A little too much?

This evening my left elbow aches more than it has for quite a few months and is perhaps telling me that it's worked a little bit too hard over the last 36 hours.

I started Sunday with 1300m swimming with just over half of that being bilateral breathing sets with no aids. I'll admit that I only did 100m sets on the whole but that's a start. I did one 200m set with alternate lengths of bilateral and RHS only and that was OK.  In the evening I did my elbow/shoulder weights session and was well aware of that effort this morning.

Just to cap it off, after work today I swam again with a main set of bilateral breathing with the ToyBuoy. The smallish pullbuoy is definitely easier than using a kick but still needs some input to maintain good posture (unlike using the BigBuoy that makes things far too easy). I was happy to keep a pace of 2:12min/100m for that with some lengths better than 2:10min/100m.

Fortunately on the way home I had a physio appointment and so I've had the various tight spots around my shoulders and forearm massaged out leaving a little tenderness around the elbow. As usual we had the talk that this means I don't have a classic tendonopathy and can continue training; although a rest is divided tomorrow.

Some swim gains but at what cost?

Today's swim was basically the same as last Monday's although I went a little faster throughout. I could have had a better pace as I was blocked on the warm up and during the pullbuoy main set. There was probably little to be gained in the main set as I lapped a swimmer three times and made quite an effort to pull past so gained a few seconds there.

However even before starting the swim my elbow was stiff - Thursday's snorkel rekindled the elbow pain and it only settled a little over the weekend. I'll keep an eye on how it develops.

More positively I felt that bilateral rotation was better controlled today and I was keeping a leading arm forwards more consistently. Strangely the SPL was slightly greater for bilateral breathing with the ToyBuoy than for right side only breathing with a kick; not what I'd have expected.

Snorkel time

Another week of swimming and my arm is doing OK. I'm aware of pain and stiffness in my left elbow still but if anything it's becoming less each day now even tough the arm is in use. Circuits last night wasn't very arm based but lifting and throwing a 7kg medicine ball repeatedly is a fair load.

In line with my policy of trying to improve bilateral breathing, today I swam most of the distance with the snorkel. That's not bilateral at all but it is still symmetrical! That's the main thing. My body seemed narrow and I worked to get a good weight transfer on both sides although I was aware that I wasn't rotating very much. Breathing through the snorkel was hard work even though I breathed on every stroke. I suppose there is a large dead space and resistance which conspire to reduce respiratory efficiency, that is a training load. There are many videos online about the technique gains offered so I should ignore pacing - 'process' not 'outcome'. Lots to practice.

Back in the water for 800m

On Monday the physio found that my left arm tested to be as strong as my right even though there was a little pain during the loading. On that basis I'm considered to be well on the road to recovery. So swimming is back on the cards although clearly it is important that I restart very gently.

On Tuesday I swam 10 lengths fairly gently and today 14 lengths. After the warm-up I did a set of bilateral breathing assisted by the pull buoy. It seems to make sense after asymmetric pain and injury to try to develop a bilateral style. Since I'm not pushing for speed or endurance currently there's also logic in trying to be neat, so there the reach, high elbow, bent arm, rotation and elbow-led recovery to try to maintain in my stroke.

Previously my arm was sore in the morning g after swims; it was fine on Wednesday and I hope it's OK tomorrow. Actually recovery is improving as my arm became quite sore after tough circuits on Wednesday and was stiff early Thursday.

Elbow pain rehab ongoing

After quite a few months I suspect that my right elbow is showing some improvement. I'm doing a variety of shoulder and forearm strengthening exercises for both arms although I only feel them in the left. When I load the joint and in the morning I'm very much aware of discomfort. However it does seem that I'm getting stronger and that the load which induces pain, or stops use, is increasing.

This morning whilst tidying magazines I spotted this.

From Outdoor Swimmer August 2018

I agree with this short item in its entirety. I found the paddles a great training aid for positioning and I felt the training load on my chest. However I do think that engagement of my forearm was part of the set of problems that overloaded my elbow. When my arm is stronger I will be reintroducing the paddles into my programme but in a very gently way.

Elbow week 1

No swimming but a fair bit of arm exercise has made my left elbow slightly aching now. After the DOMS from circuits I didn't want to do the exercises on Friday and although Saturday would have been ideal I cut the hedge - and wielding a large hedge trimmer was sufficient effort. This morning I took the chance to do them soon after breakfast and found that they were quite straightforward and didn't cause any pain at the time.

This afternoon I've been tidying the woodshed and sawn a stack of wood; although I'm right handed the left got used in moving the timber.

Elbow rehab

The physio and I agreed on Monday that as my elbow is not healing it is time to start some focussed rehab. By working through a set of exercises it became clear that my left arm and shoulder is distinctly weaker than the right. Exercises such as press-ups didn't seem to hurt the elbow whereas front raises were a little painful.

So I have a progressive plan now to strengthen the whole chain. I'm to start with the exercises least painful, mostly to build shoulder strength and stability. When they can be done pain free I'm to move on to loading the elbow muscles and tendons.

This evening's circuit included stacks of press-ups and shoulder presses and I was only vaguely aware of my elbow, so that was spot-on. It'll be interesting to see how it is tomorrow, I think the rest of me will be tired as it was a tough session.

Friday swim

So I started the friday swim being aware of my elbow and set to the intervals. I managed a few lengths below the 2:00min/100m pace but couldn't crack it for 2 lengths consecutively. I'm quite pleased that I managed to finish with 267m at a very easy 2:30min/100m fairly consistently.

Today I also took the sensible course of action and withdrew from the Dart 10km. There's no way I'm going to be fit enough and I wouldn't want to start wit the intention of dropping out and being cold and wet waiting to be returned to base. There's a goal for 2019. Now I'm thinking that I will stop swimming for a month and see if that helps my elbow.

Not healing!

Today my left elbow has been aching, with the discomfort extending into my biceps. Holding a phone still really aggravates it. No swim until Friday.

Loss of pace

After work my elbow felt pretty good so I decided in favour of a swim; even though over the weekend I'd thought I might quit for the whole of July. I thought that a continuous swim was needed as I've become far too used to stopping for sets or intervals and lost the feeling of just keeping going.

The image tells the story as my pace showed a tailing off from start to finish. For the first 20 lengths I felt fine but I was well aware that the last 12 were a struggle. Nonetheless a scan of my blog suggests that 24:22min for 1000m is a PB with an average pace of 2:26min/100m.

02/07/18 2:26min/100m
02/02/18 2:28min/100m
18/01/18 2:32 min/100m
05/03/17 2:42 min/100m
04/01/16 3:02 min/100m
26/02/15 3:40 min/100m

During and after the swim my shoulder and elbow felt good so maybe I am healing?

Ouch!

This week's swimming has caught up with me today. My left shoulder feels stiff and almost that I don't want to move it in case it hurts. My left forearm rotator muscles and the tendon insert are sore and even pain extending into my biceps. My right arm is OK, although it does feel 'worked'. I'm not sure if this problem is due to the set of swims this week or more specifically due to Saturday's swim when I was trying to do some shoulder extension - that will have worked deltoid muscles and pulled the joint to its limit of movement. I'm disappointed that the elbow pain reappeared strongly as I thought I was avoiding that load.

Hard work

This morning somehow I knew I was too weak to do well at Hatfield so went to Goodwin for a 'technique' session. I felt tired throughout and struggled to keep either pace or form. Such is back-to-back exercise. I kept thinking about a high elbow but whenever I took a sneeky look I wasn't convinced that it looked 'high'. My forearm certainly didn't seem to be vertical!

On the walk home it started to dawn on me what all the business I'd heard about 'reaching over a barrel' meant. It's all about the hard-to-achieve action of shoulder and upper arm up and forwards. Just keeping the elbow high still allows the forearm to trail when looking from the side. What's needed isn't so much a high elbow as a forwards elbow. This involves some abduction of the shoulder which can be reversed to adduction to help drive the body over the arm and thus forwards.

Thinking about this, trying to achieve a force-generating vertical forearm with a non-abducted shoulder requires substantial input from muscles crossing the elbow to generate tension. If the shoulder is abducted the forearm is largely pushed backwards which may well be more resilient.

Focus on arm technique

Since Easter I've really cut back on swim training volume as I was starting to feel shoulder problems. Soon after that I started to get pain around my elbow. I would link the onset of the elbow pain with an attempt to bend my arms to bring my hand below shoulder.

From http://www.feelforthewater.com/2012/08/bent-it-like-becky.html

Whilst this may be great technique I've struggled to achieve it and now it seems that I've been trying to mimic it by using my forearm as the driving lever. This has caused some localised pain in my left elbow which is the onset of 'tennis elbow'. The physio believes it's quite mild currently especially since it doesn't hurt during the swim itself. All my swims are quite short currently as I'd backed off because of the potential shoulder problem!

Today I focussed on high elbow and use of the upper arm as the driving lever. The pace achieved was around my current norms so no great impact there. The interesting thing will be how it feels tomorrow.

Assuming I have found a way of not aggravating it I've now got an exercise to do to try to stimulate repair through very mild loading.

It was suggested that I use a hammer - progress nearer to the end of the shaft as strength increases.