Karissa Schweizer Update - Calf tear not anything with her achilles

How medals does the US have? Seems like they have more than a few other countries.

I just turned on the 35K race walk. The first words I heard was:

"Many believe wearing the carbon plated shoes too much in training is causing repeated lower leg, specifically calf & Achilles injuries. More and more coaches are advocating limiting these shoes for training." IF this is true there would have to be a decision based on how that risk compares with the reported benefit of saving legs from repeated hard efforts.

I wonder if this has any teeth and what approach BTC takes. Has there been a upswing in lower leg injuries among professional athletes?

This is an interesting query to me.

For sure, but mostly in sprints / short distance and throwing different types of objects far. But here, we are mostly intested about distance running, and from 1500 to marathon, it is not finished yet of course, but for the moment USA have the same number of medals as the Vatican.

Is the thinking that the shoes mess with your calf/Achilles? Or that the added cushioning prevents your calf/Achilles from building the necessary strength to handle long distances in spikes?

The latter makes sense conceptually. It's not clear to me what would cause the former.

I do not know the overall context of my quote. I literally turned on the TV and the British commentator said this, so I missed any set up providing context.

Personally, if it holds any water, I agree with you. Overuse of the shoes allows the lower legs/Achilles to become dependent on the aid and weaken because of it. They shorten and become lazy so-to-speak. Again, "IF" this has any credence.

yeah a 10000m track final obviously takes a toll on the legs; it makes it even more amazing thinking that Viren did the double in '72 and '76 with heats in the 10000m back then! Shorter won in Munich in '72 in the Marathon with 2 10000m heats ran under 28 minutes in the 10 days prior--crazy considering the shoes that they wore then also...

the reality is the US women are no where close to the Africans in these races . Cranny hung on until 600 to go and was 15 seconds back from the winner . quite a spread there

1500/5k/10k at USAs was a bridge too far and set her up for injury (possibly reinjury) at World's. At USAs, I didn't see that her extra 1500 training made her faster at the end of the 5k or 10k, and that didn't happen at Worlds either. I don't think she wants to repeat that experiment. Based on past performance I would have expected her to be more competitive in a 14:46 race, especially the first 4800 meters.

An injury is an injury and she’s injured AGAIN. Idiotic decision by her and the coaches at USAs to go for so many events . Got a little greedy. Glad she did so well in the 10k before she hurt herself

not enough burritos

A strain is a muscle or tendon tear; their are 3 grades of severity. Similarly, a sprain is a lilgament tear, also with grades of severity.

There was an article in regards to carbon-plated racing shoes. The last point is in regards to how often one should train in carbon-plated shoes (and, to me, this can be applied to carbon-plated super-spikes):

".....How often should you train in your racing shoes?
This has been a popular topic as more brands have unveiled their carbon-fiber racing shoes and people enjoy running in them so much they want to wear them every day. In general, you shouldn’t train a lot of miles in the specific shoes you’ll be
racing in for a couple of reasons. First, the midsole foam material won’t be as springy and responsive on race day if you’ve logged a lot of miles in them. If you like the feel of your race-day shoes and want to wear them often, you might consider buying a second pair to wear on occasional training runs.
The second reason not to wear them every day is that shoes with rigid carbon-fiber plates don’t allow for natural dorsiflexion of your foot (upward turning of your
toes). Although research is lacking so far, some elite and age-group athletes suggest training too many days a week in carbon-fiber racing shoes can lead to numbness in the forefoot, strained calf muscles, and Achilles tendons, and stress reactions in the plantar tissue under the feet.

In addition to injury risk, Samantha Cocca, an athletic trainer and strength and conditioning
coach in Denver, cautions runners not to wear super shoes every day in training because running in such stiff shoes could weaken the muscles under their feet and toes since the shoe is providing much of the propulsion. “It’s great when
you’re running in the shoes, but the second that you’re not running in the shoes you’re just creating a stress you’re hiding in these shoes,” Cocca says.She suggests wearing them no more than twice a week for a long run or a speed workout. Cocca adds that anyone who wants to train or race in super shoes better be doing drills to strengthen their plantar fascia and the muscles in their toes. You need to strengthen your toes so that you’re able to generate your own force, she says, and can then create more propulsion through the shoes....."

Ms Cocca helped me through an injury, and I highly respect her knowledge given her background.

Yikes lol. As if Sifan Hassan didn't just win an Olympic gold in both the 5 & 10 at the last olympics.

Remember when Clayton Murphy tried to do all the rounds of the 800m and 1500m at USAs and then promptly got injured? They people run or fly to close to the sun ...

Many double in the 5 and 10 and many have had double wins in them in the past, so why not now? But Karissa was coming off of an achilles injury. Now, to say that this wasn't achilles, it was a calf strain as if these are not closely connected injuries is wrong. Tight calves pull hard on the achilles and lead to tears in both. Just look at what exercises you do to get over achilles injuries of lower grade than a full tear--eccentric calf raises. So, in her rehab she'll want to do exercises that help with both. She's lucky this wasn't another achilles tear.

The armchair QBs in this thread have no clue and I am glad you are pointing it out. When someone has an injury issue they act as if they could see it coming and they know why it happened. They have no clue but the worst part is their combo of ignorance and arrogance.

I guess this is good news. An Achilles problem can take a year or more to heal. And muscle tear takes 6 weeks, and probably won’t need surgery if mild.
By the way, a muscle strain is the same as a tear (it’s the medical term for it). Same for “sprains” when talking about ligaments/tendons.
They graded into mild, moderate and severe, though.

This is helpful and interesting. However she isn’t doing easy runs in super shoes so is actually following the guidance of not running in them more than twice a week. So is it actually an issue that she’s running in them?

If they start allowing super shoe flats on the track (which IMO they should) it will be interesting to see if athletes start wearing them in 10K’s to help save their legs for the double

A strain is just a layman's term for a mild tear. It's a matter of degrees and the amount of fibers torn. This is googleable.

It's funny to listen to people with no expertise try to use medical terminology with a very serious expression on their face like they have some idea what they're talking about.