Originally Posted by
grolby
Thanks. I'll do my best!
You've really got to be more cautious with the injury stuff, though. "I feel kinda better, so I'm going to go ride 1.5-2 hours of tempo" is not generally considered a smart way to start riding again after an injury. Start with a short, easy ride and see how you feel. If you get 20 miles out and then your achilles starts twinging again because you didn't let it heal fully (and believe me, if it "feels weird," it's not fully healed), you then have to ride all the way back. I don't think I need to explain how this would set back your recovery. You have a lot of eagerness to ride, which is an excellent trait, but you really need to learn to hold back when things aren't completely ship-shape. Get rolling again, sure, but for crying out loud, take it easy at first! Don't just try to jump right back into the same hard riding you were doing. Enjoy the weather with a nice, gentle spin. Relax. It's a long season ahead, and as you've said, you don't want a nagging injury. There's no rush to get into shape.
Enthalpic was talking about how it might just be a conditioning issue. I'll have taken 72 hours off as of tomorrow morning, so I'll evaluate. If it feels weird, I'll turn around. I think I'm honestly more cognizant that I have an achilles now, just like I felt like I had calves after I had bad cramps. I'm crossing my fingers in either event. Icing has really been helping though. I've done it 2-3 times today and I'll do it as I sleep and tomorrow morning as well. Been stretching it a bit too. I have no trouble walking on it right now, so we'll see.
I'll also do the NSAID/ICE thing after the ride to ensure it stays fine.
I'll have a mandatory week off around finals, where I'll just lift and do core work since I don't want to ride around that time. I actually might skip the quabbin race since it's on the 26th. That's the date I crashed last year. I'm not sure how I feel about being on a bike that day.
I'm not normally superstitious, but I'm not sure if I want to celebrate that I can ride by racing, or if I just want to take the day off and reflect on the year...