T back to Tufts to work 8 am  4pm.  Needless to say once I got done with that shift ... I was beat!!! 
     I woke up on Thursday and was feeling totally exhausted.  I knew I had a physical therapy appointment scheduled at 5:30pm and was concerned that I wouldn't be able to fit in a workout at all since I was already going to be cutting it close as I was getting out of work at 4pm.  Thankfully, I was able to time the bus perfectly and got home at 4:30 pm.  As this was one of the nicest days of the year, with the temps in the low 60's and the sun shining, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get a Castle Island run in.  I changed into the running gear, through on the sun glasses and took off.  I had exactly 40 minutes before my physical therapy appointment started and was going to try to fit in 4 miles. 
     To switch things up, I decided to do some intervals.  I ran my first 1.25 miles at a 7:40 min/mile pace and then walked for a bit.  In total, I did a bunch of intervals with my final tally being 3.95 miles in about 36 minutes.  While the time seemed good for me, it wasn't the best run I have had.  I think that the first 1.25 miles at a sub 8 min mile pace really gassed me out.  Regardless, it was a beautiful day, I got to run around Castle Island which is my favorite and I made it to physical therapy on time.
      On this day, however, I think PT stood for "punishment therapy" instead of "physical therapy".  I told Declan that when I was doing the foam roller at home I found a spot higher up, near my hip that seemed to be pretty tender.  His response was "that just means its another area of inflammation, we will get it out".  What I didn't realize is that by "get it out", he meant I was in for about 15-12 minutes of the most painful therapy I have had yet.  In order to "get it out" Declan started with a deep massage, moved towards using the point of his elbows to help do pressure therapy and then moved to the rolling pin (see below).  Honestly, I think the rolling pin could be a substitute for water boarding because it was basically torture.  For about 10 minutes I laid on the table laughing because I was having the outside of my leg crushed with a rolling pin in an attempt to loosen this damn IT band.  Ultimately, Declan asked me why I was laughing and I basically told him because if I wasn't laughing I would be crying.  
     I do have to say though that since that physical therapy appointment, while my leg has been sore (in a bruised type of way) the knee issues do seem to be much much better!  Guess it comes down to the old saying ... no pain, no gain. 

I just wanted to put this in here since it is essentially the same "rolling pin" that was used to absolutely crush my IT band during my physical therapy appointment this week.