Running
And Injury - A Marathoner's Drive
Often Detours Them to Physical
Therapist
By Lauren Beckham Falcone -
Boston Herald Marathon season is to physical therapists
what tax season is to accountants: unbelievably busy.
With torn ligaments, blown knees and swollen
feet, marathoners-in-training are the walking wounded. But many refuse to hang
up their sneakers, which is why many local PTs' office hours are booked solid
during the months before the Boston Marathon.
"It's a busy time of year for physical
therapists," said Nicole Connerton, a physical therapist at New England Baptist
Hospital in Chestnut Hill. "Everyone seems to be running the Boston Marathon
this year. And there seem to be a lot of injuries, too."
Marathoners, that bunch who run a distance
most of us wouldn't want to drive, generally don't seem fazed by shin splints
or tendonitis. However, before a big goal race such as Boston, would-be Joan
Benoit Samuelsons and Johnny Kellys hope they'll heal up fast enough to cross
the finish line.
And that's the problem, experts said.
"Marathon runners come in with these huge
goals," Connerton said. "And they run and they run, and then they start having
problems. The thing is, it doesn't go away unless you take a break, and most
(runners) won't."
Connerton, who is a marathoner herself, said
she tries to talk reason to her patients and friends who are overdoing it, but
sometimes they don't run with her advice.
"I tell them it's not going away unless they
stop running," she said. "But telling someone training for a marathon to stop
for four weeks makes them want to shoot themselves."
Connie Mooney, 39, of South Boston has had
to deal with a few aches and pains while training for her first marathon, but
she's not as gung-ho as some of her fellow racers.
"On one really icy trek I developed a sore
ankle," said the mother of two. "And then I went looking on the Internet,
diagnosing myself. I rested for a week because I was so worried about making it
worse. And it worked. But some other runners? They just pop a Motrin before a
long run and hope for the best. And I heard lots of people are getting a
prescription for the painkiller Vioxx."
Yet, in doing so, marathoners are running
the risk of postrace pain and possible surgery.
"Marathon running pounds your body," said
Kevin McGovern, physical therapist and founder of McGovern Physical Therapy in
Revere. "Some human beings are made for it, others are not. And that's when you
see plantar fascitis, which is basically a catch-all for tendonitis of the
bottom of the feet, disc problems and back problems."
Like Connerton, McGovern tries to tell
injured runners to rest, but he hates to waste his breath.
"There's no such thing as rest to a
marathoner," he said.
But that mentality can turn a marathoner
into a couch potato in no time.
"Oftentimes, minor injuries are left
untreated until something more serious occurs, such as a stress fracture," said
James Onate, assistant professor of athletic training at Boston University's
Sargent College of Health and Human Sciences. "The minor injuries may also
contribute to articular cartilage degeneration and possibly the early onset of
osteoarthritis."
That's not including the slipped discs, torn
tendons and knee injures, and the list of maladies associated with endurance
training doesn't end there.
According to recent research by the Human
Performance Laboratory at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C.,
marathoners, cross-trainers and triathletes can run the risk of making
themselves sick.
Evidence suggests that bodies strained by
prolonged and strenuous exercise without proper rest are vulnerable not only to
muscular and skeletal problems, but to infections and perhaps even disease.
Matthew Rufo, 27, of Brighton is one of the
Boston Marathon's casualties. An avid sportsman who "has to" go to the gym
seven days a week, the University of Massachusetts at Amherst fund-raiser
decided to run the marathon two years ago. He endured the aches and pains of
training. On marathon day, his knee gave out on Heartbreak Hill.
"I had to be carried to the nurse's
station," he said. "I don't remember a lot, but I guess I screamed like a girl
for an hour."
Now, because of his badly injured knee, he
is recuperating from arthoscopic surgery and is in physical therapy for at
least three months. His marathon days are over.
"I'll always want to run it," he said. "But
I don't know if I ever will."
McGovern understands most Boston
marathoners, injured or not, can't be dissuaded from running, but if they're
experiencing some aches and pains, he's got some last-minute advice.
"I suggest taking off a good three to four
days before the race," he said. "Do nothing. If you have to do cardio, then try
the Stairmaster. No pounding. Take some over-the-counter pain medicine, ice the
pain, keep stretching and hope for the best." |
