After spending many years running consistently, training for and completing marathons, I swore I would never fall back into my old couch-potato ways. Building endurance is hard. Unfortunately I grossly underestimated how attached to my babies I would become once we started a family. Once my children reached 2 and 4 years old, I became ready to leave them in the hands of my very capable husband while I reintroduced myself to my long lost best friend – running. At that point in time leaving the kids was now the easy part. The running part? Not so much.
As I returned to running I felt like a complete newbie, even though I knew what was around each corner. I knew how to dress in various kinds of weather. I knew I should stretch, eat well, get plenty of rest when training etc… But building my endurance and reintroducing myself to running was hard, but with these few tips in mind, I recently was able to train for and complete a 10 K race.
- Buy New Shoes
Chances are, the shoes you were wearing had a lot of mileage on them, and over time the shoes become “stale” losing their give. Your feet have also probably changed, in my case pregnancy left my feet (and the rest of me) slightly wider than they were. - Start Slow
Don’t expect to run the pace you were running before. You’re older now, you’ve lost strength and you’ve lost leg-turnover speed. Run 45s – 60s slower than the pace you were running before. - Be Consistent
It’s hard to build endurance when you only run 1 or 2 times a week. - Run A Little Further Every Week
You need to build up a good endurance base before adding speed work, however to build up endurance you need to go a little further each week. - Run at the Same Time Each Day
It’s easy to start skipping out on your runs if it isn’t part of your routine. Try to run at the same time every day. ie: Run in the morning before work, on your lunch or after work. If you don’t have a set time to run, you’ll procrastinate and skip that day’s run.
Got any other tips to share for getting back into running? Leave a comment below to share them.
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