Forums >Health and Nutrition>Shin Splints
Hello,
A little bit of background:
I have been running on and off for most of my life. In the last few years I have run 1-2 half marathons a year, with breaks in between where I focused on other workouts like boxing and yoga. There has rarely been a time in the last decade or so that I did not work out at least 4 days a week, at least 45-50 min a time, either running, swimming, bootcamp, etc.
I started training for a full marathon in January after a few months of not running, but concentrating on other steady workouts - the marathon itself is May 21., so I have about 5 weeks.
I got new shoes, and ran a couple of weeks in them, including a 15 mile run. Last Wednesday I ran an 8 mile run, and noticed some shin pain. I skipped a day, then did a 12 mile run on Friday. I had pretty bad shin pain, so I took off Saturday. On Sunday I tried to run, but ended up turning right back around because the shin pain was too intense.
I forced myself to run Monday because I had always heard you should just run through shin splints. I got 3.5 miles but it was a pretty intense pain the whole time. For the rest of that day I was limping pretty badly. I have never gotten shin splints before, and I cannot believe how bad this pain is! That being said, I do not think it is a stress fracture, as the pain is pretty generalized in the shin area.
I did not run the rest of this week even though my training schedule had a 4 mile, a 9 mile, and a 5 miler scheduled. I ran 2 miles this morning and was limping for most of the beginning, but by the time I was finished it was not as bad. I am supposed to run an 18 miler tomorrow. I am sitting down icing my leg currently.
Any suggestions or advice would be appreciated! I am very afraid of not getting enough miles in before the marathon.
an amazing likeness
Shin splints usually are almost always an overuse injury aggravated by too much forefoot 'slap' or other impact load (lots of downhill running, shoe design,etc), overuse, calf tightness, etc.
First thing is to use icing and care with your gait to stop it from getting worse, then work on strengthening and stretching both the calf (eccentric heel raises) and anterior shin muscles.
Shoes, pace, frequency of running compared to newness to running, and running surface are the main factors that cause 80% of all SS incidents. You can do all you want to rehab them but unless you change the errors of your ways they will keep coming back.
Acceptable at a dance, invaluable in a shipwreck.
What milktruck said.
You would be well advised to reschedule your marathon after you have found and solved the root cause(s) of your shin splints.
SMART Approach
Is your pain directly in front of shin or or just a bit inside of the front of shin? Have you experienced this before? There is a chance you have a stress reaction or start of a stress fracture. Generally, a soft tissue shin splint will present with pain on inside of shin bone. Whether you do have a true shin splint or sterss reaction/fracture, more than likely you need to nix your marathon or this could lead to a scenario where you are laid up a long time. Taking a few months off from running before starting a marathon training program generally is not wise and probably contributed to your condition but many factors can be involved.
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I generally walk on my heels and toes after every run and then occasionally will find a ledge and do about 30 calf raises. 10 with toes straight, pointed out, and then pointed in. I used to get shin splints all the time until I added those steps to my routine
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