Sweat dripping from junior cross country runner, Taylor Hooper’s face, she dares to glance down at her knee. It looks perfectly normal, but it’s throbbing. Her heart is pounding and a million thoughts are racing through her mind. What did I do? How did it happen? What should I do now?
Five miles from the nearest car, her teammates are around her trying to figure out what to do, and her coach is nowhere to be found because he is having surgery on the same thing she just tore.
This is what happened for Taylor Hooper on September 22, 2010. Hooper tore her meniscus just three days after cross country coach and math teacher, Rob Torres had to undergo surgery on his meniscus.
Torres underwent surgery on September 20, 2010 and missed a week of coaching and teaching. During the summer, Torres began experiencing knee pain and after a visit to Union Memorial Hospital, the doctors diagnosed him with a torn meniscus.
A meniscus is a cartilage located within the knee that works to absorb weight and provide stability. “It felt fine when the leg was loose. I could run fine and walk around fine, but after running or after getting up and walking around after sitting around too long, it hurt until it was loose again. Also, I couldn’t squat without pain or stretch the quads of that leg because I couldn’t bend the knee all the way,” Torres said.
The surgery consisted of doctors scraping out the torn part of the meniscus. “The actual surgery was between 30 and 45 minutes, but I was out cold, so I don’t know exactly how long it was,” Torres said.
The recovery time consisted of three days resting completely. In addition, he will be required to use crutches for approximately two to three weeks. He is hoping to lightly run in about two weeks.
Missing two days of school and three days of cross country practice, Torres also missed Hooper tearing her meniscus. Hooper was running on the Ma and Pa Trail with the cross country team when all of a sudden she felt her knee throbbing. “It felt like my knee was going to snap,” Hooper said.
Two of her fellow teammates ran back to JC and drove their car back to the site. When they arrived there, her teammates carried her to the car. Hooper didn’t know at the time that she had torn her meniscus, and would have benefited from the aid of her coach. “He might have known what it felt like, and what I should do,” Hooper said. Hooper won’t be running for the rest of the 2010 cross country season.
Although the cross country team will miss both of them and hope for their quick recovery, Torres is not too worried about them at all.
“This shouldn’t affect the girls too much. We have a stellar group and I’m confident in my seniors to make sure the team does what it needs to do to succeed,” Torres said.
Amanda Graziano can be reached for comment ar [email protected].