The IT Bands Have It

I think I have self diagnosed my knee issue that arose last week.  Basically, as a refresher, I felt a little pop & started getting pain as I ran up hills.  I did a pretty exhaustive search online and came up with what I think is my issue... say it with me now kids,

     Iliotibial Band Syndrome (ill-e-o-tib-e-al    ba-n-d    sin-dro-m-e)

In  a nut shell,

ITBS is one of the leading causes of lateral knee pain in runners. The iliotibial tract (iliotibial band) is a superficial thickening of tissue on the outside of the thigh, extending from the outside of the pelvis, over the hip and knee, and inserting just below the knee. The band is crucial to stabilizing the knee during running, moving from behind the femur to the front while walking. The continual rubbing of the band over the lateral femoral epicondyle, combined with the repeated flexion and extension of the knee during running may cause the area to become inflamed. 

That according to the experts at Wikipedia.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here ya go!

So, basically, it's a more severe form of Bursitis.  See the bursa that the line is pointing to above.  Well, you have these sacks of fluid where tendon or ligaments can rub against bones.  These sacks of fluid prevent chaffing of the tendons & legaments.  Something happens creating friction on the sack, which in turn causes swelling & inflamation of the bursa, also called, you guessed it, Bursitis.

For those of you who knew me at Korea, I had a bout of Bursitis in the same knee, though it was below the knee where the patellar tendon connects, that had me hobbling around base for a good month.  This one hasn't been as bad.  Not really sure what caused the bout in Korea, but this one I think was either caused by running on the ice, which is a crazy ballet style of running; or by taking the break then jumping back in to it running all out.  Not really sure, but could be both, who knows.

Anywho, I am going to attempt to run again tomorrow and see what it does.  Hopefully I won't be too far set back.

Exercise Allergy?!?!

Tuesday was my first real run where it was cold.  Man, why did I choose Germany to begin preparing for a marathon, much less Germany across the winter?  Along with the cold weather comes some extra preparation, clothing and such, but also, a whole other bag of issues that I have to watch out for.

Frost bite/Frost Nip are my primary concern during this portion of my training.  I will, hopefully, be getting some gear soon to help alleviate some of this issue, but I am still concerned about it.  The best defense against these enemies, when you know you have to be out in the weather, is to layer & cover.

You must layer to perserve warmth, but you must choose your layers wisely, as with running in layers, you are prone to overheating.  Overheating could be just as bad, if not worse than frost bite/frost nip.  Overheating & having a heat stroke while miles away from home on a cold, deserted trail at 4am is probably not a recipe for a succcessful life, much less a successful marathon!  I have been reading a lot about layering over the past couple weeks.  Under Armour has a layering system that I have been looking at that will do just fine!

Slips & falls on the ice are my next concern.  I am doing everything I can, even giving up on playing intramural football for my squadron this year, to avoid injuries.  If you know me, you know I love playing football, so this is an amazing thing in itself.  This area of Germany, historically, gets about 15-21 days of snowfall each year.  I'm sure though, after talking to lots of people I work with, we get tons of ice.  Running outside, I am sure I will run into ice patches.  This is going to be new to me.  I'm not real sure how I will handle the ice issue, other than I will just have to see how it goes.  I will definately need to get a headlight for running during the winter, as it will get dark very early here.  From what I have heard, I can expect it to be dark at 5pm during the middle of the winter.  Without a light, I won't be able to see the ice to try to avoid it.

I'm sure by now ya'll are asking yourselves, "Chris, what does this have to do with the title of your blog?"  Here we go.  Tuesday, as I said, was my first real cold weather run.  I got back and got into a luke warm shower, as I normally do.  I knew I was cold, since by the time the water ran from my head, down to my legs, the water was icy on my calves.  I thought it was just that my legs were cold, but I knew my hands were no longer cold, as I was feeling warm on them from the shower head.  I reached down & felt the water that was on the floor of the shower, and it was ice cold too.  That's when I noticed something that kind of startled me.

My thighs had turned bright red and were itching like crazy.  I didn't know what was going on, I just knew it was itching badly.  I thought that maybe I had brushed up against something on the running trail with my hands and was having some sort of allergic reaction.  Then, as abrubtly as the itching came on, it stopped.  The redness was still there though.  I asked a fellow runner I work with, but he had never experienced anything like this.  So, as I always do, off to the net I surfed.

I was searching the Runner's World forums and found this explanation, which I am sure my medical background folks have already figured out:

"The itching is not on the skin, it's inside the actual limbs. There are millions of tiny capillaries and arteries inside our muscles which expand rapidly due to the demand for more blood that is brought on by exercise. When warm, these capillaries remain open allowing maximum blood passage, but when cold they tend to collapse, allowing only minimal blood passage.  The rapid expansion of these vessels from warm water or rapid warming causes adjacent nerves to send impulses back to the brain which are interpreted as an itch. The body actually confuses the brain during cold weather activity as the extremely cold on the skin tricks the brain into thinking the muscles are cold, therefore shrinking the capillary ends to preserve blood warmth.  So, even though the muscles are warm, the skin being cold keeps the capillaries closed"

So, that explained my issue, which, if I remember correctly, was referred to as "capillary response" in the forums.  I did run across a rather interesting bit of information though, and yes, I verified it through medical websites too!

One poster was describing that while going through a class of Epi Pens, a pen type device that delivers medicine to people in anaphylactic shock due to food allergies, bee stings, and various other issues, the instructor brought up the fact that some people can go into anaphylaxis during exercise.  WHAT!?!?!  You can actually be allergic to exercise!  I couldn't believe it!  I'm sure the military would NEVER accept this as an excuse... LOL!  I would usually never add a link to an About.com website, but this just puts it in such layman's terms.  I was able to understand this alot better than the actual medical sites that love to use medical jargon.  Click HERE to read about Exercise Induced Anaphylaxis.