I mentioned the other day that I got cramp in my right leg at the end of Mondays afternoon training session. I assumed it was cramp at first, mainly because thats what the trainers said it was. But after a few days I still cannot walk and the symptons appear to be little different from cramp.
I searched online and found out that I have pulled my calf muscle. According to this article :
A calf strain is similar to an Achilles tendon tear or rupture, but occurs higher up in the back of the leg. A sign of a calf strain is similar to that of an Achilles tendon rupture – you may think you’ve just been hit in the leg and hear a “pop.” There is sudden pain at the back of the leg, pain, swelling or bruising in the calf muscle, and you have difficulty standing on the toes.
The above describes exactly what happened to me. It felt like someone had just hit my calf with a baseball bat and my muscle contracted and I hit the ground. Since then I’ve been unable to walk properly on my right leg and have been walking on the front of the foot only. My friend Sonya also noticed yesterday how big my right calf is compared to my left calf, obviously this is due to swelling.
I’m not 100% sure but I believe I have a grade 2 tear, which takes about 6 weeks to heal. I’m hoping this isn’t the case but after 3 days it hasn’t really got much better.
I’m really bummed about the whole thing as I’m unsure if I will be able to train anymore during my time in Thailand. Rawai is the perfect place to train as there isn’t much to do but if you’re not training, it’s incredibly boring, something which I have found out the last few days.
I really only have myself to blame. I should have rested my legs longer because of pulling my left hamstring. I believe my hamstring pull played a large part in pulling my calf. Apparently, a calf pull commonly happens when a person overstretches the leg. I was kicking ok with my right leg on Monday and kicking about shoulder level however I didn’t have great control over it because my stationary leg is the one which I have pulled my hamstring on. Which means that I would have easily extended my leg longer than usual.
As I said, I’m a bit down abut it all because I was excited about coming to Thailand to train for a long time and I was enjoying the training. Now I’m not sure what to do. If my leg gets better within the next week then I could train everyday and just box but there would still be a risk of pulling it more and doing so could make things a lot worse long term. I know the best thing for me is rest but in the last few years I have trained at least 5 times a week and I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do with myself if I’m not training.
I consider myself a positive person and in the past I have tried to look at the positives in a bad situation. For example, when I pulled my hamstring I thought, well it will give me a chance to improve my boxing. I’m sure that not training is going to give me an opportunity to do something else. I just don’t know what that is as yet.
I’m going to relax over the weekend, clear my head and think about what my options are :)