NEW YORK — For Dustin Pedroia, the mission had been clear. He had been told that six weeks was a normal timetable by which to return from a broken navicular bone in his left foot. He was going to beat that assessment.

Now, it is evident that he will not be back in less than six weeks. Indeed, Friday’s game against the Yankees marks the six-week marker of the fracture that Pedroia suffered when he lined a foul ball off his left foot, and his progress came in incremental form.

Pedroia jogged 90 feet at what he estimated to be 70 percent on Friday. Manager Terry Francona said he thought that the effort went “great,” but noted that the second baseman still had trouble decelerating. Pedroia acknowledged that he’s running faster than he had in previous sessions, but he’s still experiencing pain.

Until that stops being the case, Pedroia won’t return to games. And so, he’s searching for a new goal, but aware that any timetable for his return is now guess work.

“I’m upset till I can play. I didn’t think it was going to be this long. I think I got more of a sense of an idea in Anaheim, when [Dr. Lewis Yocum] told me this isn’t anything to mess around with. … If they would have told me how realistic [the six-week goal] would be at the beginning, then I’d have probably set different goals.,” said Pedroia. “I still felt it [while running on Friday]. It still hurt. But I was running faster, so that’s a good thing. My goal is to play when we get home [on Aug. 17]. I don’t know if that’s realistic. I just don’t know.”

It has been painful for Pedroia to watch his team while unable to help. The day he went on the disabled list, the Sox were three games behind the Yankees in the standings, tied with the Rays for the wild card lead. Entering Friday’s game, the Sox trail New York by six games, and are 5.5 behind the Rays.

“It stinks, man. Miss two months of the season where you feel like you can be helping the team, but you just can’t be out there physically,” said Pedroia. “It’s just tough that we’re five games out, this is a big roadtrip for our team and I can’t help them. That’s the thing that’s tough. If I got hurt and they won, I don’t think I’d [care].”

Pedroia, who is hitting .292 with a .370 OBP, .502 slugging mark and .871 OPS — numbers very much in line with his 2008 AL MVP season — recognizes that even though he fall short of the goal he initially set for his return, he can still give his club a boost. It is simply that he does not know when that will happen, or whether there will still be enough time for him to impact the season when he does get back on the field.

“I’m going to come back and make an impact. That’s a fact,” said Pedroia. “I just don’t know when that’s going to be.”