Week 2 - Monday 23 January

Straight back into it with an 8am start at PW this morning - ouch! Another good two hours with David starting with forward, backward and side lunges to target the glutes and hamstrings; then moving onto the treadmill for the best part of an hour. As David said this morning, my issues are almost all neurological - the muscles are functioning and the strength is either there or building fast, but I need to get them to fire faster and with the correct co-ordination. To help me do that, I do two types of treadmill exercises (in the harness, to provide partial body weight support and safety) - at slower speeds, constantly shifting from forwards to sideways to backwards walking, to confuse the nervous system and train it to keep up with the changes; and "overspeeding" - challenging my legs to fire the right muscles in the right sequence to power forward and keep up with an increasingly faster treadmill. Last week my top speed was 4.1kph; today I comfortably reached 4.5 (or was it 5?) kph with no assistance from David and briefly got over 5.5kph with some assistance. That was a huge improvement - David and I were delighted! To keep up the focus on the glutes and calf muscles, I was then strapped back into the sled pull, which challenges the whole thing - glutes, hamstrings, calfs, co-ordination. Last Friday I pulled 20k. That's about Amy's weight and I told the kids that meant that I'd be able to pull Amy down the street when I get home. Today I pulled 32k, around Max's weight! So now the kids are waiting for me to get over 50k, so I can pull them both at the same time! On the way through, I had a very definite change in sensation in the ball of my right foot. For the first time, albeit briefly, I felt what seemed like the right type and level of sensation at the right time in the push off. My sense was that was a response to the work I did on Friday on the power plate - so we got me straight back on there for more of the same.

Eric, one of the co-founders of PW, then gave me an hour of great input to improve my right leg movement. Big focus on the hamstrings; building stability in the pelvis; and keeping a slight bend in my right knee as the foot lands and avoiding hyper-extension. Andrew, if you're reading this, you'll find it all very familiar!

This afternoon I've done pretty much my entire set of OT exercises, making this the first day when I've managed by full regime - 3 hours at PW and a couple of hours OT. I ended the afternoon with a walk outside, to test whether the work done this morning was bedding in. Result - very happy with my walking (but need to keep focussed on that right knee and pelvis)! Its a stormy day in SoCal today, with the wind whipping up some surf and sea spray on the Pacific. Staying upright in a gale force wind was not one of my goals - but I think I've checked that box!!