calf injury from joggingv

Question
After about a 6 year hiatus from jogging or any regular exercise, I started jogging again about 9 months ago, 20-30 minutes, 4 - 5 days a week. I do stretch for about 5 minutes before I start. As long as the temperature outside stayed cool enough, I jogged in my neighborhood with no pain/injuries, once my leg muscles got used to jogging again. Then when summer came and I live in south Texas, I finally gave up on the heat and started jogging on a treadmill at the gym. For the first 2 sessions, it went fine. I was jogging about 10:45 minute miles. Then on the 3rd time, after about 7 minutes into it, I felt a catch in my left-mid calf, then a burning feeling after that. I stopped jogging, went home, applied ice. The area was sore the next few days (normal activity). After 8 days and I was pain free I resumed the treadmill again. Things were fine for the first 9 minutes ?no pain. Then I increased the speed from 10:45 min. to 10:15 min. About 30 seconds later, the same thing happened ?a catch, then burning feeling in the left mid-calf area. My questions are, is this just a muscle 搒train? What are the best things to do to enhance healing (meds, ice, ect)? What kind of healing timeframe should I give it (ex. after no pain, wait one more week, ect.)? While it is healing, as long as I am not in pain, is it okay to walk on the treadmill or does this delay healing? Lastly, can you recommend some good stretching exercises before jogging to help prevent this from happening again? Thank you for your time.

Answer
Sorry to hear that you are feeling some pain, it sounds like it could be something that is just a strain, and maybe just that area, you have some muscle problem. Stretching beforehand should be light, while you don't want to do too much to over strain or pull an area before you exercise it.

When you finish, that is when you should focus on about 10 minutes of good stretching. http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_1/126.shtml

You can heat/ice the area of pain, but it won't fix it. If it continues, get to a doctor to check it out, you might have specific problems in that area that deeper in the tissue that are causing the pain.

good luck.