Lessons in Lunging

On Tuesday afternoon, Jacob sent me a text from the school bus that he had just hurt his leg during 6th hour gym class. His physical education course recently switched over from swimming to running and Jacob has come home fairly sore some days. This time seemed more serious, though, so I drove to the bus stop to pick him up. Jacob was in quite a bit of pain when he hobbled into the car. He complained that something had "pulled or popped" in the area of the hamstring on his left thigh. I wondered how he would be able to complete his required running the rest of the week if he really had a significant injury. I decided to call the doctor to see if Jacob could go in to have everything checked out. In the meantime I asked Jacob to describe exactly what had happened, and he replied that the class had done their usual stretches, then gone upstairs to run on the elevated track. After running 10 minutes or so, the teacher told everyone to stop and lunge. Jacob said that the kids all came to a halt and confusedly looked at each other saying, "What's a lunge?" The teacher instructed the class how to lunge, the runners lunged, and Jacob evidently lunged with much gusto because that is when his muscle stretched too far. When he could barely make it up the condo steps, I gave him some ice for his injury, then phoned the doctor's office for some advice. To make a long story short, Jacob's hamstring was not "pulled" but rather was "strained." His treatment consisted of rest, ice, elevation, and ibuprofen. He was given a doctor's note to forgo running in gym on Wednesday so as not to further aggravate the strain. By Thursday he felt a lot better and was able to work out with the class. On Friday Jacob completed his compulsory 12 minute run. I told him to take it easy from now on because each Friday the mandatory running time will be going up by two minutes. He does not need more lunging injuries - or any injuries for that matter - especially with all of the stairs we have to climb at our three-story condo.