 Oh man, let's open this up more recovery gear for the runner's knee. Onward and upward, okay, two boxes arrived today and one of them was definitely an impulse buy. That's this one. The other one is for the running injury. So hopefully you can see me open up that skylight. So this one though is totally an impulse buy. I could not resist and I justified it. Hold on, let me get something to open this up with. I justified it as motivation for 2021, okay? So if you remember what I said a couple of days ago, the marathon that I'm interested in in 2021. Here we go. Shout out to Running Warehouse for getting this to me nice and fast. Oh, I couldn't resist. Oh, there it is. Boston Marathon. Boston Marathon hat, oh, with the, hold on, whoa, over the eyes. One second. There we go, with the blue and yellow, the classic colors of the Boston Marathon. So total impulse buy, I saw it on Running Warehouse and I was like, I got to get it. I got to get it. So this will be my motivation to stay healthy, train smart in 2020 so that we can go onward and upward to Boston, Massachusetts for the 2021 Boston Marathon. Okay, not this year. Not this year. All right, off we go. We're going to pick up some recovery gear that I have been using at the physical therapy office. And yes, we're going to talk about how running injuries, oh yeah, running is a gift. Running injuries are a gift. Bye, Michael. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Oh man. Rashes. We're not messing around. We're not messing around now. Oh man. Okay. Here we are. We got the bag of goods to try and work on this runner's knee. And back at the house, I'm going to talk about how running injuries can be a gift. I'll explain back at the house. But my little mental strategy that I use for getting through running injuries, and it's probably been, well, it's probably been about seven months since the last major running injury that I really brought this up, is that I approach the injuries as if I'm preparing for a peak race. Now, you know, if you get into the dream race, the bucket list race, you're going to do everything in your power, everything with the time that you have to prepare as best as possible to arrive on the starting line as fit, fresh, and healthy as possible. Well now, because of my runner's knee, I can't arrive on the Houston, well I could, but I decided not to arrive on the Houston Marathon starting line at all. Therefore, all this time where I'm not out running, I'm not, yeah, well, I'm not out running or I'm not traveling to go running the mountains, I have a little extra time on my hands to take that time and apply it to figuring out how to get rid of the runner's knee, reminding myself that it's a tendon. Tendons can take time, I've got to be patient, but based on the research I've done, talking to the doctor, talking to the physical therapist, talking to the massage therapist, that there are steps that I can take to not, I don't want to say expedite the healing process, but make sure the healing process is actually happening on schedule. So that's how I approach running injuries is use that mental approach of, okay, the race is out, the peak race is out, now I'm going to, I'm going to troubleshoot and put the pieces together in the puzzle to make this running injury go away as quick as possible. Okay, here we go, on to the gym, yes, oh, this is one of the pieces instead of sitting on my couch going to the gym. Hold on, where are my keys? There they are, all right, let's go, let's go. All right, I'm checking out a new gym, choose, choose, that's going to make you love laugh, choose fitness and I am interested in a new gym because some new equipment that they have in there that my old gym does not have, I'm not saying I'm going to switch right now, also it's free seven-day trial and they've got a hot tub, all right, come on, enough said, enough said, the gym is pretty interesting, so where did I spend most of my time, stretching in the steam room, they have a steam room at Chuz, so there's a good chance, because of my knee, I might be leaning toward Chuz, we shall see, all right, remember that first box that arrived today, let me grab it real quick, here we go, oh man, let's open this up, more recovery gear for the runner's knee and if you are suffering from runner's knee out there or have suffered, maybe you've used this item before to help with your recovery, I'm excited, let's pull this out here, oh man, oh it's kind of heavy actually, okay, there we go, there we go, so I need to put it together, it's not assembled, oh do you know what it is, do you know what it is, there it is, it's a slant board, so out of all of the pieces of gear and you all have sent me a lot of pieces of gear for me to try to help get rid of this runner's knee, this was recommended the most, I mean at least, I want to say at least eight people said I have to get one of these slant boards, so hold on, let me just see, oh there it is, okay, so then, oh that's easy, oh my goodness, so let me just put this like that and then it's got a little pin here, wow that was incredible, I thought I was gonna have to pull out the screwdriver, so then you've got these pins here to hold it in place, oh my goodness, wow, okay that's incredible, all right so I'm actually, I'm actually gonna put it up a little bit, so look at this, it's adjustable, so different heights, sorry I should say different angles, hopefully you can see that, so I'm gonna put it on the second one for starters, just put it like that, put it like that, and hold on, okay, so I know the camera's little ways are off there, but the slant board is, you can use it in different ways, but one way is simply calf stretches, okay, and the angle of the slant is not very steep right now, so I can't feel that stretch too too much, but that's one just simple way, and I have heard that tight calves can lead to runner's knee if they're really really tight, but let me, well just to show you, let me just bump this up one more, there we go, we'll put it like that for now, so this is the third from the highest level, and for runner's knee and patella tendinitis is the more official term, whoa, wow, oh my goodness, okay, I need to tie my shoes, hold on, okay, there we go, shoes are tied and I have had this approved by my physical therapist, I had to ask him just to see if I could do this, and he gave the thumbs up, so you're gonna stand on it like this, and the trick is that you want to keep your knees right over your toes, you don't want your knees going way out in front, and so what it is, it's a squat, but you're on this, you're on this slant, and that is the key, and again, I'm not gonna get into all the science behind why the slant is critical for runner's knee for this squat, and you want to start very very slowly, so with tendins what I have learned is that pain, a little bit of pain is good, sorry, well I shouldn't say good, but is okay when you're trying to rehab runner's knee, they say about a two to three, definitely no more than a four on the pain scale, and I realize everyone's pain scales vary, and so during my physical therapy over the past ten days, it's been hovering right around a two or a three I would say, so I feel good about adding the slant board into the rotation and low reps early, so I'm gonna do ten tonight, and that's it, but eventually you want to work your way up to three sets of ten, again, talk to your physical therapist, talk to your doctor, and then you can work up to as many as, well from what I've read, up to three times a week with three sets of ten, so here we go, and again I want to try and keep, now this is the first time I've done this, but you want to keep your knees over your toes, so it's a squat, so you want to stick your, stick your butt out, and then, so that would be one, I think that was pretty good form, and oh yeah, slow, and I should also mention that as you're going down, you want to put more weight on your hurt leg, so that would be my left leg, and then on the way back up, you want to put more of the drive into your healthy leg, so down you want to put a little more weight into your hurt leg, and then come back up, in my case with my right leg, so what is that? Is that two? So this would be three, and you want to make sure that the comfort level, like you're not feeling any sharp pain, and that the pain is not getting worse in your runner's knee, again I got to keep my knees back, keep my knees back, that's the key, so, and last one down, okay, wow, that was a burn, oh man, oh man, okay, here's the slant board, hopefully you can see that's kind of up close there, there's the sandpaper to get a good grip for your feet right there, and then there's the back where it attaches, okay, I'll get you some better shots in the coming weeks as I continue to test this out, and here's the deal, what do I mean by, and by the way the pain while I was using this just now was a one, maybe a one, definitely not a two, I barely felt it in my knee, we'll see how the knee feels tomorrow, I'm excited, I'm incredibly excited, and here's the deal, what do I mean by the title of the vlog, running injuries and physical therapy is a gift, if you have the right mindset, I would not be able to communicate with all of you about everything that I am learning at physical therapy and through everyone, and you know who you are who told me first about the slant board, but then everyone that's encouraging me to continue to research all these different tools, recovery tools and strengthening tools out there to make sure I can arrive in Boston 2021 healthy and New York City 2020 healthy, okay, so that's what I mean, like injuries, they're hard, it's no fun, but it's an opportunity to learn and hopefully help other runners out there, because I know you're out there who are suffering from runners knee as well, because it's the little tips and tricks that makes the difference for becoming a healthy, healthy runner, so question of the day, what have you learned in your physical therapy experience that you can share with all of us down in the comments, like what is a little, and it could be for any injury out there, whether it's Achilles tendon issues, plantar fasciitis, well you don't really go to physical therapy for stress fractures, but you might, I guess if there's an issue with a soft tissue that's causing the stress fractures, but that's the question of the day, what have you gleaned from physical therapy that you could share with all of us down below in the comment, that's what I'm sharing today, all about the slant board, I am beyond excited, now just got to find a place to store it in our huge house, okay, also this bag from Dick's Sporting Goods, I decided I'm going to show this to you tomorrow because I know the blog's going a little long, but I'll show you what I'm going to do with these in tomorrow's blog, all right, there you go everyone, thank you for being there and we're going to get through this together, we are going to get through this together, all right, I'm going to toss it back on the right to my first physical therapy session about two weeks ago, maybe three weeks ago now, and that'll be on the right and on the left, we'll throw it back to just a discussion about injuries in general that we've had on the channel in the past six months, okay, seek beauty, work hard and love each other, see you tomorrow.