My Torn Meniscus

Update: This page is by far the most popular on Cantabloggia. If you're interested in how a runner might recover from arthroscopic meniscus surgery, these later posts may be of interest:


My best mile in 5 years, 10 months after surgery
My best marathon ever, by 19 minutes, 20 months after surgery
Beating Lance Armstrong in the Boston Marathon, 25 months after surgery

MRI of my knee. At the end of that yellow arrow is a white area at the bottom of the black triangle which is the anterior horn of the medial meniscus. That would be a tear in the cartilage.

Well, I now have a decent explanation of why it hurts to run 100m. The medial meniscus is the cartilage that sits between the femur (the big black almost-circle above the arrow is the bottom end of the femur) and the tibia (below the arrow). It's the shock absorber of the knee. The white area right at the end of the yellow arrow above is evidence of a tear in the meniscus. The meniscus itself doesn't have much in the way of nerve endings, but I gather that running with a torn meniscus puts strain on lots of other things, since the bones above and below it are accustomed to working with a smooth, not torn, piece of cartilage between them. Looks like the best treatment is to cut off the torn piece, so you end up with a thinner but smoother meniscus. Arthroscopic surgery is probably in my future - hopefully with more pictures to come.

I thought it was very cool that I could get a copy of my entire MRI, complete with the software to read it, on a CD-ROM. No extra charge once the MRI is paid for. Hence the picture above.

I have a rule on this blog (occasionally violated) to always touch on at least 2 of the 4 themes. I couldn't really find a good architecture- or travel-related angle on this (running-related) injury, so I'm going for the musical angle. Songs about torn menisci are few and far between, but the following song:

My Blue Hawaii - Future Bible Heroes

does at least have the property that you can sing "My torn meniscus" in place of the title. Rest assured I have done so. I see a future Karaoke possibility here.

I also have been getting a lot of value out of my small collection of dance & techno music lately, as it is perfect for riding on the stationary bicycle, my alternate exercise of choice while running is off the menu. Here is one of my favorites:

Hey Boy Hey Girl - The Chemical Brothers

I think that song increased my pedaling cadence by about 10 rpm the first time I put it through the headphones. More from the grammy-winning Chemical Brothers another day.

No Cliché Unturned

As noted previously, the concept of playing "Chariots of Fire" during a running event has worn a little thin over the last couple of decades. With the Academy Awards almost upon us, I propose to institute my own awards, The Vangies, or more formally the Vangelis awards for worst musical choice during athletic events. While the organizers of the national cross country championships made a promising early entry with multiple hits on the all-time most-clichéd songs list, the front runner for 2006 will have to be the Reebok Boston Indoor Games.

I had competed in the 2005 version of this event, and until sidelined by a knee injury (recently diagnosed as a torn meniscus), was planning to compete this year as well in the Masters Mile. I even had my name in the progam, along with a photo of last year's race that used a cunning camera angle to create the illusion that I was at one point not in last place. However, as it happened I was in the stands this year when the gun went off for the old men's race. And as if to rub salt in my wounds, the gun was immediately followed by the tired old sound of Chariots of Fire. My GBTC friends all turned to me and laughed, my opinions on this song being well known at this point.



Above: Pete Hegelbach wins the masters mile and shows his opinion of Chariots of Fire as a race soundtrack.


While the night was outstanding from an athletic standpoint (see letsrun.com for coverage) the musical aspect only went downhill from the opening event. My first thought was "Oh well, at least we've got that out of the way" when I heard Chariots of Fire the first time, but in fact it would be repeated at least 3 times during the night. It only got worse from there. While Eye of the Tiger was mercifully omitted, a number of other lame songs made appearances, notably Time by Hootie and the Blowfish. This song has little to recommend itself at the best of times but it completely lacks the beat to be a good song to play during a race.

So, in reponse, I offer a new addition to my suggested songs for track meets. The first one seems particularly appropriate for a discus competition, but also makes a lot of sense whenever a world record attempt is under way (as was the case several times at the Reebok games).

You spin me round (like a record) by Dead or Alive. I think I could improve my mile time by a second or two with that pumping out over the speakers rather than Chariots of sodding Fire. (sorry, this is only an excerpt, not the whole song.)


I also offer a track that I mistakenly omitted from my earlier post on obvious running songs:
Long Run by the premiere Australian socialist folk-rock ensemble Redgum. They always used to finish concerts with this track as it was the only upbeat song they ever recorded.