Achilles Tendonitis

Achilles Tendonitis can be tough.  NOT something you ever want to 'fight through the pain' with.  If you catch it early and stretch you can come back fairly quickly.  However, if it gets bad you can lose weeks to months of no running.  Listen to your body and if it starts to hurt, shut it down.

Good luck,

i would also add to target the muscle groups around it.  the pain is coming from tension in the muscles connecting to it which is causing the strain/tear.

i had a friend who had this hit a few weeks before his marathon and had good results using KT tape or something similar in addition to stretching/rolling/icing.

Foam roll (everywhere, but especially your calf), massage, ice, repeat.

Erin

I've fought chronic achilles tendonosis all my life.  Overdoing it Cost me 6 months of no running last year and a whole race season.  

So, hopefully you've caught it early.  Eccentric Heel drops are effective for many people.  

DO NOT stretch, roll, or tweak with your achilles in an acute injury state.  Let it rest and ice to prevent swelling early on.  After the first week, guess what?  More rest.  The achilles tendon if you dissected it is white for the reason that there is very little blood supply to it.  Blood helps with healing so this is a long term deal.  Do not run through pain - if you don't let it heal you will have a chronic problem that will ruin your entire year.  Do not go barefooted, always have shoes where your heel is higher than your toes to prevent overstretching.  How long for recovery depends on how badly it is injured and if you keep "testing" it with runs before it is healed.  So how do you know when to run?  Given the info you stated I would give it a month.  Say hello to water running.  (Believe me, been there and done that.)  Only I kept jumping back to running and really messed myself up.  If there is still pain with slow gentle running (no hills) then take 3 months off and let it heal.  Only when the pain is managable do you want to gently stretch it.  Tight calves and hamms contribute to overloading the achilles in the first place.  

     I saw 5 events I had signed up for come and go without me because of my prolonging the injury with jumping back in too early.  Eventually had to take 6 months off.  3 months strict rest, 3 months doing eccentric exercises - they are the bomb.  The only thing that will strengthen and actually help rebuild your tendon - assuming it's that bad.  You can find eccentric howtos on line as well as photos of tendons before and after eccentrics.  Sorry for the glum news.  Good luck.    

Here are a couple of EXCELLENT resources:

http://www.pponline.co.uk/encyc/0125.htm

http://www.sportsinjurybulletin.com/archive/achilles-heel-injury.html