Ahead of the 2024 Paralympic Games, Lisa Corso was furiously pedaling on a stationary bike parked in the courtyard of her apartment building in Nashville, Tennessee. In the brutal summer heat, the two-time Paralympic athlete closed her eyes and imagined the women’s 1500m final.
She imagined the purple track of the Stade de France and the uniforms of the competitors she had competed against in the T13 classification (athletes with visual impairments). With pop music blaring in his headphones, Corso pedaled faster for the biggest race of his career.
On August 31st, Corso was finally visualized. After six weeks of cross-training while healing from a stress fracture in his left femur, the Lipscomb University senior won the bronze medal with a time of 4 minutes, 23.45 seconds. This was just over a second behind two-time Paralympic champion Tigist Mengistu (Ethiopia) and silver medalist Ezala El Idrissi (Morocco). . After the race, the Newmarket, N.H., native shared on Instagram that he had only run eight miles in the six weeks leading up to the event, a mentally and physically grueling week of training.
So how did the 21-year-old manage to win a Paralympic medal while recovering from an injury and not being able to run? In an interview with Runner’s World, Corso revealed his outstanding performance on the world stage. He talked about the many ups and downs of the cross-training regimen that helped him safely prepare for.
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July 1st to July 26th: Under treatment for injury
About three weeks before the July 18-20 U.S. Paralympic trials, Corso started feeling pain in his left quadriceps. She went to the doctor and had an MRI scan of the area where her quadriceps meet her hip, which revealed she had tendonitis. Corso, who is recovering from a stress fracture in her tibia during indoor track season earlier this year, was relieved by the diagnosis. “I didn’t want to get tendonitis, but I was scared of something (with the bone), so I thought this is the best-case scenario. I can keep running it,” she said.
By the time of the U.S. National Championships in Miramar, Florida, the pain had worsened, but Corso still competed in the women’s 1,500 meters and earned a spot on Team USA. But as the pain worsened, Corso returned to see a doctor. This time, we performed an MRI scan of the femur. About a week after the race, Corso learned he had suffered a stress fracture.
“It gave me some peace of mind knowing I could still run and I was going to make a plan to race as safely as possible,” she said.
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Late July: Change in mindset
After receiving his diagnosis, Corso worked with his orthopedic surgeon, physical therapist and coach Nick Polk to decide on his next steps.
Corso said her doctor recommended that she stop running for six to eight weeks because of the injury. She had already been cross-training for the trials, so the team expected she would be able to return to running a week before the Paralympic 1500m final. They were confident she could heal while maintaining fitness through cross-training.
Three years after winning silver in the 1,500 meters at the Tokyo Paralympics in a time of 4:30.67, shaving 13 seconds off his previous personal best, Corso has had to completely change his preparation for his second Paralympic Games. I realized something.
When developing a cross-training plan with his coach, Corso focused on mimicking the same workouts he would do while running. On the bike or in the pool, Corso did the same heart rate-maintaining workouts he would experience during a track session, quality run, or long run. However, her bike and pool workouts were longer than her typical running workouts (during cross-training, she typically averaged 90 minutes to two hours each day).
To avoid fatigue in different muscle groups, Corso alternated between the two exercises, riding his bike one day and swimming or aquajogging the next. She also incorporated an easy day each week to recover from the increased time spent cross-training.
Corso struggled to feel like he was building the same level of fitness, but his heart rate reached 160 beats per minute in a 90-minute session and hovered between 175 and 180 during hard workouts. Seeing them do this was actually encouraging. “My coach said, ‘Your heart can’t tell whether you’re running or cycling,'” Corso said.
Late July to August 31st: Pain monitoring
After her Paralympic trials, Corso’s first priority for the first two weeks after her diagnosis was to walk without pain. Working with her physical therapist, she focused on using crutches when not cross-training and limiting weight-bearing activities for the first three days after her diagnosis. Corso gradually reduced her use of crutches, and about two weeks after her diagnosis, she was able to walk without them and without pain.
Corso also incorporated blood flow restriction (BFR) into his training. This method involves applying a cuff (tourniquet) proximal to the muscle being trained. The cuff is inflated to a certain pressure to block the blood vessel. The goal is to strengthen muscles and promote healing, Corso said. She typically wears cuffs on both quads for the last 10 minutes of each bike session. “It restricts blood flow, which makes[training]much more difficult, and the muscles become more fatigued, so wearing them can make your training even more effective,” Corso says.
During the last 10 minutes of these grueling sessions, Corso also practiced visualization. As he rode his bike, Corso imagined fast paces on the track and different scenarios that could happen at the Paralympic finals in Paris. Her eyes strain when she opens them (Team USA says Corso has an amblyopia disorder called albinism, which causes her vision to be 20/200), so she imagines that moment. I closed my eyes.
She also relied heavily on the support of her college teammates. They log miles on the grass for the fall cross country season, with Lipcomb finishing 11th at the 2023 NCAA Cross Country Championships and ranking 11th in the nation, but training on the bike and in the pool. Encouraged Corso inside.
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August 24th: Back on the track
After five weeks of cross-training and pain-free walking, Corso was cleared to do some running a week before the Paralympics.
To slowly get her muscles and nerves back into motion, she did three short track workouts, including an 800-meter warm-up, 200- or 400-meter repetition intervals, and an 800-meter cooldown. She logged a total of about 8 miles in the seven days before the race.
Although the laps felt awkward at first, Corso tried to focus on the factors he could control and uplifting thoughts that would help him in the race. Most importantly, she had no pain.
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August 31st: Race day
At the Stade de France, Corso quickly found himself in contention for the leaders. By the homestretch, she was in third place, but she had no idea how fast the other competitors were coming up behind her. When she reached the finish line and regained her podium spot, Corso felt overwhelmed, knowing that she had overcome weeks of heightened self-doubt and anxiety to achieve her goal under difficult circumstances. .
“In order to prove to myself that I wasn’t letting them (negative thoughts) win, I kept a positive mindset and chose the more difficult path of engaging in cross-training sessions which were quite lonely and debilitating. “At the end of the day, it’s all worth it,” she said.
Reflecting on his experiences this summer, Corso knows how powerful team support and mental tools can be in difficult situations, helping other runners find hard-fought victories in their healing process. I hope so.
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Taylor Dutch is a writer and editor in Austin, Texas, and a former NCAA track and field athlete who specializes in reporting on fitness, wellness, and endurance sports. Her work has appeared in Runner’s World, SELF, Bicycle, Outside, and Podium Runner.