Injured but miss racing

omegamaster40

So, I suffered an 'overtraining injury' about a year ago and elected not to do surgery on my shoulder (torn anterior labrum). It does fine except for overhead rotations (i.e. freestyle).

I really want to get back into racing but don't sure what to do with the swim piece. I am thinking I will have to breast stroke with a modified kick or training with breast stroke to get my pool time in but then just pushing through the pain on race with freestyle.

Any suggestions or ideas?

TenPercentBF

Freestyle one arm, not great but doable. I have train with one arm freestyle before to show support to an arm amputated friend

jillebean86

Are you working with a physical therapist? Swimming might actually help strengthen the rotator cuff muscles to stabilize the shoulder, but you can't just jump in a pool and start race-training, even with breast stroke - even if you go slowly and build up strength safely with medical supervision, you may need to change your goals... probably stick with sprint distance this year. Remember, overuse is how you ended up with this injury in the first place, don't push through the pain and repeat the whole past year again!

If that's not a viable option, there are plenty of duathlon options out there. It looks like I'll be doing only aquabikes this year myself, but I think bike-run duathlons are the more common of the gimpy-triathlete events. And don't forget about relays! Once you get over the stigma of skipping 2/3 of the race, relays are relaxing and fun - like you're getting away with something.