Dream Chaser On Wheels

Finally Some Good News

After weeks of treatment, I'm happy to say that I finally see light at the end of the tunnel. There are hours in the day when my fingers are no longer numb and tingly. The sensation of weakness in my hand is also getting milder when I swing my arms during workouts. All signs are pointing to full recovery in near future. Woohoo!

At any typical indoor practice, my club mates would probably find me exceedingly grumpy. I've been wondering about that too and I finally connected all the dots recently. The truth is, I am actually skating better than all my previous seasons at indoor. However, Monday nights are brutal in my training schedule. It is the tail end of a series of hard sessions starting from Saturday and thus intended as a recovery workout. Often times, my legs are so sore that I am doubtful of my ability to stay on my feet. It is frustrating for me when I do not complete the drill as instructed and appear like I challenge the coach's authority.

Despite fighting my Monday night fatigue, I did break into a smile that I could not suppress at our last practice. For the last set of the 25 lap drill, coach PD asked us to skate in the clockwise direction. If you remember, I rediscovered my right crossover last week when I went ice-skating at a public session. That muscle memory translated beautifully and I finally can crossover in the other direction with proper underpush! I was smiling ear to ear because of this small victory. I can see this being helpful in my road racing since many of the marathon courses involve multiple right hand turns. Last summer my typical approach was to glide my way through and accelerate out of the turn. It was a bit clumsy and definitely drained more energy than necessary. If I do not lose any speed with right cornering by next summer, I'll be one very happy girl. 

Recovery Fun

Little known fact: I gave figure skating a try as an adult skater before I got into inline speed skating.

Back in February 2002, like many people, I rushed home every evening and stayed up late to follow the Winter Olympics. Of all the sports featured on the broadcast, I was most interested in figure skating which of course occupied lots of airtime. In fact, I was so inspired that I ran out immediately and signed up for the adult learn-to-skate program at my local figure skating club. Figure skating has strong roots in my community with world-class skaters such as Elvis Stojko and Emanuel Sandhu hailing from Richmond Hill. I'm lucky to have easy access to some great facilities right in my neck of the woods.

As Canadian, of course I already knew how to skate on ice. I always had a good time goofing around at public sessions but what I really wanted was something more. I set my sight on being able to do one jump and one spin. If you are not aware, figure skating is a very youth-oriented sport. When I showed up to class on my first day, I quickly found out the adult program consisted of either new immigrants who cannot skate at all or ex-figure skaters who used to compete when they were kids. Grown-up with aspiration to learn some figure skating moves was indeed a rare breed. Over the course of three winters, I progressed through the CanSkate program and received my badges. Terms such as 3-turn, mohawk, bracket turned from meaningless words to things that I could do on ice. And yes, I learned to jump (single revolution only heh) and spin.

It had been years since I last took to indoor ice on my figure skates. On Monday night, a string of scheduling coincidence gave me a chance to revisit the arena for an atypical recovery workout. My blades! They were so short! And that rocker! Argh toe pick! Hey my ankles were locked in place! My shins were not happy while I shuffled around and gingerly adjusted to the feel of figure skates. Slowly but surely, I got more comfortable with better posture and more powerful pushes. Before I knew it, the crosscuts (I guess that's figure skating lingo for crossovers except the blades do not leave the ice) were smooth and I was gliding across the ice with some decent speed. I was smiling ear to ear from the sheer enjoyment.

Of course, public session has the unspoken rule of changing direction at the half-way mark. When the skate patrol ushered everyone to skate clockwise, I was once again tentative with my crossovers. Actually, "tentative" is too forgiving of a description. I barely pushed anything...oh the embarrassment. However, with nothing else better to do in those 45 minutes, I forged ahead and muscle memory eventually returned. I was so unbelievably happy when I finally regained my ability to crossover "the other direction"! Just goofing around, I even managed to do a tiny waltz jump.

Getting back on my figure skates was a fun recovery workout. At the same time, I have a new-found appreciation of how much I sucked back in the days. Knowing what I know now, I realize I never had good command of my edges before. Nor did I know how to cover the ice with few strides. And how incredibly slow I used to be. Perhaps there is some truth to MW's advice: taking up a different sport will help with my inline skating abilities in unexpected ways.

A Note On My Injury

Updates to my blog have been infrequent lately because I have been occupied with treatments for my shoulder. In the last couple of weeks, it was bi-weekly trips to the chiropractor and weekly trip to the massage therapist. Training continues as normal but then it's only the typical rotation of weights, plyos, indoor, and aerobic sessions anyway. Nothing out of the ordinary. By now, I am used to the volume and intensity of winter training. Muscles do get sore but they are simply good reminders of how tough the program really is.

My index and middle fingers on my right hand are numb. The diagnosis is that the 5th and 6th section of my spine are pinching the corresponding nerve. There are also various trigger points on the upper right side of my torso around my shoulder. This all sounds a bit icky to be honest. However, repeated treatment are helping me to open up the spine as well as work out some tensions in the muscles. You know that sensation when your arm fall asleep and all of a sudden it warms up and all feeling returns back to normal? In the last week, my right arm feels like it's on the verge of experiencing that sensation.

I've been concern that my injury may lead to disc herniation. I brought it up to my chiropractor and he deduced from my symptoms that it is not a likely possibility. That is reassuring to know. Did I mention that both my chiropractor and massage therapist used to be speed skaters? I think that is awesome cool because communication is so much easier.

Because of the unexpectedly slow recovery of my injury, I am once again postponing an extended work trip to India. I want to be absolutely sure that I am injury-free before leaving the country. Stopping and resuming treatments would only drag on recovery and thus a waste of money.

Strength Of Relevance

Yesterday I briefly touched upon strength as a focus for my winter training this year. I've given it some more thoughts and have since drawn some connections between what I do and how I skate. What do you think of when you describe a skater who possesses lots of physical strength? One who does not get tired when everyone else does? Or perhaps one with huge leg muscles? Those are some obvious associations but they are not the connections that I see with my training.

Of course I work hard on my cardio so that I can finish a race and recover from multiple bursts of acceleration during a race. I also train to get more powerful so I have a higher top-end speed and better acceleration. Technique is not necessarily the first thing that comes to mind when mentioning strength but it has everything to do with improving my skating technique. I have a number of technique issues that go way back. Coaches have worked with me patiently over the years. We identify the symptoms. We try to analyze the root cause. We try to come up with visualization tricks. Of course I still don't skate with good technique. Is it because I don't try hard enough? Possibly. Is it because my body is built such a way that prevents me from executing good technique? Not likely. After many frustrating sessions, coach SZ came to this conclusion: I do not yet have the necessary muscular strength to execute good technique.

Let's use an example to illustrate my point. When I first learned to crossover, coach AA spent lots of time correcting my collapsing left knee. Knee should point out instead of in, easy enough, right? Well, no. Lacking the necessary strength in the glutes to actually balance my weight with my left knee pointing out, my body compensates by collapsing the knee.

An obvious solution is spend more time on skates while maintaining good technique. If it's only that easy. How long can I realistically skate with "perfect" technique? A few minutes? Once I pass that threshold, body seeks a more comfortable position and once again I am reenforcing compensation and bad habits. This reminds me of the saying "one step forward, two steps back". In order for me to break out of that cycle, coach SZ prescribes weight training and off-skates drills that focus on strengthening my skating-specific muscles. This is the kind of strength I try to develop this winter.

It is too early to tell if it is working yet. SZ and I both know that it is a long-term investment. I still remember the time when I could not will my body to move certain ways. It was especially frustrating when coaches pointed out the same issues over and over again. I wanted to cry "I understand you perfectly, I just cannot do it"! That, of course, is an unacceptable response because cannot is a word that does not exist in a dedicated athlete's vocabulary. Changes do not happen overnight. However, recently, I'm starting to feel that I have better control of my body. I can actually make minor changes and feel the difference they make. I am confident that I am on the right path.

Can't Fake It

Last Friday I visited a RMT (registered massage therapist) for my shoulder and numbed fingers. Did I mention that my RMT and coach are actually the same person? The obvious advantage is that she has an in-depth understanding of my training, my conditioning, and my sport. During the session, SZ brought up a few observations of how an athlete's body feels different to a massage therapist. It was certainly interesting information but then today I realized something funny. As my coach, that massage session also revealed information on my conditioning. Weight training is a new addition for me this year and I am already into week 6. The fact that toned muscles feel different in her hands means if I slack off, she can tell. Wow.

Yesterday was my usual long hours of aerobic training. I went to the gym first thing in the morning to spend some time on the bike. I felt good but my day was far from finish. I rushed home for a quick bite before driving to the trail for some outdoor skating. The weather was still remarkably skating-friendly and I met up with a few friends on the trail. Unlike last week, I felt strong and skated quite well for this time of the year. From past experiences, when the mercury dips, my skating would feel sluggish. It was not the case on Sunday and I was definitely surprised. Perhaps getting stronger and developing more power really do help with skating in less ideal weather condition.

Indoor practice is also going well. My third indoor session had me facing my nemesis, echelon drill. Skating in such close proximity and so close to the cones are sure ways to get me tense up. Of course, when I'm tense, there's little hope for me to skate with any decent technique. In previous winters, that has always been the case and I was always frustrated with the drill. Something changed subtly at practice tonight. I was still uncomfortable and not skating as technically proficient as I could be during echelon. However, I had more confidence in leaning on my wheels. That translated to tighter corners and better control of my skates. I really hope that I can continue with this upward trend for my indoor skating for the rest of the season.