Lateral ACL tear during a practice session with a noob in 2009. No surgery as the tendon wasn't torn to the point of major instability, but my knee has been 'loose' ever since.
Haven't sparred or fought in awhile and the extent of my training is bag work. Terrible. No kicks either.
Has anyone experienced a major joint injury and came back in good form to compete again? What do you recommend? My competitive days are likely done but I'd like to resume sparring and training. Any thoughts?
[quote]RubberToe wrote:
Lateral ACL tear during a practice session with a noob in 2009. No surgery as the tendon wasn’t torn to the point of major instability, but my knee has been ‘loose’ ever since.
Haven’t sparred or fought in awhile and the extent of my training is bag work. Terrible. No kicks either.
Has anyone experienced a major joint injury and came back in good form to compete again? What do you recommend? My competitive days are likely done but I’d like to resume sparring and training. Any thoughts?[/quote]
First, I recommend getting reevaluated by a orthopedic surgeon or physical therapist, since the injury occured in 2009. You do not know what the extent of the injury is after 6 years. If you have medical insurance, I would suggest going to a orthopedic “sports performance center” since they focus on athletes.
Having said that: I have had the same injury in my left knee (no surgery) and caught a small bit of shrapnel in my right knee( surgery, but, not major). So, yes, I have an idea what you are going through. On the advise of a good PT, I started riding a stationary bike for about three months, then switched over to a “spinning bike”, began incline walks, later added weight for about 3 months, after 6 months started light land mine squats. I was lucky on both injuries and got back to fighting shape. To this day, I am a big believer in keeping your knees (tendons , ligaments) in shape and still use the same routine whenever I can. IMH and uneducated opinion, land mine squats are the safest way to bring a knee up to working order. They worked for me and I now have full range of motion with my MT and TKD kicks.
Sento, who is a regular here, is much more knowledgeable than me on human kinetics and I know he has encountered those injuries in some of his students, so, he may see this and offer you a more professional opinion. Good luck.
Thanks for the kind words Idaho.
RubberToe,
Did you do any rehab/physical therapy for your knee? Have you had it re-evaluated by an Orthopedic? Until you got the go ahead from a medical professional who had checked you out in person and run the necessary diagnostic tests it would be unethical for anyone (let alone over an Internet forum) to give you the green light to begin training and sparring again.
If you have already received the go ahead, and have effectively rehabbed your knee, then you could probably start with light training (but I would still recommend performing exercises to strengthen the muscles and connective tissues in your lower body at least; again, only if you have the “green light”), but understand that your body is nowhere near as conditioned to the rigors of training as it was prior to your injury, so you must start easy and slowly over months build the volume and intensity of your training. Ligaments take much longer to heal, and to adapt to the stresses of exercise than muscle tissue (about 3 times as long), so my advice is to take things slower than you think you need to and don’t gauge when it’s time to increase intensity on muscular effort/adaptation.
A good general rule of thumb is to take however long it too you to actually heal from your injury (to the point where you could “normally” function) and expect to take at least that long to get back to where you were pre-injury. That may seem like a long time, but you have to look at things from a long term perspective or you risk re-injury.
Brother I ve got exactly the same problem. I was training with a (almost) beginner he was like an 18 yrs old kid who was trying to prove that he was strong and going too hard on the training while clinching. He was twisting and doing this jerking motion to throw me of balance. I foolishly try to resist and spin him towards the other side and partially torn my ACL.
After 9 months of gradual recovery I can box now but decided to give up mma and muai thai. I stick to boxing. What bothers me the most though, is that I got injured in a stupid way in training with a 18 yrs old kid. I lost my confidence completely even when someone clinches with me in boxing I panic. Even the thought of a twisting motion makes me freeze.
You know for people who do fighting sports is weird to feel that you have this weakness on your body the whole time. It is the first time I feel I have a weakness like that and it affects me definitely. My mind is always on the knee not on the opponent. I hope you can recover. I will never forget the moment when I got injured just a stupid second and a kid busted my knee.
It shows how easily we can break even if we feel as made from steel. Try to gradually increase the strength on your muscles on your leg and then after you have rebuilt the strength only then start doing functional exercises with 3D motion.