Today marks 5 months since I declared myself an injured runner on the 18th October 2020 following the completion of the Virtual New York City Marathon.

That statement alone tells you that I waited until completing a marathon before saying enough was enough. In fact, I had the pain at the end of August and continued to train as it “didn’t feel that bad”, I could run pain free but it only hurt when walking up and down stairs. I went on to run four virtual marathons between 6th September – 18th October. It was only during the four and final virtual marathon when I felt some pain during that run.

The general consensus was that I had tendonitis in my left knee and this would over time heal and I can get back to running to the same standard as prior to the injury, as long as I took the recovery sensibly and did not run too much or too hard when I was able to get back running.

I did not run between 19th October 2020 – 30th January 2021, a full 104 days out. During that time I spent many many hours focusing on core and upper body strength training as well as stretching. All with the aim of improving my flexibility and strength in readiness for a return to running, which would also reduce the risk of injury further down the line.

I made my return to running on the 31st January whilst my knee wasn’t pain-free. It had progressed a lot in those 104 days and more so in the preceeding 2 weeks, I would say it was 85 – 90% there. We felt that included some short easy paced runs shouldn’t have a negative impact on the recovery process at that stage.

Below is a breakdown of my “Return to Running” plan:

• Week 1: 1 Run, 1 Mile
• Week 2: 2 Runs, 4 Miles
• Week 3: 3 Runs, 6 Miles
• Week 4: 4 Runs, 12 Miles
• Week 5: 4 Runs, 16 Miles
• Week 6: 4 Runs, 20 Miles
• Week 7: 3 Runs, 18 Miles

As you can see, it has been a gradual increase in total distance over the weeks upto 20 miles where I intend to hold it for a month and increase slightly again but not up passed 30 miles until I have been running pain-free for 6-8 weeks.

All in all, I think this plan has worked out ok. The knee pain has not gotten any worse as a result, it still isn’t 100% pain-free. There is still some knee pain when doing things like walking up/down the stairs, squatting or kneeling. Walking is 100% pain-free and running is pain-free for the most part, I have noticed some pain or discomfort during the first mile but I am not sure whether that is more down to the muscles and joints not being warmed up as all my runs have been in the early hours straight after waking up.

There was one occasion where the knee was aching more for 2 days after a run during week 6, which was the reason for the 3 runs in week 7 rather than 4. I took a few days off and things returned back to normal for those 3 runs.

What is bugging me is, I am now 5 months on and still not 100% pain-free, I would say it is around 95% pain-free now but it has been taking a lot longer than I had hoped. I guess you can’t put a time frame on the body recovering.

Luckily, the races that were scheduled in February – May have all been cancelled which took off some of the pressure. The next one on the plan is Ironman 70.3 Staffordshire in mid-June with Ironman UK 3 weeks later.

Obviously I am going to be a long way off the marathon fitness I would have hoped to have going into a full distance triathlon come July. My hope is I can remain injury-free during this training block and get the knee to 100% pain-free then make a decision on whether to take part in Ironman UK on 4th July. I know I can run a marathon off the back of just a long run of 16 miles but it will be a long tough struggle and would it be worth the risk of injuring the knee again? there is the option of taking a safer choice and run/walking the 26.2 miles. I will just have to see how the training progresses over the coming months.

The fact that I am now running 20 miles a week is a big possitive. Just getting outside and running has felt so good. Even if some of those runs have been as cold as -19’c.

All of this Return to Running has been planned by myself, unfortunately, as a result of the UK lockdown the physio has been closed since the beginning of January so I have had to manage all this by myself. Ironically, one positive from the various injury and illness “comebacks” over these past 2 years has been, I have a very good well tried and tested comeback plan and the confidence that this plan can get me back from a grade 2 calf strain or apendicitis back to running a 3:00.45 marathon (with an injured knee).

The physio is due to reopen on the 12th April, so if my knee still isn’t pain-free by then I plan to go in for a checkup just to make sure I haven’t missed something in my stretching or strengthing that may help or see if there is any physio exercises that may help loosen or strengthen the tendon.

One thing I have not been able to do since mid-August is any form of lower body, leg or glute strengthening. Will this have an impact on the knee or the training for the rest of 2021? Certainly an area of focus in the coming months once I am pain-free that’s for sure.