Ski Fitness Training After Cartilage Tear
How to Recover Strength and Form After Skiing Knee Injury
Sep 9, 2009
Andrea Binning is one of an elite group of women who ski professionally. While she loves her job and is dedicated to her profession she has in recent years suffered from a spate of skiing injuries. Suite101 talks to Andrea and discovers that her holistic approach to training and injury recovery is about more than doing a few bicycle sessions.
After 5 months of recovery from a cartilage tear in her knee, Andrea received the all-clear from her surgeon to get back on skis for the the winter season 2009 / 2010.
Basic Ski Fitness Training Program
Andrea follows the following basic fitness program in build up to a ski season:
- Cardiovascular / endurance is the main fitness component consisting of 10 hrs bicycle per week over 5 sessions 70% (road bike), operating in the ‘green zone’.
- Power endurance (slow RPM’s and high resistance) on an indoor bike.
- Strength and core training
- Balance and coordination balancing on an ’unstable surface’ such as a wobble board or Swiss Ball with a distraction element such as someone throwing a ball.
- Stretching including yoga sessions.
Closer to winter Andrea shifts her training focus to strength and power workouts such as plyometrics. Plyometrics involve exercise that enables a muscle to reach maximum force in the shortest possible time. These require a good recovery time so Andrea allows 3 sessions per week.
Red Bull Energy Drink Extreme Sports Sponsor
Red Bull energy drink one of Andrea’s sponsors of the last ten years, has played a strong role in her training and recovery providing the support of surgeons and access to their in-house Training Center in Thalgau, Austria. At the training center they take a holistic approach to fitness and post-injury rehabilitation where athletes can take advantage of physiological testing facilities, physiotherapists, psychologists, nutritionists and trainers.
Based on typically 6-monthly testing, Red Bull provides training programs to sponsored athletes which are up dated every two weeks where necessary. Tests look at the whole body from every imaginable perspective including blood tests that provide information on an athletes metabolism such that dietary recommendations can be made.
Mind Training and Visualization Techniques
Andrea considers visualization a really important part of her training and injury recovery and schedules daily sessions. From prior injury experience, Andrea sees it as one of her goals of mind training that she doesn’t “carry the injury” with her into the coming ski season. “I am taking steps to go into winter with a very positive frame of mind,” she adds.
Visualization involves initial sessions of quieting the mind, a form of meditation. In later sessions she expands on her mental training, imagining the mountains as a calm, peaceful place. Finally Andrea recreates in her mind what she describes as the ‘winning feeling’, having a good run, "doing something challenging on skis and coming through". She uses recollection of empowering skiing experiences from recent seasons to trigger these positive, 'winning feelings'.
When Suite101 asked Andrea about maintaining motivation while injured, she said, “It's work, part of my job is to train and regain my strength and fitness.” She went on to add that at the beginning when she is on crutches and feels very restricted by her body, “I have to dig really deep”. Yet, she considers herself lucky to be surrounded by the support of medical professionals and especially her friends.
Andrea Binning's Recommendations to Other Injured Ski Athletes
Andrea empathizes with anyone injured from ski accidents and advises that rehab although quite monotonous is absolutely necessary. “The most important thing after injury” says Andrea, “is to have very good preparation. Listen to your surgeon and the medical people around you." She follows by saying that once the preparation is done, getting back out there with a positive state of mind is the next step.
When Andrea is not training or skiing she spends much of her time mountain biking, rock climbing and surfing with her Norwegian husband Stian Hagen, also a pro-skier.
Andrea is very passionate about the work she does. Even though the risks she takes at times threaten life and limb and her day to day work can punish her body she says, “I feel like this is kind of what I’m meant to do. I would never regret what I’ve done or where I’m at.”
Andrea Binning also talked to Suite101 about Making a Living From Skiing. Read more about physical preparation for skiing in this series on professional skiers.
Photographs provided by A. Binning with permission from the Red Bull Photofiles.
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