Couch to 5K - week 5, run 3

Run 3: brisk 5-minute warm-up walk, then 20 minutes running, with no walking.

It's quite normal for me to go months without blogging and now I'm writing two posts in two days.

I wrote yesterday about how worried I was about doing 20 minutes of running without stopping. I felt a bit sick the whole day worrying about it and I was hoping and praying that my running partner wouldn't want to go out. When we did go out the warm up was awful, I'd been and done a gym class earlier in the day and I felt stiff and uncomfortable, and I was aware that we were walking much slower than we really needed to for an effective warm up. I was very tempted to turn around and walk home without even starting to run. Eventually we got to our normal starting point for running and I felt completely hopeless, there was no way I could possibly do 20 minutes constantly without stopping so there was no point in trying. I decided to run as slowly as I could to the mouth of the park on our normal running route, I'd done this before in a free practice and I know that this is about 10 minutes away. I'd also decided that I wouldn't check my watch until I got there. So I kept running, aiming for the mouth of the park but before I got there Laura on the C25K podcast said I was half way through. This confirmed that I was running surprisingly slowly. So I decided to keep on going to the mouth of the park, as I had originally planned. I checked my watch at this point and found I was 12 minutes and 30 seconds in heading in to the really difficult park going up hill over longish grass. I then decided to run through the grassy bit and then review. Part way through it said that I was 15 minutes in and only had 5 minutes left. This was the first point at which I acknowledged that I could actually complete this. I had a slight mishap at this point when I tried to go down the gully way out of the park but there were some people going the other way, running partner had already gone through so I got a bit stuck running up a path in completely the opposite direction to the one I needed to go, but I managed to run a small loop so I could keep going and the whole thing was quite a useful distraction. We ran up to our normal cooling down stretch and the app told me that we'd made it.

I don't think I ever really considered stopping. It was a fantastic experience, before I set out I was sure I couldn't do it but once I got started I quietly decided that I was going to do it and I did. I know that today was make or break, if I had stopped to walk it would have knocked my confidence and been the first time that I hadn't enjoyed running so I'm so pleased it worked out well. Now we get to graduate onto week six.  

Couch to 5K - week 5, part 1

Week 5

There are three different workouts for this week. They are as follows:

• Run 1: brisk 5-minute warm-up walk, then 5 minutes running, 3 minutes walking, 5 minutes running, 3 minutes walking, 5 minutes running.
• Run 2: brisk 5-minute warm-up walk, then 8 minutes running, 5 minutes walking, 8 minutes running.
• Run 3: brisk 5-minute warm-up walk, then 20 minutes running, with no walking.

I honestly thought I’d read this week’s couch to 5k schedule wrong.

Run 1 - that’s possible

Run 2 - that’s challenging but possible

Run 3 - surely in the wrong week. That can’t possibly be run three of week five!

I don’t understand why run three is so much more challenging than any of the others. It’s more than double the time I’ve run in one go before.

We’ve now completed run one and two from this week without any real issues. I enjoyed both of them and I suggested to my running partner that maybe we should do these two once more each to get up more into running for an extended period but he said we should just go for it. My worry is that I’ve never actually given up on a running section and walked and this is something that I prize highly, I don’t want to give up on this but I just don’t think I’ll be able to keep going for the full twenty minutes. I think it’s important to note that my running partner stops to walk (and sometimes stops completely) quite regularly, he tends to do a sprint section and is then exhausted, so stopping holds no shame for him. Part of me wishes that I’d stopped for a walk in one of the earlier runs so I could experience the failure of giving up earlier and then gone out the next day and smashed it. I’m pretty sure that’s cheating.

I’ve been trying to sort out strategies for this big run. I’ve got my new running shoes, which are really successful and I’ve got one of those handheld running water bottles because I’ve found being really thirsty distracting in previous runs, I know that you’re not supposed to need water up to 5k, but I’m hoping it will at least be a reward I can give myself. What I’m not sure about is a strategy during the run. I’m planning on going as slow as humanly possible whilst still not walking (I do still run slower than I walk at times, but I don’t stop running) but I’m yet to decide whether to “allow” myself some walking breaks, how many and for how long.

I’m ready for the physical side of the run, but I’m yet to figure out the mental part.

via GIPHY

Couch to 5k - week 4

Week 4

For the runs in Week 4, you will begin with a brisk 5-minute warm-up walk then 3 minutes of running, 90 seconds walking, 5 minutes running, 2 ½ minutes walking, 3 minutes running, 90 seconds walking, 5 minutes running.

Week four is where the running starts to get really difficult. I actually felt like I started to experience what it is like to do some "proper" running rather than the very short bursts we'd been doing up to now.

On run one of this week I had misunderstood how many runs there were in the session, we did three minutes, followed by five minutes and then three minutes, at which point I thought we'd finished and I started to figure out the best route home at which point the woman, who I absolutely detest, by the way, chirped back up and said I'd got to do another five minutes. I was absolutely devastated. I spent the 30 seconds before the running section started completely inconsolable, I kept repeating over and over that I couldn't do it and it was impossible. I started up and I did actually manage it, which I was really proud about. The sense of accomplishment at completing something really difficult overrode any pain or discomfort that I felt when I was out there. I think this was the first time I’d come across a mental challenge where it was mind that was letting me down rather than my body. This may be more difficult than the physical challenge.

Couch to 5k - weeks 1 to 3

Week 1

For the runs in Week 1, you will begin with a brisk 5-minute warm-up walk, then you will alternate 60 seconds of running, with 90 seconds of walking, for a total of 20 minutes.

Week 2

For the runs in Week 2, you will begin with a brisk 5-minute warm-up walk then you will alternate 90 seconds of running, with 2 minutes of walking, for a total of 20 minutes.

Week 3

For the runs in Week 3, you will begin with brisk 5-minute warm-up walk followed by 2 repetitions of the following; 90 seconds of running, 90 seconds of walking, 3 minutes of running, 3 minutes of walking.

A couple of months ago I heard a colleague speaking to another colleague about running, he said that he was a former runner and he used to really enjoy it. The key thing he said was that the first few weeks would be difficult but, within a couple of weeks you’d really begin the feel the benefit. I’m not usually susceptible to the power of suggestion like that which is why I never have any idea what the radio or television ads are actually trying to get you to buy, but for some reason this really resonated with me. I’m not sure what it was, maybe I was feeling a bit down or having a fat day, but I just decided that I’d go for it. My colleague went on to say that he felt that the best way to get into running was interval training where you walk a bit and then run a bit to stop you overdoing it and he suggested a couch to 5k app which would give you a running plan to help you build up into a proper runner

I went home that night and downloaded the NHS couch to 5k app, I was surprised that there were literally hundreds of choices so  plumped for this one as it seemed the most ‘official’. I set off my first “run” which was a five minute warmup, followed by 60 seconds of running, then 90 seconds of walking repeated for 20 minutes and then a five minute cool down walk. The app is narrated by a selection of famous voices, I chose Jo Willey, who tell you when to walk, when to run and give you ticks and encouragement as you go along. I don’t know how I managed it, but I did the perfect route which took me to my front door at the end of the cool down. I found it really hard, especially on the middle few running sections but I managed to run the whole time that the app instructed me to run and I had a huge sense of achievement once I’d finished.

The first couple of weeks were difficult at first, but I found I was very quickly able to do things which to start with I found really almost impossible. I also feel really good in myself, which is an added bonus. I’m definitely going to keep going with the programme and see how far I get through.