Tape-tastic

During the LA Rock N Roll half, I began to experience some knee pain at about mile 6. Now I have felt "pain" while running before...my hip was giving me a lot of trouble for a while there...but I've never really felt anything that was debilitating enough that it crossed my mind that I might not finish a race. This was that kind of pain. It literally hurt so badly I had to slow down and walk a bit. And when I transitioned to a walk, the pain IMMEDIATELY decreased dramatically and would eventually go away completely once I wasn't on a decline. When I ran up hills, it didn't hurt, but running DOWN was excruciating. Luckily, I was able to walk enough on the downhills and run enough on the uphills that I was able to finish the race with my friend.

I know enough about running injuries that I immediately thought it could be ITBS. The location of the pain, the painful downhills, the immediate relief when walking...it all pointed to it. Post-race, I didn't really have too much trouble with it since I was mostly walking, but anything downhill, even SLIGHT, was a bit uncomfortable. Walking up stairs was okay, but coming down was nightmarish. I took it upon myself to go get my self-diagnosis checked out with my Physical Therapist today. As soon as I described the symptoms, he nodded and agreed it was definitely ITB related. Thankfully, he suspected that the big effort I put forth at Nike followed by another race the very next weekend might've put it into an overuse situation and he doesn't think it'll end up being a chronic problem since I've never had a problem with my ITB before. Ice, reduced running, stretches and strengthening are what he prescribed, which works out since this week is supposed to be a recovery week for me anyway.

He also recommended taping the ITB, and he did a tape job on it for me using KT Tape. I've seen this tape before at race expos, and mostly just thought wow, that stuff looks weird. As bizarre as it looks, once I was taped up, they got me on the treadmill for a little test run. After a mile on zero decline, they put the tread on a 2% downhill. This was really painful during the race, but with the tape on (and after having had a few days rest!) I didn't feel any pain. I still say it looks really weird, but I was sold enough to pick up a roll of KT Tape to keep in my race bag. It came with instructions on how to tape preventatively and for a huge variety of injuries, and online you can even see videos of how to tape yourself. I'll keep everyone posted on how things go moving forward, but so far I'm liking the stuff. It will supposedly stay on for up to 5 days even through showers and swimming. (So far, it's lasted really well through one shower!) We'll see. And it's a plus that the pink tape matches my Nike Finisher's shirt! Have you ever tried KT Tape? If so, I'd love to hear what you thought.