Calf strain?

[Crankin]

When I was on my tour, I had a back and leg massage the day we did the 17k (10 mile) climb. The therapist told me my right calf felt "different from my left," and that the muscles were stressed. She told me to stretch and baby it, as she was worried I could pull it, etc.
I hadn't noticed it at all before she told me this, but of course, as soon as someone puts an idea in my head, I obsess on it! I've been stretching it with calf raises. I did feel it a bit on the last day of the tour. Since then, I have only ridden twice and run twice, along with some yoga. Yesterday, I woke up and I could *feel* the pain. It's not excruciating, more like a dull ache on the right side of my gastroc. I don't remember feeling it hurt on my 5K Saturday; I wore sandals with small heels (1.5 inch) Saturday night and it was like after the run and wearing those shoes, it got worse.
I rested yesterday, finally getting my sleep back on US time. I can feel it even a little more this morning. I am supposed to ride later today (nothing more than my 18-20 mile loop), run tomorrow, as well as doing an easy ride with a friend. Wednesday I have a 50 mile hilly group ride.
What other stretches can I do to help this? Should I be icing it? Get a massage? Help!

[OakLeaf]

Are you working out trigger points? That should be done before stretching.

The ones I get in my calves are so hard and deep that my PT actually advised going over them with the foam roller first to soften them up, then attacking them with Stick or Thera-Cane.

On me they can be so hard and deep that the only ways I can get enough pressure without totally wearing out my arms and back are (1) sit on the floor, hold one end of the Stick and wedge the other end on a piece of furniture a foot or so off the floor, then drape my calf over that; or (2) again sitting on the floor, balance a Thera-Cane on the long protrusions, hold the curved end and use that to drag the small protrusions across my calf (ouch!!!). You might want to be a bit more gentle than that if it's giving you trouble.

Last time I had something that I was identifying as a strain, it was in my vastus intermedialis (no idea how I did that ), and I hesitated to do SMR on it, but as soon as I got it on the foam roller, it cleared up.

Hope you feel better soon.

[Crankin]

I don't have a stick or cane, but I did use the foam roller yesterday. Not sure how to exactly position it and myself to do that correctly. I ended up actually doing some upside down push ups (?) to get the right pressure to roll my calf out!
Will be going to work on this shortly. Thanks.

[OakLeaf]

Rolling pin will work, if you have one of those and don't mind putting it on your skin.

Opposite knee in a sitting position works too, but I can't get it close enough to the knee of the leg I'm working on, to get the highest points.

[KnottedYet]

Calf muscles don't spontaneously turn into hard knots for no reason.

Treating the knots is nice, but you might want to go after what caused the knots in the first place. It might be worth it to wander in to a PT's office and ask them to figure out what is off with the mobility of the foot on that leg, that it is causing your calf to go nuts. (usually its a dorsiflexion loss)

Some folks have bigger calves on their long legs, because they vault on that leg when they walk. But that's a life-long compensation, and not usually symptomatic.

(of course, you had no problem until the LMP mentioned you were assymmetrical -which everyone is- and got you stretching and eccentric loading the heck out of it... which would make anyone sore)

[OakLeaf]

Knott, can I jump in? The PT I saw was of the opinion that it was the knots that were causing my loss of dorsiflexion. Does this kind of thing tend to be a vicious cycle?

IAE they're getting lots better and I'm doing a lot of things, including strengthening my feet and hips, losing the custom orthotics in my running shoes, putting in support for the metatarsal arches, trying to stay away from aerobics as much as I can (really I'm thinking I won't teach any more after this year), and lowering the seat height on my bike.



Now that I think about it... Crankin, maybe it was the rental bike that did it? It was a matter of 3 mm that made all the difference in the world to my calves, and it was a long process of learning not to plantar flex while pedaling so that I could lower my seat without hurting my knees. It's a small enough difference that maybe you might not even have noticed being too high on the rental bike?

[Crankin]

Well, the geometry of my rental bike was fairly close to my own bike, despite the too long reach/brake lever issue. Both bikes are 48 cm. and the top tube and other parts were exactly the same measurements. I brought my own saddle, which was clearly marked to be set up at the same height. I also brought my own pedals. The bike had 12-25 gearing instead of the 12-27 I have, which did mean that I was working a bit harder in my granniest of granny gears, over terrain that was difficult. I might have tweaked something there.
Knott, my right is my longer leg. But, the only time I have ever had a calf issue is when I started running or back in the day, doing aerobics. That never lasted long. I would *love* to go for some PT... I would have to go to my doctor to write a scrip, which I generally don't want to do, but I will if necessary. My insurance seems to pay for endless PT, though.
I iced the area for 15 minutes (my son seems to have left a huge variety of ice packs here, from when he was racing) and it feels better. Will give it a couple of days and then decide if i will get a scrip for PT... since I will be traveling down to Philly next week for the wedding reception, it may wait until after that.

[KnottedYet]

Knott, can I jump in? The PT I saw was of the opinion that it was the knots that were causing my loss of dorsiflexion.

What caused the knots?

Again, knots don't spontaneously appear for no mechanical reasons. (chemical reasons, like electrolyte imbalances, dehydration, alcoholism, etc. will cause cramps) Dorsiflexion when gastroc is extended is influenced by the length of the gastroc, but any PT worth his/her salt knows to check the JOINT motion, not relative muscle length, when looking at dorsiflexion. (putting the gastroc on a slack so you get a truer measure of the joint mobility)

What we see over and over again is calf compensating for weirdness at the foot. The calf becomes anxious and tight because it's being asked to do a job that it wasn't meant to do (stabilize an ankle that is pronating due to the foot being forced to evert over a dorsiflexion derangement, for example)

Yeah, a tight gastroc will obviously limit dorsiflexion in certain positions. But first and foremost you always have to ask "what made the calf tight in the first place?"

I always hated the old PT saw "stretch the tight stuff, strengthen the weak stuff." Like that's all there was to it. If that's all we're doing, then we're just treating symptoms of the problem and not addressing the real problem; and we're no better than snake oil salesmen who would prescribe opium syrup for cancer. Yeah, the opium syrup makes a person feel better, but it doesn't do a darn thing for the cancer.

Don't let me get started. I have issues with the crap PT as a whole flings around as "treatment," and the complete lack of evidence-based decision making.

ETA: forgot the word "no" in the phrase "for no mechanical reasons"

[KnottedYet]

Knott, my right is my longer leg. But, the only time I have ever had a calf issue is when I started running or back in the day, doing aerobics. That never lasted long.

There you go. You solved the problem. You have a perfectly normal long-leg calf, the massage therapist freaked you out about it, you beat it up trying to stretch it, and now it's sore.

Leave it alone. It will be fine.

[Crankin]

Thank you! That was my gut feeling, anyway.

[tulip]

Did you walk on the beach over there in Spain? That'll make your calves sore because you are using your feet and legs differently.

Endless PT...that sounds wonderful.

[Crankin]

I didn't really walk on the beach, but I did do a ton of walking on cobblestones, which really was not fun, even with good shoes. We figured out that we probably walked at least 20 miles...

[tulip]

Crankin, I think you should go to the doc and have it checked out. I have known two people (active, healthy, 40s) who have developed deep vein thrombosis after transoceanic flights.

If you have to see the doc anyways for a PT prescription, you might as well get checked out for DVT to be on the safe side.

[Crankin]

I wore my Zoot compression recovery tights both on the way there and back, as well as after a couple of days of the riding. I suppose something could have happened on the way there, but the LMT noticed the difference in my calves before I came home.
OK, I will call.