Injured during half marathon training - am I going to make the race?

[coldchipsfortea]

Hi all, would love to hear people's thoughts / advice about this.

I'm training for a half marathon at the end of May. I'm 51 and have done a few half marathons before (about 5 years ago), but I'd pretty much stopped running in the past few years due to a busy life, so this was me trying to start up again. I was doing other forms of exercise during that time, so not totally unfit. I entered the half because I needed a goal otherwise I just tend to give up. FWIW I'm very much a slow runner, back end of the pack which is fine by me (my target time for May is 2 hrs 30)

I've been training for this since December and had got to running 8 miles which was great, but last week I developed what I'm pretty sure is achillies tendinitis. Pain at the back of my heel / calf - bad when walking, but really bad when running. I rested for a week and went out for a trial run this morning - not great. 3.5 miles but then the pain started up again. Not too bad, but definitely grumbling away.

Any advice on what to do? Should I give up on the idea of the half in May? Or do you think I could maybe build up again if I take it easy. I'm really not worried about being slow - but I don't know if I'm just kidding myself!

See a physio! Don't try and self-diagnose. Get a professional opinion. All may not be lost, don’t worry, but you risk making it worse by not knowing what you're dealing with.

Fingers crossed!

I'd say don't do it.

I injured my knee five weeks before a half marathon a few years ago, rested entirely for 3 weeks, had my knee strapped up by a physio, but I was in pain most of the way around and had to take painkillers as I ran. Not ideal.

I made it but my time was abysmal!

Honestly give up. I had similar issues and carried on. 5 years later I still can’t run, limp like mad, loads of operations and struggle to walk. I wish I’d stopped running for six months to let it heal. See a physiotherapist.

Eek - ok three people saying similar things there, I hear you! There is a physio close to us so I'll try and get an appointment asap.

I do have a tendency to think things will just sort themselves out (which to be fair, has always been my experience in the past), but appreciate that particularly as I get older this may not always be the case.

thank you

Hmmm. If your training was going well before the injury I'd say you might be ok; but given the race is 5 or 6 weeks away, you're only up to 8 miles for your long run and realistically you need to take at least two or three weeks off altogether for it to heal - it's a no.
If you let it properly rest now then you might be OK by early May, but then jumping up from 8 miles to a half marathon race is a sure recipe for getting injured again.
The fact that you're a steadier runner won't help either, as two and a half hours on your feet is much more likely to get you injured than whizzing round in 90 mins or so.
I would aim for an autumn race instead - sorry, OP.

See a physio, get your footwear checked out.

Mine flared up from too much racing in autumn 2021 when the spring races and autumn races all bunched up. I rested when I realised that there was an issue, but it took 3 months of rest before carefully starting back with C25k from a HM pb 4 months earlier. I'm now about to do a marathon (which had had to be deferred), deliberately at a gentle pace and jeffing to keep the impact down. It's not 100%, and I'm mindful of it.
Other people have rested and got back to normal far quicker because theirs didn't get as aggravated in the first place.

My boundary is that if I know it's there while I'm running, that's OK but be cautious. Back off and rest if it interferes into non-running life. I initially got advice and stopped at the point that it began to be felt in normal life (despite a natural break in running) but with tendons being slow to heal, I'd aggravated it more than I realised in the first place.

@fellrunner85 thank you - there is a HM local to me in autumn so I might aim for that instead.

The whole point of me getting back into running was to get fit and stay that way as I move through my 50s so there's no point in me risking permanent injury just for one race. It's frustrating- and I'll lose the entry fee - but I know that all of you are right.

Everybodys replies are really helpful as it helps me reframe this in my mind as me doing the sensible thing to protect my long term fitness as opposed to me giving up when things got tough.

Thank you all.