Heya Jon,

I can feel your pain in many ways. I'm heading to CdA myself and have been battling IT Band issues...finally started running in a limited sense about 4 weeks ago.

The absolute best instant advice I can give you - if something hurts your knee, stop.

In my case I was initially seeing my PT a couple times a week. The basic rules I followed: not allowed to do anything that causes my knee/IT Band to hurt, religious stretching.

Effectively it meant that during rehab I could bike while focusing on spinning a lot more and no big hills, I could swim like normal, just no kick sets. As long as my knee didn't hurt I could aquajog up to my normal running time, and hop on the elliptical.

If you can, and do, elliptical work, I found it helped me to run on it without holding the bars with my hand - facilitated balance work and muscle perception/growth in that area.

I've had a cortisone shot before. Personally I'm only a fan of using them for diagnostic purposes due to the increased chance of seriously hurting something, or delaying healing for a much longer time, due to increased tissue damage. Though in all honestly I forget whether serious damage can result from running on a tight IT band, or more just pain.

As far as the marathon and making it through, it's going to be a combination of what your knee can handle, what your running has been like up to this point, your goals, etc. If my situation helps with perspective...I wasn't able to run at all Dec - March. After about 4 weeks of PT I was finally able to run under my own weight without sharp pain (there's some dull pain that's present at the beginning of each run, but my PT is fine with that as it goes away and it's the sharp pain that signalling true IT Band issues with me). I started back into running with my long runs on dirt and all other runs as aquajogs or on the elliptical, and my mileage has gone 7, 9, 11, off, and 13 this coming week...probably looking at a 16 or 17 miler as my longest for the past half year.

Then again, in my mind, the difference between a 7 mile jump and a 10 mile jump on race day after I've been racing 125-130+ miles doesn't seem like a big deal.

Best of luck!
Jeremy

I'll mostly just echo what has already be said -- play it smart, listening to the doc and your body.

But remember... it's just a race. Yes, a big one. Yes, you have investment in it. But yes, just a race. Is it worth having leg issues for a longer time? The note that you recently did a half on it (with the aid of strong anti-inflamatories) was a warning flag to me. I also love racing, and having to miss a race or go in knowing it won't be the effort you could actually do can be TOUGH. But honestly, I think I'd rather go, do the swim and bike, and just see how the run goes. No expectations, no drugs, no pushing through the bad kinds of pain, and just knowing I might have to DNF if it hurts. As important and big as a race may be, I think I've accepted (finally) that to me it's really more important to be able to continue with tris after the race is over. The race is one day, and the training is actually more important to my life.

PHYSICAL THERAPY! Always my answer to injuries, because there's usually something else at play in body mechanics too.

Good luck!