First Week Back

I survived my first week of running since not running for three weeks due to my heel injury.

First, the numbers:

Runs: 6
Miles: 21.6
Time: 3:04:06
Pace: 8:31/mi
Long: 6.2 mi
Avg. HR: 134

I kept track of my heel pain for each run, based on a scale of 1-10, ten being pure agony. Here's how the week went in that regard:

Mon - 2.1 mi, heel pain 4/10
Tue - 3.1 mi, heel pain 4/10
Wed - 2.1 mi, heel pain 5/10
Thu - 5 mi, heel pain 3/10
Fri - 3.1 mi, heel pain 3/10
Sat - 6.2 mi, heel pain 2/10

I won't bore you further, but I also kept track of which shoes I wore (I rotate 4 pairs) and whether or not I added a Superfeet Green insole to my right shoe (which I only did once, on Wed). Today (pain rating of 2), I wore my Brooks Defyance 3's with factory insoles. This may be the best combo for me right now, based on how my heel felt. Today's run was also relatively quick (7:35 pace), with some hills, which was even more encouraging.

I still don't want to write myself any official training programs yet. I'm going to keep it day-to-day and monitor how the heel feels. I'd love to add in a few half mile intervals within the next couple of weeks to prepare for Ragnar, but it's certainly not necessary, especially if it's going to put my heel at risk.

So all in all, a very encouraging first week back. I'm hoping the recovery continues so I can gradually start building the mileage and pace once again.