I have a plantar plate tear in my left foot. Welp.
There will be no Thanksgiving half marathon through the streets of Atlanta for me this year. This is the first time I’ve registered for a race and later had to pull out because of an injury.
I am admittedly pretty bummed! Like any triathlete, I’ve certainly had injuries over the years. But this is the first time the word “tear” has had to enter my lexicon. Corny realization: It is painfully appropriate that the word “tear” is a heteronym. This tear in my foot has brought a tear to my eye. Har har har.
Remarkably, I actually have had this tear for over a month. For better or worse, I raced Ironman 70.3 North Carolina with this injury! I still went sub-5 hours for the first time, set a PR, and finished higher than I’ve ever placed in any Ironman branded event. Now I’m wondering what would have happened if I hadn’t been running with pain in my left foot.
After Chase poked and prodded at my foot yesterday, he said there’s no doubt this is his diagnosis. But it’s a mystery exactly how and when I tore this ligament. I didn’t feel any pain during my training block leading into North Carolina. (I felt terrific throughout!) I first noticed it while walking from the parking garage at Nashville’s airport before our flight out to Raleigh.
I’ve learned over the years that my brain is notorious for inventing phantom pain and injuries during race week. I can’t even begin to tell you how many potentially crippling injuries I’ve felt pop up during race week. Or the fake sore throat from the phantom cold. Or the fake headache the night before the race. But magically, when race day arrives, all is well.
So while I felt it all through race week, I dismissed it as another nonsense injury that I’d made up in my head.
During the run, I do remember feeling pain in my foot. But the story of 70.3 North Carolina for me was how cold I felt. I struggled to stay warm during the bike and run, particularly in my hands and feet. So I wrote off any foot pain as a result of the cold, and ran through it on my way to a PR.
In the weeks since, that foot pain has remained and intensified. Only then did I realize something was wrong, so I made the call to see Chase.
After the diagnosis yesterday, I spent most of the day having a pity party since I’m sidelined from running for a while. The immature response to this would be to get down in the dumps, wonder why bad things happen to me, and drown my sorrows in fried chicken.
But I am trying to resist the temptation!
I should be able to avoid a walking boot or surgery. That’s not nothing! This will undoubtedly be the headline of my winter offseason, but I should be ready to go next March for Ironman 70.3 Little Elm in Texas. There is never a good time for a serious injury, but the start of the offseason is the most manageable.
Charlie Morton pitched for the Braves in Game 1 of the 2021 World Series on a broken leg. I had my best ever Ironman 70.3 with a plantar plate tear. Totally the same thing, right?
