I've been meaning to start running for a while and agreeing to enter an adventure race in March that will require me to run 10km, before riding a MTB for 25km and paddling a kayak 1.5km seemed like a good reason to get my act together and start.
I'm following the Couch to 5k (C25K) programme, which starts very easily and slowly builds up to 5km, or 30 minutes, of running over 8 weeks. I'm hardly in "couch" condition, but my legs are not used to impacts and it's going to take a while for them to catch up with my lungs, so this seemed like a nice, structured way to get them used to the idea of repeatedly hitting the ground hard.
Yesterday was week one, day one. A five minute brisk walk, followed by 20 minutes of running for 60 seconds and then walking for 90 seconds, followed by walking home. I walked down to the field by the river near our house, so that I could run on grass rather than tarmac, then set off. My watch beeped at me to tell me when to start and stop running and I used my phone to GPS record the route and speed. The run record is on my Sportstracker profile.
I made an effort to run properly (both feet in the air at once, none of this bouncing up and down jogging nonsense) during the running phases. Hopefully, I'll keep the speed as I increase the running time and decrease the walking time.
Felt fine the whole time. Legs started to feel a little tired in the last half of the last few run sections, but didn't get out of breath. This morning, I can tell that I ran yesterday, but my legs feel fine - a massive improvement on the last time I tried running 9 years ago. (9 years !)
Same again on Thursday and Saturday, then days with 20 minutes of running for 90 seconds and then walking for 60 seconds next week.
Distance: 3km
Time: 20 minutes
Surface: Grass
Weather: Warm and dry
Trainers: Inov-8 Mudroc 290
Clothing: board shorts and long sleeve merino baselayer
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