What are shin splints and what can we do about them?
Young triathletes are often at risk of injuries in their lower legs, particularly the calf and shin area. As coaches, we have noticed that if athletes come from a swimming background, have not done much running previously or have ramped up their running too quickly, pain in the shin area can crop up. We asked our resident Clinical Myotherapist, Skye to answer our top questions about Shin Splints…
1. What are shin splints?
The technical term is ‘Medial tibial stress syndrome (MTSS)’, but more commonly we refer to the injury or pain as shin splints. It’s basically an overuse injury of the lower leg and we see it most in runners and in sports where there is a lot of jumping.
2. What does it feel like?
Usually it is characterised by diffuse pain along the inside, lower part of your tibia or shin bone and occasionally in other parts of the tibia. The pain or tenderness is brought on by exercise and then disappears or reduces when you are resting. As it progresses it can start to take longer to settle and begin to hurt the morning after.
3. What usually causes shin splints?
There are three things that usually increase your risk of getting shin splints.
1. Changes in training load, 2. Past injuries and 3. Biomechanics.
If you change the amount of training that you do (particularly running) or the intensity (speed or distance) of your training, then keep an eye out for sore lower legs. Even a change in your regular running shoes or the surface that you run on regularly adds extra stress to the muscles in the lower leg that they are not used to. Some of these muscles will get tired quicker leading to overuse.
If you’ve been injured somewhere else, like your hip, knee or ankle, and maybe haven’t done the rehab to make that area strong again, that can lead to weaknesses through the kinetic chain.
The way we move influences the impact on our muscles and tendons. This is called Biomechanics. We can make subtle changes to the way we run that can help de-load areas of the body and reduce the risk of getting injured.
4. What can we do to avoid shin splints?
There’s a lot of theories about this, but there are a few categories of things that we can do to help avoid shin splints:
Firstly, manage the amount of training and load that you are putting your body through. If your shins are sore, back off the amount and intensity of run training and see if that helps. No big, sudden changes in run training volume! The beauty of being a triathlete is that you can always swim and cycle to keep fit.
Secondly, make sure you are moving well when you run. Looking at your biomechanics, your posture, how you land, your step rate and whether you can improve that can make a difference.
Thirdly, test for areas of weakness. We all have different imbalances, range of motion and our muscles, bones, tendons and ligaments can cope with different amounts of load. We can find those areas of weakness and build up strength in the tissues through a range of exercises, to cope with the demand.
Lastly, if the pain is bad, then things like ice, massage, dry needling, taping and orthotics can help temporarily reduce pain and that feeling of tension, although they will not fix the issue longer term. Think of them like a bandaid.
5. So what’s the main message?
Shin splints are usually caused by too much activity. If you do have them, they can be pretty painful, so avoiding them altogether is the best plan! Chat to your coach about how much running you are doing, any previous injuries and how you are moving when you run. Keep strengthening those lower leg muscles and recovering well with rest and the occasional massage or treatment. Between those things we should be able to pick up most potential problems before they happen!