My Sports Hernia- Part I

On April 14th, I had pelvic floor repair surgery for a sports hernia.  The problem really presented itself last November.  After racing Kona, I needed some motivation, so I joined the Somerville Road Runners to run indoor track with them.  That turned out to be short lived.  During my second track session I felt pain in my left hip/ab area.  It could have been a number of things....tear, pull, strain....but for some reason, I knew it was a sports hernia....I just did.  I took time off in hopes that it wasn't....and it would heal on its own.  It didn't.  I ran sporadically in November and December.  But, the pain kept getting worse.  The thing for me wasn't so much the running....it was the afterwards.  After running, usually the next day, I would be in bad shape....not being able to walk w/out pain.  It was debilitating.  Fortunately, running was the only thing that really caused the pain.  I could still swim, bike, ski, etc.  In fact, skiing is what caused me to push my surgery out until April.  I had a big ski trip planned in February, so I waited to see a specialist until afterwards.  In retrospect, I would have set up my surgery a little sooner.  But, as I had never had surgery before, I had no idea how it worked.  I didn't realize that the actual surgery can be 2-3 months after the visit with the specialist.  Since I really wasn't planning on any big racing this year...it really wasn't a big deal.  In fact, the forced time off may be the best thing that could have happened to me.

After my big February ski trip (Big Sky Montana), which was epic, I started to look into seeing a specialist.  My friend, Jeff, who's a doctor, gave me a list of recommendations....but ultimately told me that there's a guy in Worcester who is the best...Demetrius Litwin out of UMass Medical.  I had done a lot of internet research.  I had read about many doctors who performed the procedure to fix a sports hernia.  Dr. William Meyers was the closest specialist that I had read about.  I'm sure there were others...but Dr. Meyers was supposedly the best.  I hadn't even heard of Dr. Litwin.  But, Jeff assured me that not only was he good, but he trained with Dr. Meyers.  Dr. Litwin is the head of the Department of Surgery at UMass, a teaching hospital.

My appointment with Dr. Litwin was in the beginning of March.  I was pretty excited about it, because I really wanted to get healthy.  This was the longest I have gone without running in 20 years....it was getting frustrating.  I sat down with Dr. Litwin and he started asking questions.  At the end of appointment, we had no answers.  He basically told me that it could be a sports hernia.  He told me that we could wait to see if it heals on its own....a few months to a few years.  I think he saw the frustration in my face....so he told me that he was sending me to his colleague, Dr. Brian Busconi, head of Sports Medicine at UMass.  I'll have to say, as nice at Dr. Litwin was, I really wasn't too fond of him after my visit.  After trekking across Worcester to a different campus, I saw Brian Busconi.  He was definitely a bit more laid back....a guy's guy.  I felt that he understood me.  He knew I wasn't about to wait a few years to see if the injury would heal on its own.  I'm about to turn 40....and as much as I want to be doing this in 20 years.....I don't have too many more "fast" years left.  I wasn't about to take the wait and see approach.  Brian scheduled me for an MRI.  The MRI didn't show anything....which wasn't surprising.  Sports Hernias rarely show up.  My surgery was scheduled.  The actual surgery is handled by both Brian and Dr. Litwin....two doctors.  Now, I just had to wait until April....(to be continued).

Back in the Saddle

It's been a rough winter from a triathlon/training perspective.  Following Hawaii, I decided to run indoor track w/the Somerville Road Runners.  That lasted a whole 2 sessions.  During the second track session, something didn't feel right in my hip/ab area.  It was a weird discomfort/pain.  I know my body pretty well, and though that I might have a sports hernia.  After laying off the training completely, I finally went in to get the issue diagnosed in February....and low and behold, it was a sports hernia.  I had surgery in April...and have been rehabbing over the last several weeks.  I'm back training (lightly) again.  I've been laying low since I discovered the injury....not really even posting much about it on Facebook or anywhere else.  But, now that I am starting to come back, I'll start posting again.  I plan to post an in depth post about the surgery and the pre and post process.  When I discovered the injury, I searched high and low for information....and it was sparse.  I did find one blog post from someone who had the same surgery, by the same doctors.  I even contacted him directly and we spoke on the phone before my surgery.  It was invaluable.  So, I want to make my experience available to others....and the road back to triathlon.

IMH Race Report

Sorry for the delay, but I inadvertently posted my race report on my team site rather than here. You can find it here:

Blog.bostontriathonteam.com

Day Four and Five....and Six

It's been a busy last few days...and I've been a bit neglectful in my postings.  Race day is tomorrow and I began feeling a bit under the weather yesterday afternoon.  Obviously not an ideal time to start feeling bad, but I'm doing my best to cope with it.  It just feels like a cold coming on....scratchy throat, etc.  My bike and race bags are down at transition.  I'm getting ready to eat dinner and get my final things ready.  I'm just keeping my fingers crossed that I feel better and not worse tomorrow.  Oh well...it is what it is.  This race is the icing on the cake.  I'm going to do my best to enjoy it...no matter how I feel.  Anyway, this will be the last post until post race.  Hopefully Madame Pele will be kind to me on Saturday.

As for the last couple of days, I thought I'd do a little photo montage:

Wednesday morning swim with my coach, Chris Thomas and a few others from Team Timex-

Matt and Shay up early on Wednesday after arriving on Tuesday-

The famous "Coffees of Hawaii" floating espresso bar-

Wednesday night couples cookout at the Sea Village-

Tuesday morning swim with Tim and Matt....trying out the new Blue Seventy textile suit-

The boys getting ready for the Kona Underpants Run (is that Fun Pokress?)-

The Guru, shined up and ready to go (more so than it's owner:))-

Sporting the limited edition BTT polos.  Do we get Powerbar Points for this?-

BTTers at the welcome banquet-

Ahoha!

-P

Day Three

Day three is in the books.  It was a busy day that started with another open water swim.  Today the floating espresso bar was set up, so I stopped on the way back in for a coffee.  Nothing like finishing a swim with a coffee.

After the swim we spotted some strange guy wading into the water in full garb.  He looked like he was chanting something.  I think he spotted me snapping his photo.  Nothing like a photo-op!

  I hit up the ART tent for another round of treatment after the swim.  I got registration out of the way....#1206.  And, finally, I picked up my Blue Seventy PTZ3 suit for the swim.  Whew...and that was all before 10:30.  I topped off the tank and took my bike out for a quick 40 minute swim.  I immediately had some mechanical issues...but my personal mechanic, Brian Hughes, had them ironed out quickly.  Let me say this...it is freakin' hot here.  Real hot.  I don't care what the news and papers say....they're saying 84-85....it's closer to 100 with the humidity.  Saturday should be fun!

Tonight we hit the ironman parade and the expo.  We ran into the Infinit guys who we're giving out t-shirts to the US athletes during the parade.

The expo was a zoo.  Lot's of cool vendors set up....Zipp, Scott, Kestrel...a virtual who's who of the triathlon industry.  We did all we could just to get through the masses.  If you're wondering what the difference is between an ironman and THE ironman in Kona....well, you typically don't get a full-on DJ spinning at LP....like you do in Kona!

Another early wakeup call

Well, I was out cold at 9pm, but still awake by 4:30. I'm hoping to really get caught up with sleep tonight. Today is the day that I really want to dial things in...and start to get mentally ready to race. The day looks like this:

1) early swim
2) register
3) visit the ART (active release therapy) tent
4) visit the IM store
5) 40 min bike
6) rest/welcome the Pokress' to kona
7) go watch the IM parade
8) visit the expo and demo days

It's a full day. Report to come...

Day Two

Up at 4am today.  At least it was a half hour later than yesterday!  Tapply and I headed down to "Dig Me" beach around 7am.  The place was definitely busier than yesterday.  I swam for about 40 or so minutes.  I felt good for about 20.  My body is still fatigued from lack of sleep.  I did see a manta ray for the first time.  Afterwards, Brian Hughes came by our condo and put our bikes together.  I was happy to see that it was in one piece out of the bike box.  Tim and I were going to go for a short ride, but all of us decided to head out for an exploration drive instead.  We headed toward Captain Cook and saw some amazing views.

Our first stop was St. Benedict's "painted church".  I've been wanting to stop by here for a while.  It was pretty neat.

 We then stopped by a Hawaiian state park (I can't even begin to pronounce the name).  The park had a tour of the ancient Hawaiian culture.  We then headed back into the hills of Kona and stopped by Greenwell Coffee Farm to order some peaberry coffee to be shipped back to Boston.  The stuff is awesome!  After a quick rest, Jenn and I headed out to dinner for our anniversary (7th).  We went to a place called Huggos.  The food was okay, but the view was awesome.  If you ever wonder why Kona is such a special place, here's why:

 -P