On the 29th of July I participated in an ultra trail.
At Km 5,5 it went wrong, it was still pretty dark outside since we started at 5am and I made a misstep.
I knew immediately that it wasn’t just a small ankle twist.
I continued the race until Km53 out of 80.
Then I decided to stop as I noticed that my ankle started to swell up and I got more and more pain, so this was my first DNF.
One additional side note is that in total I sprained it 5 times during that 53K.
Back in our hotel I finally could asses the situation.
I could still walk on it, but the ankle was swelling up even more and I was in pain.
The first things that I did was place it under cold water.
Since I didn’t had a bad tub at my disposal, I used the shower to cool it off.
After the shower I applied a soothing gel called voltaren and I elevated my foot on a pillow.
Generally it’s recommended to put your feet higher than your heart to stop it from swelling even more so that’s what I did.
Before going to bed I reapplied the gel.
The next day we had a 6 hours drive back home.
Luckily my girlfriend took it upon her to drive so I could keep my foot up as much as possible on the dashboard.
When needed I applied another type of soothing gel which gives more of a cooling effect.
Once we got home i laced up the Adidas Solar glide 4 ST, which is a stability shoe.
Check out my review to know more about it.
I already went out for a 5K run, it started off really slow but I had the impression that my quads were suffering more than my ankle.
Around km 4 the ankle started to feel a bit uncomfortable though.
After the run I placed it in a cold bath with a temperature between 10 and 15 degrees.
I kept my foot in it for about 10 to 15 minutes.
This is something I kept doing for about 5 days, around 2 – 3 times a day and especially after when I went out running as I noticed that the ankle felt a bit warm and was a bit more swollen due to the impact.
Every time after the cold bath I also applied the soothing gel to cool it further.
Furthermore I also elevated my foot as much as possible during that first week, not in a sense that I elevated it higher than my heart, but just to let it rest.
I also immediately purchased myself an ankle brace to support my ankle during the day.
This has also helped a lot, but I noticed that I couldn’t wear it for a long time.
Usually after an hour or so it stated to bother me, so I removed it.
Because of this I only used it when I felt pain in my heel/ankle area.
The next days when I went out running I continued to test a bit more in what I could do and what not.
There were moments that I really wanted to do a long run but sometimes you got to take one step back to be able to take 2 steps forward.
That was how I was thinking at that time, I knew it wouldn’t have been a smart idea.
In that first 7 days I managed to run 44Km!
Even my girlfriend told me multiple times to please take some days off of running, but I listen to my body and I know my body very good.
The pain for me personally was still at a level that I can tolerate, if it would have been a 9 or even a 10 out of 10 then I would have decided not to run.
In total I ran 11 consecutive days in the Adidas solar glide 4 ST.
For me that shoe was a real life saver to be honest.
It gave me such a support and stability, that in a way I felt safe from the moment I’ve laced them up.
Difficult to explain, but even though that my foot was swollen, the shoe was really great.
It never felt too snug or too loose, always just right.
Also during a run and on uneven terrain, they felt the right choice and gave me a bit more confidence.
After switching over to other shoes, I noticed a big difference, but I gave my foot some time to adjust and to make sure that my ankle was stable.
During those first runs the only thing going through my mind was to make sure I don’t twist it again, or else I would have been in a very big mess.
But luckily everything worked out, and that is also due to the fact that I immediately started to take good care of it.
Not only I took good care of it, but my girlfriend also helped as much as possible to make sure I could keep my foot elevated.
It’s not because you have an injury that you cannot run.
It all comes down to how good you know your body and what you can tolerate.
Taking care of your injury the best way possible is always very important!
During my trail and my whole recovery I always remembered my motto: be positive, be motivated, be strong.
This was something that kept me going and made me keep fighting to get better!
Do check out the video to have a better idea of the products that i used to help my recovery!
And let me know if you found this useful or if you have any other suggestions that i could try if in the future i sprain my ankle again.
Until next time… bye
