So Tuesday was fine, as reported. But yesterday the pain returned to my inner right calf. Today was my routine follow up appointment with the podiatrist. I showed him the problem and he literally put his finger right on it. YOW! The pain normally is very light, but when he put slight pressure on a specific spot on my tibia it was like lightning through my leg.
His verdict: Traditional shin splits are caused by inflammation of the ligament along the bone. So the pain is usually felt all along the bone. In my case he felt down the bone and there was no pain and then BOOM, there it was. Then he kept going and just as fast as it came, it went away. This explains a lot, including why ice didn't help.
A stress fracture is a microscopic fracture of the inside of the bone (he showed me a model of the bone). It's the step before a regular fracture. It's caused by too much running too fast. He confirmed that this is a new injury unrelated to my previous one (which is still perfectly fine). He took an x-ray to make sure it hadn't already turned into a real fracture. Negative. He was happy to hear that it doesn't hurt when I actually run on it, so it could be very slight. I have to get an MRI next week to confirm.
If confirmed, the diagnosis is: 6-8 weeks no running (swimming, biking weight lifting is fine) and then a very strict and gradual build up under his supervision.
Sorry
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the_macnab, the Doug Flutie Jr. 5K is out for me. As for the marathon, it is looking tough. The official marathon training schedule begins Nov 1 with a 20 minute run. My leg will be ready by then, but I will be starting from stratch yet again. And under strict rules to not progress too quickly. So I dunno. It's not out, but this is definitely a set back. My plan right now is to swim, bike and lift weights aggressively - basically do everything I can to simulate long distance running without the running.