I’ve sprained my ankle, how long should I give it before trying to run on it again?

[samsam70]

It’s swollen and bruised and sore but I can walk on it, I did this 3 days ago.

[UnfitNoMore Graduate]

Sadly, we cannot put a timescale on these things. Ankles can be slow to heal, and rushing the comeback can make things a lot worse. You need to be pain free for a start, the swelling and bruising should be gone before then. When you do come back, go real gentle and really short to test it and at the first sign of a reaction, abort the run. In the meantime, follow PRICE and if it doesn’t improve soon seek medical advice. There’s seated cardio that you can be doing to keep your fitness up over on the Strength and Flex forum.

Hope you’re back soon and safely.

[samsam70 Graduate in reply to UnfitNoMore]

Thank you! I’ll monitor it and go back slowly. I had just started WK 8 I guess when I restart I’ll go back to maybe wk6.

[UnfitNoMore Graduate in reply to samsam70]

In the first two weeks, you won’t lose any fitness... then there will be a gradual decline. That’s the bad news but, the good news is your fitness will almost certainly be above the runs you were on. The best thing to do once you’re pain free, and have done a short test run, is to just go run nice and gently and see how long you can go for comfortably... that run will tell you where to drop back into C25K. It’s entirely possible that you may complete 28 minutes, but set an alert to stop you if you do.

[samsam70 Graduate in reply to UnfitNoMore]

Thank you for the reassurance. I will listen to my body!