[hafjell]

I pulled my soleus (muscle near the achilles) and am unable to run for a while. I can do all of the core and half of the strength exercises in my transition phase, but none of the cardio.

Any thoughts for a work-around while I recover? Swimming is an option, but I know this won’t translate well to skimo.

Topic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on October 12, 2018 at 4:29 pm #13941

Roller skiing!

It’s terrifying to start, but I’ve found roller skiing to be a great, low-impact addition to my training this year. It’s made a big difference to how much volume I can handle.

When I feel my knees or hips start to protest from running, I put a few days in of roller skiing. If I keep roller skiing to 20-30% of total training time, I find I don’t have any knee or hip issues at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous on October 13, 2018 at 1:19 pm #13955

While I agree with Scott that roller skiing will allow you to add considerable volume to yor aerobic training, There is a significant learning period and the soleus muscle may be even too sensitive for roller skiing. Swimming is a great exercise but being non-weight bearing and arm centric would be down the list for my choice. I hike as first choice if possible, then stair machine, then bike, then swim.

By the way: read this. Cardio is not what you are doing for basic aerobic training. https://uphillathlete.com/dont-call-it-cardio/

It is my personal mission in life to get people to stop using this term incorrectly. You want to condition the skeletal muscles to develop a better aerobic capacity with this easy base training.

Scpott