If you haven’t ran before and are carrying some extra weight then yeah it’s probably a good place to start for your first couple of short runs. Even running slowly puts additional stress on your achilles so it’s a bit of a wake up call to your body. Running slowly for 10 minutes a few times when you’re just getting started isn’t going to hurt anyone and if everything checks out then you can start to up the pace.

I’m horribly out of shape and that’s pretty much what I can manage. The question isn’t how fast _should_ I go, but how fast _can_ I go so that I can come back and do it the next day.

Running is harder work than walking. Try it!