Avoid Overuse Injuries with the Latest Running Research
By Dr. Trish Kana, PT, DPT
Many recreational runners follow popular training programs easily found on the internet: the tried and true Hal Higdon plans, Nike Run Club, or lately even asking AI to design a training plan based around specific performance goals they want to hit. What you may not know is how these programs could be unintentionally putting you at risk for an overuse injury.
For years, runners and coaches have followed the "10% rule"—a guideline that recommends increasing weekly mileage by no more than 10% week over week. The idea is to prevent sudden jumps in training load, which increases risk of sustaining a running related overuse injury.
Let's say you ran 20mi last week. If you're following the 10% rule, you would run no more than 22mi the next week.
20mi * 10% = 2mi
20mi + 2mi = 22mi
That's over the course of the whole week, with little guidance or research around individual runs.
The problem with the 10% rule:
The 10% is a rather arbitrary number. One study published in the Journal of Orthopaedic and Sports Physical Therapy in 2014 followed 874 runners across an entire year to investigate running volume spikes and incidence of injury types. What they found was that novice runners who progressed by over 30% week to week were more at risk for injuries than runners who increased weekly mileage by less than 10%.
But there’s a pretty big gap between 10% and 30% - so at what point is the progression actually too much and predictive of overuse injury: 12%, 20%, 29%?
Another study in the American Journal of Sports Medicine published back in 2007 compared novice runners training for a 4mi race who followed the 10% rule over a 13 week training program compared to runners who followed a standard online 8 week program. There was no significant difference between groups when it came to sustaining a running related injury (RRI). Both groups had around a 20% incidence of RRI during the course of the study.
Despite evidence (or lack thereof), we still hear about the 10% rule as a guide for progressing weekly mileage.
Thankfully, a new study published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine in August 2025 added a lot to our knowledge and should impact how runners and coaches program their weekly runs and mileage.
The newest research:
In an 18-month cohort study involving 5205 runners, 1820 runners sustained an overuse RRI (that’s 35% of runners). A significant increase in the rate of injuries was found when a single running session exceeded 10% of the runner’s longest run in the last 30 days.
This study also looked into 1 week training period data relative to the preceding 3 weeks using the acute:chronic workload ratio as well as the 1 week period using a week to week ratio and found no association (or even inverse association) between these approaches and injury risk.
What this means for your training:
Let’s use that 20 mile week example from the beginning. Following the 10% rule for increasing weekly volume without paying attention to your long run progression could mean you're putting yourself at risk for injury.
Week 1:
Monday: 4mi
Wednesday: 4mi
Friday: 4mi
Saturday: 8mi
Total: 20mi
Week 2:
Monday: 4mi
Wednesday: 5mi
Friday: 3mi
Saturday: 10mi
Total: 22mi
Yes, you followed the 10% rule when progressing your weekly mileage, but you increased 25% from your last long run to your next. Based on current research, this jump from 8 to 10mi in a single run might put you at an increased risk of lower extremity injury.
While this is a common progression and may not necessarily equate to an injury, it does shift the traditional thinking in terms of weekly progression + long run progression.
The biggest takeaways for you as a runner should be:
Stay consistent and avoid big spikes in training, especially as you’re progressing your long runs.
Spread mileage across the week (even adding in short runs more frequently) rather than "making up mileage" by adding on to your weekend long run.