The Interventional Use of Water Treadmill Running During Long Periods of Injury.
The repetitive nature of endurance running and the transference of energy generated on impact with the ground2,3 is entwined with reported high incidences of lower extremity injuries. Previous reports suggest incident rates of those embarking on training for distance events are between 2.5-12.1 per 1,000 h6 with specific reports regarding those training for a marathon equating to >70% of participants.7 Such odds, makes training for events like the marathon a particularly risky business and there seems to be no distinguishable preference to individual performance status.
As such the injured runner faces the predicament of a cessation in training, the onset of an initial negative psychological/emotional response(s),9 followed by differing degrees of physiological and subsequent performance detraining effects.10 Justifiably, such emotional responses are based on the substantiated and well documented understanding that physiological function decreases after as little as 3 weeks cessation due primarily to cardiovascular system changes. However, the differentiation between cessation of training and a reduction in training load in terms of physiological and performance response is critical.
Therefore, the purpose of this case report is to establish the efficacy of waist depth ATM running throughout a period (28 days) of injury to the lower leg, where normal land based running was not possible. As such the emphasis was to assess and compare post-injury LTM running spatio-temporal parameters and the subsequent physiological responses with pre- injury measures at a sub-maximal running velocity. As such the emphasis was to assess and compare post-injury LTM running spatio-temporal parameters and the subsequent physiological responses with pre-injury measures.
Sport Exerc Med Open J. 2015; 1(6): 174-181. doi: 10.17140/SEMOJ-1-127