Did you hear the one about the uninjured triathlete..?

There's a common saying that states something like there are two types of runners: those who have an injury, and those who are coming back from an injury. It's a simplification, of course, but it's pretty damn accurate all the same.

As triathletes, we like to think of ourselves as being above that – after all, we 'cross-train', we have the muscular non weight-bearing benefits of also swimming and cycling, right? Yet, visit any triathlon club in the world and you'll likely find that 90% of members are currently injured, trying to balance an injury with training or have just come back from time off with an injury. Except me...or so I thought. I'm bulletproof. Not in a cool Batfink way, but in a 'haha sport, you can't injure me' kinda way!

I broke loads of bones playing football growing up, but that's bones, right, not muscular. I even broke my neck in a swimming accident as a nipper but that was contact (namely, head making fairly rapid contact with the bottom of a pool), not a tendon strain. Sure, I get sore after big bouts of training, marathons and Ironman, but I recover. I decided that all that swimming (remember: non weight-bearing, not that my head and neck could tell the difference when they had that run-in with the tiles), football (not American football, or Aussie rules all you Yanks and Home & Away-makers out there, but actual football where you kick a ball with, y'know, your foot), rugby and tennis had given me an all-round athleticism that'd carry me through any event and see me walk from a World War 1 battlefield with a couple of scratches and throbbing headache.

Till Monday night.

My programme had me riding for 2:20 which I managed fine (thanks for the company Mr Le Pelley – excellent, as ever) in pretty blustery conditions. After quickly throwing my bike into the car (read: stopping, taking a giant leak, having a little chat with a few folks, putting the bike in the car, changing clothes, putting my trainers on, having another pee) I ran out of the car park ready for the scheduled 9k brick run holding 4:30s, which I'd managed the previous two weeks. The first 4k were fine but over the next kilometre, the lower part of my right leg got tighter and tighter till I could hardly run. After 5k, I stopped and stretched it out but it was no good, so I did the sensible thing and jogged slowly back to the car – not easy when it's the first session I've had to cut short since I joined T2A.

Having not had a tri-related injury before, and weirdly priding myself on that (hey, it's my thing), I worried about it all night. I stretched before bed and when I got up. I decided that the cold (yep, even in Dubai...) could have been responsible. I knew I'd been putting in some serious kilometres this month too, maybe it was a pure overuse strain... I'd have to see.

Luckily, I felt no ill effects yesterday. I took the morning off and ran 7k in the evening, 6k at a steady 4:30 pace. I could tell where the stiffness and soreness had been but it was fine. I was bulletproof again! (I realise that having put all these thoughts into words, I'm tempting an almighty karmic bitch slap of epic proportions to come and snap my achiles clean in two or push me off my bike at 50kph, but...)

POWEEE! Who's the monkey now?

But the experience did make me think about some things. I heard someone say that triathlon is not something you do, a triathlete is something you are; while cheesy enough to make vomit-inducing bumper sticker, there's something in this. I realised that I've been doing the kilometres and training hard, sure, but don't always look after myself in the way I should. And, if I want to stay (relatively) uninjured, I have to start. That means more stretching; an occasional ice bath (i.e. when a long weekend finishes with a 26k run); sports massages; wearing the compression stuff (both for training and recovery) that I once swore by; looking after my nutrition both during and immediately after long sessions; taking a rest day and not using it to catch up on other sessions I had to miss due to work.

While I don't prescribe to the idea that being a triathlete has to inform and shape every fibre of my being, I know that consistency is the key to improvement and meeting my objectives in the sport, and the key to consistency is remaining uninjured. 

Plus, given the way I sulk when inflicted with even the lightest dose of the deadly man flu, I'm not sure how I'd cope with a real in jury!

Man Flu: tragically misunderstood