BRUISE INJURY

QUESTION: Help! I am signed up to run my first marathon (thanks to Pose) in 2 weeks and I've injured my foot.

I woke up early yesterday morning to do my last 20+ mile run before the race. I was running in the dark and I stepped on a stick in the trail. The stick had a broken branch leaving a nice stub pointing upwards. The point went into the bottom of my NB 230s (thin sole) and poked me REALLY hard just behind the ball of my foot.

I went on for another mile to see if I could shake it off, but the pain didn't go away and I was worried about making things worse (I have a pre-Pose history of plantar fasciaitis) so I turned around and headed home.

I now have a red/purle bruise a little more than an inch in diameter about an inch behind the BOF. I am icing and elevating the foot. It's a bit sore, but not debilitatingly so. I ran 6 more miles on the injury (had to get home) and the pain was bearable.

My two questions are:

1) Does anyone have any advice on how to make the bruise heal faster.

2) What should I do for my remaining marathon training. I have done regular long runs culminating in two 20+ mile runs in addition to my regular running. This was to be the third. Do I need to get in a run of 22 or 23 miles? Should I just continue with my planned taper as if I had done the run? Do people think I'll make the bruise worse if I do another long run?

Opinions? Your help is much appreciated.

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ANSWER: It’s quiet a difficult task to treat this kind of injury on the foot, but it is possible to reduce the negative impact and the time of healing.

First of all, try to take off the inflamation. The simpliest way to do it – to take a hot bath with apple cider vinegar.

Second, try to involve the injuried tissues in some work through isolated exercises for the foot. Start with the plantar flexion exercise with no resistance. Sitting on a chair, place the foot on the floor on the heel and flex your toes 20-30 times in one set. Do 3-5 sets. Then try to do the same exercises with a slight resistance from a Thera-band (rubber band).

The next step is to do this exercise for the big toe in the same order: first, without resistance and then with the rubber band resistance, 3-5 sets by 20-30 reps. You have to continue doing these exercises until you get some burning feeling in your foot. If you don’t have a rubber band available, try to provide resistance with your hands.

Do it every day in combination with some running drills, which do not give any pressure on the injuried spot. Use hamstring and hips exercises to keep strength conditioning and also some cross training (biking and swimming) to maintain your aerobic condition.

When your pain reduces, include some short and long running. Do not be afraid of losing your conditioning. What you developed in your training previously will not dissappear in two weeks.

Dr.Romanov