Richard Paul

I am a triathlete and competitive mixed martial artist. I had injured my ankle while running in the summer of 2012, but didn't realize the extent of the injury at the time. In fact, I continued to train on it after a short convalescence, and did two small triathlons in 2013. However, by the winter of 2013 I was going down the stairs on my backside.

I asked my physician what I should do about this, and he recommended HSS. I was able to get an appointment with Dr. Bohne, who examined me and put me in contact with HSS. As it turns out, I had torn cartilage, fractured the talus bone, and torn a ligament off. I thought that my physical endeavors were going to be extremely curtailed.

My surgeon and PA assured me that with the proper surgery and recovery, my ankle could be restored to excellent condition. I was operated on during the first week of March, 2014. I was cleared to run again in the end of July, and ran a Half Ironman in September. I wasn't happy with my time, but that was due to a very short training window, not the ankle. Besides, I am almost never really happy with my time.

Just over a year later, I can say that I give virtually no thought to the injury at all. I am able to do all of the training and activities that I did previously. What took the longest was getting over the fear of re-injury, and trusting the ankle again. It took some time to convince myself that the surgery would withstand the striking force of martial arts training, or the pounding of distance running. However, it could and still does.

My greatest thanks to my surgeon and his entire staff. I don't know what would have happened to me if my training and racing was over.