Rehab
 

I broke my left fibula spring snowboarding. I usually ride left foot forward, especially on my snowboard. Anyone else boarding a season after a broken leg? I get released at the end of July to wakeboard and would love any hints any of you have for making the comeback easier. My leg muscles are already shriveling up...I'm horrified/amused by the shrinking left leg, bulging right leg effect I have going on right now :) Pretty bored and have lots of time on my hands! I don't want to be a wussball, but I don't want to push it too hard too soon either. I am a jackass and didn't know it was broken for 25 days, so I don't really trust my pain sensors to tell me what's okay and what's not. I'm working with my Dr. but would love to hear anyone's personal experience.

Start surfing to build the muscles back as soon as your Dr says you can. You can also wakeskate at slow speeds, I'd suggest taking the fins out too, and it will realy work your legs and get your ballance centered back on the board. You can also strap the board on and ride like 20' back at speeds around 15 or so and start carving and jumping and doing spins grabs etc...

Just build off of that, but do not just go out there and start jumping around, especially with a weak front leg. Landing with too much weight on your back foot and lack of control of your front leg is a common way of tearing your knee.

If you go to the gym, make sure you do weights just on your left leg - my physio told me that there's some crossover effect to the other leg whether you do reps on it or not, so if your right leg is already big, just ignore it and work on the left!

I had a similar issue with my knee. I had sever atrophy in my left leg. I followed the rehab plan laid out by my doctor and physical therapist. Start small at first:
Example:

1. Stretching
2. 5 mins spin sessions on a bike, work up to 30min in 5 min increments
3. Body weight squat. I was told to avoid any excersizes early on where the foot was not planted to the ground. (i.e. avoid open kinetic chain exercises)
Closed chain: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_...hain_exercises
Open chain: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_ki...hain_exercises

Talk to your doctor and see what they have to say about giving you a rehab program. Good luck with the rehab.

m-