Emphasizing Upper Body (and Giving Ankles a Break)

My ankles have been sore lately, hopefully just an overuse injury. I had been hiking a lot so I cut back on that, but I’ve still been doing high-volume biking, like more than two hours per day. So I’ve decided to give my ankles a breather by sticking to shorter rides. This gives me time to bump up my upper body training a bit, which I tried today. It was an enjoyable and challenging workout with multiple stations of dumbbells or resistance bands. I do a combination of isometric and conventional strength training with heavier resistance, and also strength-endurance training (higher reps with less resistance).

I saw my Doc yesterday because I have a bump on one of my knees. Not painful, but it didn’t go away after about a month. So she’s sending me to get it x-rayed and an MRI. I also told her about the ankles, and she also thought of overuse injury or possible arthritis, so she’s sending me to get the ankles x-rayed also. She also thought physical therapy might help if giving them some rest doesn’t do the trick.