You've injured yourself while running and don't know what to do. Should you stop completely? Continue despite the pain? Take anti-inflammatories and push through it? This uncertainty is frustrating, especially when running is part of your routine and well-being.

• Breaking up your runs (walking + running) speeds up healing¹
• Several short runs are better than one long run when injured
• Masking pain with medication delays true healing
• Quality sleep is essential for tissue repair

This article provides concrete recovery strategies. To understand why injuries recur, consult our article on recurrent running injuries.

What to do for a running injury? If it seems to persist or you want to resolve the injury as quickly as possible, you should consult a physiotherapist who has expertise in running.

Some will be able to treat themselves with good quantification of mechanical stress, choosing appropriate footwear (see the article on shoes – Link to blog #13) and adopting good running behaviors (see the article on running technique – Link to blog #12).

###

• Break up running sessions by including walking minutes in the run.
• Reduce the duration of running sessions, but increase the frequency during the week. For example, it is better to run 5 times for 10 minutes a week than twice for 25 minutes when injured. The body adapts faster this way.
• Do not run through pain by masking it with medication. Pain is a warning signal indicating that there is potentially something that deserves to be investigated.
• Listen to your body. It will often guide you to the right dosage for running sessions.
• Practice transfer activities such as swimming, cycling, aquajogging. This allows you to maintain a level of physical activity without putting too much stress on the running injury.
• Optimize your sleep quality. As with any injury, tissue repair occurs mainly when you sleep at night. The better your sleep, the better your chances of improving.

To learn more...

Episode #1 discusses the prevention and treatment of running injuries.

Find the episode on YouTube:

Click below to listen to episodes on podcast platforms:

Source:

• Van Gent RN. (2007). Incidence and determinants of lower extremity running injuries in long distance runners: a systematic review. British journal of sports medicine.

10 Quick Tips for Understanding Your Pain

The ones that have made the biggest difference in my patients' lives. 1 a day, 2 minutes.

(function(){

// GHL form_embed.js reads UTM from parent page URL

// Add UTM params to URL before loading iframe

var path = window.location.pathname;

var parts = path.split('/').filter(Boolean);

var slug = parts[parts.length - 1] || 'homepage';

var source = parts[0] || 'direct';

var url = new URL(window.location.href);

if (!url.searchParams.has('utm_term')) {

url.searchParams.set('utm_term', slug);

url.searchParams.set('utm_source', source);

url.searchParams.set('utm_medium', 'cta-inline-form');

window.history.replaceState({}, '', url.toString());

}

})();