Allen Johnson
It’s been a very busy time since I last blogged and I know the burning question everyone is wondering, is how’s my arm? It continues to get better each day, and I feel pretty good right now. I think I am ahead of schedule with the healing process. I still can’t work the muscle or pick anything up, but I can bend it and stretch it. My doctor took the cast off and put a brace on my arm recently. The cast was basically for the first couple of weeks after the surgery to keep my arm completely stationary. Having the brace on has freed up my arm up a lot more.
I’ll be starting rehab on December 30, which will consist of lifting weights and doing various exercises with a therapist once a day. By the middle of January I should be pretty close to being fully healed. I just have to be careful and patient and let it heal fully, so that I don’t tear it loose.
I’ve learned to do a lot of things with my left hand since I had the surgery on my right bicep. The most challenging has been things like shaving and putting deodorant under my left arm with my left hand. I’ve managed pretty well and can eat pretty fast with my left hand now.
Since I can’t do much in the gym with my upper body right now, I’ve been working on a regimen with a trainer for abs, core and lower body, which should help a lot when the season rolls around and I climb back in my Mopar Dodge Avenger.
While there has been a lot going on this off-season, my wife Pam and I had a chance to slip away for a little R&R recently, as we traveled down to the Dominican Republic for a friend’s wedding. We stayed at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana and soaked up plenty of sun each day. The wedding was on the beach, so that was pretty cool. We had a great time there and it was a good break before the holiday rush.
With the 2012 season just around the corner, we are testing this week with our Mopar Dodge Avenger in Bradenton, Florida. We arrived here on Sunday and are testing for four full days. We have both of our cars with us, and Richie Stevens is doing the driving. Since I can’t yank any gears yet, I’m helping to make some of the decisions set-up-wise on the cars and have learned a few things. We’re putting both cars through the hoops to see which car works better for us.
The testing has been going pretty good so far. We’ve worked through a number of things. We came down here with a list as long as your leg of different scenarios that we wanted to try and things we wanted to work on. Some of things we have tried have worked and some haven’t, but that’s what testing is all about. All in all everything is going smooth right now.
After we are done testing this week, I’ll head back home to Greeneville (Tenn.) for the Holidays, and we’ll have our whole family over on Christmas. Then on New Year’s Eve, we’ll go to Pam’s parents and on New Year’s morning, we’ll go to my parents. It will be a nice, relaxing time visiting with our family and friends.
Before I forget, I have to give one final update on the Greeneville High School football team, and it’s a good one. They won the Tennessee state championship in their class for the second straight year. They have made it to the finals three years in-a-row now and have won it now twice in-a-row, which is a great accomplishment. They had an amazing season and I really enjoyed the couple of times I got to see them play.
The off-season continues to go by fast. It seems like all I’ve been doing this winter is working out and getting everything in order for next season. Before we know it, we’ll be heading west to Pomona to open 2012 in our Mopar Dodge Avenger and I can’t wait!