The weather is finally beginning to cool down in the desert Southwest, which means I can run outdoors again. Yay!
Somehow, I unintentionally took the summer off from running any significant mileage at all. I had several excuses, disguised as good reasons, for why I hardly ran at all during the summer; the heat, not wanting to get up super early, the boredom of the treadmill, or other training that was more appealing at the time. A few weeks ago, when I began to run more than a half-dozen sprints during my leg day workout, I realized that I’d lost my running base. Running more than a mile at an easy pace sent my breathing to the edge of raggedy and my legs felt like I was slogging through jell-o. So I started running more and more often.
On a three and a half mile lunchtime run on Monday, I thought about people who are new to running, or might want to run and don’t know how to get started. Below is my sure-fire method to turn ‘even you’ into a runner.
First, get some real running shoes. Seriously, make the investment. Don’t run in the same shoes you use to mow the lawn or go grocery shopping, or that you’ve had since high school. Bad shoes will cause knee problems, and you’ll feel awful and your feet will hurt and you won’t want to run. So don’t run in bad shoes. Go to a local running store and work with a sales person to get you fitted with the right shoes. If the sales person seems runner-snobby and treats you like you’re not a real runner, thank them for their time and go find another shop that will bend over backwards to get you fitted in the best shoes for you. I don’t care if you run a five minute mile or a thirteen minute mile, if you ain’t walking, you’re a runner. Don’t forget that. Speed only matters to you. Never let anyone ‘speed shame’ you.
OK, you have shoes. Now you’ll need some kind of watch, phone, or timing device. You can even do this on the treadmill, if you don’t mind that contraption. The goal is 30 minutes of continuous movement, broken down in 3 ten minute blocks. Each ten minute block will consist of periods of running and walking. You will start by running one minute then walking nine minutes (see how it adds up to ten?) You’ll then repeat that two more times, for a total of thirty minutes. Run at a pace that feels good enough that you can sustain it for the entire minute (as slow as you need to go,) then walk briskly for the walking segment.
After a few sessions of every day or every other day, depending on how you feel, increase the running to two minutes and reduce the walking to eight minutes (still adds up to ten.) Repeat two more times. See where we’re going here? When you’re ready, move the running to three minutes and the walking down to seven minutes and repeat two more times. Keep doing this gradual increase of running and decrease of walking until you are running nine minutes and walking one minute. Once you’re at that level, you should be able to run thirty minutes without stopping. You now have a running base!
From that point, you can increase your time and mileage, and also start to play with your speed if you want to begin running faster. Start with this and I’ll talk about how to get faster in another post. Happy running!