Today I went to pole vault practice.
When I first started learning to pole vault nearly five years ago now, regular weekly practice was Sunday morning.
With the summer heat bearing down every day right now, Sunday morning is still a great time to practice.
I thought today’s practice might be a bust when my left calf kinda pulled a little bit as I started warming up. When I first started learning, I pulled nearly every muscle in my body at one time or another. One of the times I hurt my groin muscle — the left-side adductor, I think it was — I actually tore that thing. The reason I know it tore is because my entire upper leg turned deep purple from bleeding inside. It also was excrucatingly painful.
I’ve also pulled a calf muscle a couple of times and that ain’t no fun, either, so when I felt a twinge today in the calf, I nearly called it a day before things got worse. But I decided to carefully try one more little two-left jump and it was OK. So I tried one more and another one after that, and I guess the muscle got warmed up or decided to cooperate for some reason, and I went on with a really good practice session.
My calf is a little sore right now, but not injured, so it should be fine in a day or two.
When you’re working out, learn to listen to your body. There have been plenty of vault practice sessions, especially in the beginning, when I decided to call it a day, rather than push through a little pain or something and wind up injured and out of commission for six or eight weeks.
There have been days in the gym when I’ve cut things short after a half-hour or whatever and said, ‘That’s enough.’
Some days are better than others.
A friend of mine quotes Bo Jackson or somebody when he says, ‘Some days, 100 pounds feels like 50, and some days 50 pounds feels like 100. Just work with whichever body shows up that day.’
That’s it for today.
Listen to your body — it knows best.
