Track and Field Blogs - Reid Coolsaet

Since my last race a few weeks ago I've been laying low, getting fat, hanging out with friends, skateboarding and mountain biking. I also had a check-up with the doctor who works with the National Endurace Centre here in Guelph. In the check-up I mentioned that my right foot has been hurting for about a year and a half, not enough to stop running but enough to cause pain if I step on uneven ground. So she decided it would be best to get an X-ray and bone scan to rule out anything serious. During the bone scan last thursday I saw a couple of bright spots on my right foot on the screen. My coach decided, just to play it safe, that I should not run for a few more days until I got a diagnoses...

I just got back from my doctor’s office where I got the results from my blood test, X-ray and bone scan. Blood results were good and the X-ray didn’t pick up on anything, no surprises in those departments. The diagnoses from the doctor who looked at the bone scan was that I have a “Probable stress fracture base of the right metatarsal. Probable stress fracture right navicular bone” and “shin splints left tibia.” My doctor had to make sense of “probable”. My foot hasn’t felt this good in a long time as I’ve only run once since September 15th. The plan is to start running this week and ramp-up really slowly and supplement with pool running and biking. I was a little worried that the results would of been worse and I would of had to take more time off, so this is good news as I definitely feel like running on the trails again!

My first race back will most likely be an 8km in Van Cortlandt Park on November 3rd in NYC. It will be a fun weekend for the Speed River team to compete as a team in a XC race and also to watch the American Olympic Marathon Trials. Since I’m not even running yet I will likely treat the Nov. 3rd XC race as a workout and then lay it down later in November in Manchester, CT.

Tomorrow I’ll be taking part in the world record attempt for the most people to walk 1 km at the same time. There are tons of sites across Canada that are taking part and I’ll be talking about promoting an active lifestyle at the Fergus site. Later this week I’ll post an entry about the best practical joke ever played on me, always a crowd pleaser.