(from Ask MetaFilter, initial section verbatim)

Running again after six months off. Last weekly totals were in the 25 mile range. Can I start again at 10? Details follow.

As has been my tradition, I am returning to running the first week in February. I’ve done this on and off for about four years.

I stopped running in August after some sort of injury, don’t recall what, could be any number of things, see below.

I run barefoot on a treadmill.

I am a 50 year old man with no family history of heart issues, HWP (no really). However, I have a form of early-onset arthritis which likely impacts joint resilience. This arthritis is the primary reason I took up running, as a means to provide stressors to the joints.

In the four years I have been running, I have experienced any number of running-related minor issues, from tendinosis to baker’s cysts to some sort of Achilles inflammation. My primary arthritic site is my right hip; the kind of arthritis I have is within the constellation of symptoms that HLA-B27-positive folks have and is likely to become quite serious as I age.

I really want to restart at a higher weekly number than I have in the past, primarily because it takes so long to get to 25 miles a week at a 10% weekly distance increase. I did a trial run yesterday and had no difficulty whatsoever going 2.25 miles in about 25 minutes, with the exception of my impatience at the pace. I want to shot for ten miles this week. As soon as I post I’ll be taking a crack at three miles.

Can I jump in like this? Should I? What’s the recommended starting distance for someone who is effectively back at zero?

Thanks. Links to sources appreciated!

———

The preponderance of advice given was that ten miles is too fast a pace. As of the Thursday of the week I posted this (February 4), I was at 7.5 miles with no ill effects and the expectation of finishing the decade on Friday.

I did take a rest day on Wednesday, after a three-mile run completed in thirty minutes on Tuesday, and was very stiff. I have noticed a slight uptick in hip soreness at my inflammation site but no loss of mobility.