COMPLETELY CYST OFF!
Post-Witton Trail Relays and a concerted effort to get one's arse back in to gear. Strictly off-road when absolutely possible, hills, hills and more hills. I also got to take out my new training partner for the first time, Connie the dog. She loves the hills. The mileage has been a bit patchy in recent times with the old Achilles tendon still stifling real progress, another biting hamstring and general aches, pains, stiffness and slow recovery to remind me that a bit more care and precaution is necessary as I tumble past the first quarter of my forties. But the running was starting to come together again until the untimely appearance of a Baker's cyst which resides behind my right knee. First popping out in to prominence when swimming around the age of ten, the breaststroke kick was the culprit and ever since, this innocuous little sack occasionally fills itself with fluid after a hard workout and pokes out of the back of my leg like the top of a hard ball. It's not painful, just a little uncomfortable, feeling restrictive and stiffening the area behind the knee. Over the years I have got to know my Baker's cyst well, like a grumpy old friend whose buttons you have to be careful not to press too hard. Generally it deflates within a day or two after any aggravation. I am normally fine to go out for steady runs until it pops back in to hiding. But on this occasion it wouldn't go away. Even a super-steady couple of miles only served to irritate it further. I tried the bike instead, which turned out to be even worse. After fifty minutes of cycling I couldn't even straighten my leg afterwards. Concerned at this, I proceeded to do a bit more research which basically consisted of reading horror stories about ruptured cysts. I didn't want to risk a rupture!
It was time to have one of those little conversations with myself. I couldn't run, I couldn't ride. It was time for a break. In the end it was the best part of a fortnight of training disruption before the cyst subsided. Hardly a catastrophe, but yet more nuisance value to temporarily derail the ultimate goal of getting back in to some sort of form to race.