Ouch that hurts! Leg injury runnning and the 10% rule

This week is recovery week, and the goal is to be rested and recuperated for the next few weeks Ironman training, but I have managed to injure my leg.... damn!

I'm hoping its minor, I hurt it last week during the running technique group training. It has been giving me problems since, but it seemed to be on the mend.

I cruised through the warmup this morning and got through one of the 1min build to firm pace intervals when bang, during the second interval as I went up a rise onto a bridge, I felt a sharpish pain and my leg tried to dump me on the pavement. Needless to say, that was the end of intervals and I finished off the session with some easy jogging. It appears that my new running technique combined with the increased running and cycling volume is putting some strain on my legs.

After googling it, as i do with anything and everything, I am of the opinion that it is my rectus femoris muscle that is giving me the problems. However, I think I will leave the final call up to the people who get paid to diagnose these things because they unlike me have studied muscles and such at university. I will talk to a physio tomorrow. Fingers crossed its not to much of a biggie.

I think an important point that this illustrates, is the risk of dramatic increases in training volume and intensity when training for Ironman, triathlon or any sport. I have read numerous articles discussing increases of no more than 10% per week. It makes good sense particularly to athletes early in their triathlon career. Any more than this can put stresses on your body that increase the risk of injury significantly. I think it is probably common for more experienced triathletes to make quite sharp increases in training volume after their off season rest period. If you are going to ignore the 10% rule, as I did, then it is important to listen to your body, use caution when you feel a twinge and stretch regularly. Start getting regular massage early, beginning as you mean to precede. Hopefully I won't lose too much training time because of this. It is a definite possibility to make more loss than gain if you increase your training to dramatically and end up badly injured and not training at all.

Here is a site with info about my suspected Rectus Femoris injury in case you are experiencing a similar problem. I'm not an advocate for self diagnosis, I'm just a know-it-all.

Here is a site that mentions the 10% rule with regards to marathon rather than Ironman training, though still relevant to triathletes.