International Soccer Game in Vienna

I’m writing to you all from Vienna, Austria, actually just outside in a small town called Tulln.  We (my fiance and I) are here for her cousin’s wedding.  As part of the pre-wedding festivities there was a soccer game.  Poland vs Croatia (her cousin is Polish, and his fiance is Croatian).  I played for the Polish team.  I haven’t played soccer since I was little, and this game was very informal, most of the Polish players took regular cigarette breaks 🙂

Soccer Time!

We got dominated in the game, but afterward I found out that the Croation team had 4 guys who are currently playing in semi pro leagues, so I don’t feel so bad.  I did OK, for being a little rusty. I had 2 perfect headers and handled and passed the ball like a champ.  No goals though.  We lost 8 to 3.   The team called me the “marathon man”, being a runner and all.  I finished the game almost unscathed, I did have a small shin to shin clash which left a mark.  And my achilles tendon wasn’t too happy with my soccer game.  Oops.  The original achilles strain came from my venture with the Five Finger shoes a few weeks ago.  I guess it wasn’t all the way healed, but it is definetely sore today.  A slight case of achilles tendonitis.  I have a wedding to attend tonight, so there will be some dancing.  No break-dancing tonight I guess 🙂

Here is a couple good sites on treating achilles tendonitis.

Time-To-Run

About.com Site about Treatment

I’ve been icing every couple hours with an ice cube directly on the sore area and didn’t run today.

I will be doing more biking and swimming when I get back to the US to let this heal before it becomes chronic.  I’m not worried though.  I’ve had this before, it just takes rest and attention.  A lot of ice, anti inflammatory meds and don’t do anything crazy, like play soccer.