Tuesday’s Tips: A Chat With Jeff Galloway, Running After Injury

As part of the #runDisney event that I attended last month as part of the Princess Half Marathon weekend, I got to stalk have a chit chat with famous marathoner Jeff Galloway. (In fact we got to run with him too!)

But my favorite thing about him is that he speaks to thousands of runners, yet when I got a chance to talk to him, we chatted like we were old friends. He is so kind and so friendly and very, very helpful and I was honored to get some running advice from him.

I’m going to break this into three parts because he had so many great things to say and this first part is going to be focused on running after or through an injury. (I’ll focus on how to prevent losing a toenail and how to make your miles magical in the next two posts.)

My conversation with Jeff Galloway makes me wish I had gotten a chance to speak with him when I was sidelined through my IT band injury this winter because I perhaps wouldn’t have been sidelined at all. This conversation alone changes the way I view injuries and even the way I treat my body through them.

In fact, I might have been able to train through it and even heal through it, if I had treated it right. And yes, according to Jeff Galloway, it’s possible to keep moving even if you’re injured. How? “First of all make sure that the injury has healed just enough so that you’re not going to set yourself back by running. In most cases, most of the people I work with have been able to  run through while they’ve been injured but they have allowed the injury to start healing,”  says Galloway.

And if you’ve healed it just enough, then Jeff Galloway says you can move forward. “It’s all about staying below the threshold of irritation. Every other day running will be the most frequent, and you want to go at a slow, slow pace and you want to take walk breaks a lot more often,” he says.

Here is a sample post-injury run workout by Jeff Galloway:

• Start out by walking for 3-5 minutes or more, and mostly walk.
• Run for 10 seconds, walk  for 50 seconds. Do that for a week.
• If things seem to be healing, move up to 15 seconds run, 45 seconds walk.
• Gradually progress, “allowing the injury to heal and the body to readapt to running,” says Galloway.

Where were you 4 months ago Jeff Galloway???? *snicker*

Running in the water, Galloway says, also maintains fitness as long as you’re not reinjuring the injury in the process. 

And if you’re stuck in the middle of a marathon training program with an injury? There is hope for you yet! “I have had numerous people that have come to me injured and they were in the middle of a marathon training program so I had them walk the long runs and they didn’t lose any endurance,” says Galloway.

Yes. This Jeff Galloway guy knows his stuff. The former Olympian has written over a dozen running books, is a trainer for runDisney races, contributes to Runner’s World Magazine and is famous for his Run-Walk-Run program. You can check out his running programs at www.jeffgalloway.com

Tune in next Tuesday for more running tips from Jeff Galloway!

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