istock/Organic Media

Getting the green light to return to running again after an injury can be exciting, but it’s important not to rush your comeback. Your fitness and strength may have changed while you’ve been out, so simply jumping back into your old training routine could set you back. A sensible return to running will give your body time to adapt to the demands of training again while helping you rebuild confidence and consistency.

1. Ease yourself back in to running after injury

You might be keen to make up for lost training time, but it’s always better to take a cautious approach to running after an injury. If your injury reoccurs you could be facing an even longer layoff.

2. Get the green light from your physio

If you’ve been seeing a physiotherapist for your injury, take their advice on how and when to return to running. They may give you a run-walk programme to follow for a few weeks to ease you back into your training. It may feel frustrating but it’s best not to push it too hard in the first few weeks.

3. Be patient with yourself

How much fitness you’ve lost will depend on how long you’ve been away from running and how much cross training you were able to do. If you haven’t run for more than a couple of weeks it’s likely that you won’t be as fit as you were before your injury. Be patient with yourself and adjust your pace when you head out running – don’t set off at your pre-injury pace.

Image: istock/Organic Media

4. Keep up the cross training alongside running after injury

Once you’re back out running it’s a good idea to keep up any cross training you’ve been doing. This will help boost your aerobic fitness, especially while your running distance is still relatively low. You can also use cross training as a way to do your harder interval efforts, while keeping your runs at an easy pace.

5. Carry on with your physio exercises

Runners are often very diligent with their physio exercises while they’re injured because they are motivated by getting back out running. But once any pain has subsided and they’re regularly running again, they stop doing the exercises. Make sure you keep doing your exercises for as long as your physio has prescribed rather than stopping once it feels a bit better.

6. Setting goals for running after injury

You may have had to sit out a race you had planned this year, but you can still set goals for yourself. Make sure that any goal you set are relevant to your current fitness and level of running. A marathon might be out of your reach for now, but you could train towards improving your parkrun time or a 10k race.

Looking to get stronger after recovery? Here’s what you need to know about strength training.