Groin pain

I would stop running as of today. Go to the gym and find a x-training activity that doesn't hurt. Biking is best, but if that aggravates it then try something with less hip flexion (elliptical on low incline). If you are proficient at pool running I prefer that over elliptical because it is closer to running and you can get a great workout.

If you can bike with no pain, I would do a low intensity aerobic/threshold ride. You can maintain a great amount of fitness this way. You can also have many more workout days where you include intervals or bouts of tempo effort and not feel like you are getting hammered like you do when you are running. Don't stress about lost fitness. You aren't going to loose anything significant if you simply have a minor strain in the groin.

What I would do is wait until you are able to do some simple form drills (e.g. butt kicks, karaoke, high knees, skips, etc) WITHOUT any pain. If you can do these pain free chances are it's safe to get back out there. And just for mental comfort, you can take up to 14 days off of NO activity whatsoever and you are not truly losing any aerobic conditioning past 3%. Since you are on the bike you are obviously not even losing 3% fitness. The reason you'll feel a bit sloppy/fatigued when you start back up is just because neuromuscularly you won't feel as sharp. You'll be fine in 5-7 days if you let the injury heal first.

That is at least how I would treat it...

Thanks. Others agree? I am really torn up over this.

I experienced some groin pain (hip flexor/adductor) while training for a marathon two years ago. It was usually not too bad except for after long runs it was painful to lift my knee towards my chest, and doing situps or crunches hurt it.

I trained through it and ran the marathon, with the intention to let it heal after the race. I set a PR so I was happy about that. But instead of taking some solid time off, I got greedy and went back to training after a couple weeks and the pain was still there. After a few months it got worse and put me out of running for about 7 months. I don't think the layoff would have had to be that long but I over-did other things, like the elliptical. I trained on those machines way too hard and it still ended up aggravating the injury. In hind sight, just a few months of really easy short runs probably would have been fine.

I actually still have some remnants of it. I think it may never totally go away but at least it doesn't get worse pretty much no matter how hard I work out. It's just always there in the background.

I did go to a PT for a while when it was still bothering me. They never did figure out what it was. They had me do some exercises that didn't really help.

so what would you have done differently?

More opinions/experience on this please!

I think it depends where the groin pain is. is it in the adductors or at the junction of the legs to the thigh?

I have had groin pain for oh 2 years. Never diagnosed. I have chosen to run through it, and so far that has been the right choice.

What I have has every symptom of being a sports hernia, although I don't know for sure.

It started 2 years ago from just running - in my lower abdomen. Over the course of a year it moved slowly down to my adductors/groin, and now it is coursing over into might right leg.

About 6 months ago while I was doing strides, I felt a vicious twang and my whole abdomen/groin area was in serious pain. I stumbled home, took a month off, convinced I would have to have surgery.

But the pain receeded, and there I am now - mild pain while running, except when I try to go very hard. After doing 200s or 400s, it will hurt pretty bad for a week. When I have to sneeze on a run I have to stop because it hurts so bad.

But my running is not affected, so I am just living with it.

Most stories are different - that they just got worse and worst until they were out for life. we'll see.

Going to try and cycle today to see if that helps. Thanks.

it's probably your psoas so do more planks.

I agree 100% with Neliah's suggestion.

You specifically said "acute" pain, which to me is a discomfort usually involving an injury which needs immediate rest (although usually a short period).

However, the problem remains that pain is completely subjective.

While I do no necessarily condone being greedy with your body when it comes to pain, I can appreciate the fact you want to train through it. I would limit yourself to the following conditions (just my opinion):

1. If your stride changes or is compromised in any noticeable fashion, stop running and get on a trainer of some sort.

2. If you begin your run with a certain level of discomfort that raises only 1-4 points on a scale of 0-10, then keep running to toleration.

3. However, if that discomfort level raises past a dull ache or slight weakness and pushes you above a 5/10, stop running.

4. Sharp pain or stabbing that does not start to go away within first 5 minutes of run = stop running.

5. If you feel excessively worse after you stop running or the next morning (i.e. area gets very tight, burns, loss of ROM, sharp pains) then chances are you should stop running because in another 9 weeks it's not going to feel pretty.

Bottom line is "groin pain" can be a MILLION problems and a large amount of the time the pain is radicular and may not even be stemming from your groin. It could be coming from your SI-joint, hip capsule, pubic symphysis, etc. The smartest way to treat your body is individually.

My last bit of advice is if you have a marathon log, log your pain level for that day and exactly what hurt and how it hurt during the run. Log improvements/problems that are new. That way, you can take note of any trend. One of the worst problems with injuries that tend to creep into the picture is you have a chance to adjust mentally and physically to the pain and tell yourself it's not getting worse.

I pulled my groin this morning, it felt so good that I pulled it again.

can you elaborate on #5 and what you mean by not going to feel pretty?

Happened to me but much worse. I actually tore the muscle doing leg presses. - idiot move. Took about four months to heal; could not really walk for the first two. Take five days off and have it heal before you hurt yourself even more and end up being out for a year which sucks 50 times worse.