Trying to beat this ITB pain!!!

As you know, I'm continually looking for a new way to beat my IT Band pain.  For those of you who are reading my blog for the first time....here is where your IT Band is located:

 

When the band rubs against the little bone in your knee, you will experience sharp pain on the outside part of your knee.  I have suffered with this for most of my running time as I try to increase my mileage.  I have seen chiropractors, osteopaths, and physiotherapists.  And tonight was no different....except that I saw a new physiotherapist.  Two members of the TTP have seen great success and raved about Joel from Nova Physio located in our area, so I decided to give him a try.   After a 1/2 hour assessment, Joel gave me 3 daily exercises that I need to complete to build my hip muscle.  Despite the fact that the pain stems in the knee, weak glutes and hips cause the knee to slide inwards, pulling on the IT Band.  Makes sense.  The only problem is I have to stick to doing the exercise...he said it will take 4-6 weeks before I will see a difference in my strength...that's a long time.

The 3 exercises that he gave me are:

1. Side Leg Raises - ensure the hip does not roll back, and lift the leg at a slightly backward motion.
2. Clam shells - I was doing these ones before....but he wants me to straighten my legs out a bit more.
3. Wall squats using an exercise ball.  This is a new one for me...and he wants me to do them as one leg squats.  OUCH!

On top of these exercises....foam roll 5 minutes per day!

I need to figure out some way to force myself to do these each day...stretching is the easiest thing to do (you can do it while watching TV) but I'm a HUGE slacker in this area.  Please feel free to remind me daily to do them!!!!!

Here is a great article on prevention and helping with ITB. http://www.runnersworld.com/injury-prevention-recovery/treating-and-preventing-iliotibial-band-syndrome

In other news, the Timberea Tundra Pounders will have group clothing in about 2 weeks.  The members are going crazy with orders and the town better watch out as it won't be able to miss the TTP as we run the streets.  A lot of us have signed up for the Santa Shuffle on Dec.7th and we should have the shirts by then.  I'm excited to see us line up at the start all wearing our group shirts.  :-)

Thanks for stopping by, only 2 days until the weekend!  YAHOO

This weekend is the Lucky 7 Relay and I'm making t-shirts for our team...will take pics as I work through it!!!