Couch to 5k - any good?
Discussion
No_Idea said:
RizzoTheRat said:
Proper "Technical" clothing is definitely better than the alternatives, it wicks sweat away and won't stick to you like a cotton shirt when you get sweaty or it rains. Decathlon and Trespass do decent stuff pretty cheaply.
I find at the current 7-8 degrees I'm fine in shorts and long sleeved top, or better yet a t-shirt and separate arm sleeves (they're usually aimed at cyclists but great for running), but thin gloves can be well worth it.
I bought a cheapy pair of running tights from Lidl when I first started but found them way too warm. If it gets really cold now I wear shorts and knee length socks.
If you find running is for you, the one thing IMO it is worth spending the money on is decent trainers. A proper running shop will put you on a treadmill for a couple of minutes to look at the way you run and tell you if you need a supporting shoe or not.
Thanks. Will give it a couple of weeks to make sure I don't bottle out before spending on proper kit. I find at the current 7-8 degrees I'm fine in shorts and long sleeved top, or better yet a t-shirt and separate arm sleeves (they're usually aimed at cyclists but great for running), but thin gloves can be well worth it.
I bought a cheapy pair of running tights from Lidl when I first started but found them way too warm. If it gets really cold now I wear shorts and knee length socks.
If you find running is for you, the one thing IMO it is worth spending the money on is decent trainers. A proper running shop will put you on a treadmill for a couple of minutes to look at the way you run and tell you if you need a supporting shoe or not.
Got the first run done tonight and currently sat filling my gob with chocolate
Don't worry about trainers until you're a few weeks in, that will be the main expense.
I splashed out on 2 pairs of thin gloves for a pound, did the job well today in 3 degrees or so.
I live in the country but its too wet and slippery this time of year for running for me, so I use gym during the winter months and run out in the country in the summer.
I find after a break I either go back a few weeks and repeat those runs or this year I'm going right back to week one while I shed the Xmas weight, to be honest I enjoy the progression and the threshold training more than simply doing the 20 or 30 min runs.
I find after a break I either go back a few weeks and repeat those runs or this year I'm going right back to week one while I shed the Xmas weight, to be honest I enjoy the progression and the threshold training more than simply doing the 20 or 30 min runs.
Christmas messed me up with a 12 day break of not running so I am repeating Week 3. Will do run 3 tomorrow then try to stick to a Monday, Wednesday, Friday routine for the next six weeks plus some cycling at the weekend if possible.
I am glad started in December so I am not starting completely afresh now. I feel like my body is slightly used to the idea of running now, albeit very slowly for short distances.
Congrats Crack Taxi and others making good progress towards the end. I'm really looking forward to running a sub-30 mins 5k in February!
I am glad started in December so I am not starting completely afresh now. I feel like my body is slightly used to the idea of running now, albeit very slowly for short distances.
Congrats Crack Taxi and others making good progress towards the end. I'm really looking forward to running a sub-30 mins 5k in February!
GM182 said:
Christmas messed me up with a 12 day break of not running so I am repeating Week 3. Will do run 3 tomorrow then try to stick to a Monday, Wednesday, Friday routine for the next six weeks plus some cycling at the weekend if possible.
I am glad started in December so I am not starting completely afresh now. I feel like my body is slightly used to the idea of running now, albeit very slowly for short distances.
Congrats Crack Taxi and others making good progress towards the end. I'm really looking forward to running a sub-30 mins 5k in February!
Thank you very much mate, good luck in your progress I am glad started in December so I am not starting completely afresh now. I feel like my body is slightly used to the idea of running now, albeit very slowly for short distances.
Congrats Crack Taxi and others making good progress towards the end. I'm really looking forward to running a sub-30 mins 5k in February!
Not long got back from week 8 run 1, which is a solid 28 minute run.
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
CrackTaxi said:
Not long got back from week 8 run 1, which is a solid 28 minute run.
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Awesome Taxi 28 minutes is a really solid effort. Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Stu-nph26 said:
CrackTaxi said:
Not long got back from week 8 run 1, which is a solid 28 minute run.
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Awesome Taxi 28 minutes is a really solid effort. Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
CrackTaxi said:
Not long got back from week 8 run 1, which is a solid 28 minute run.
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
I knew you'd catch me up Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Great effort mate, did you believe that you'd be here a couple months ago? The program really works.
One more run for me to finish, tomorrow night hopefully
Dan_1981 said:
One issue - with the NHS app on an android phone how do you stop the app resetting each time the phone locks??
Huawei p20 pro
Go to settings, apps, c25k, power usage details, app launch setting, set to 'run in background' . You should be able to play music and your companion (our Laura Huawei p20 pro
) will chime in with 5,10 20, 25 minutes etc. wjb said:
CrackTaxi said:
Not long got back from week 8 run 1, which is a solid 28 minute run.
Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
I knew you'd catch me up Absolutely dripping wet tonight, not only sweat but it hammered it down, even my boxers were soaking! I of course had my cotton T-shirt and hoody on too, they were wet and very heavy!
Anyway, stats...
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 5.02km
Average pace was 5:38/km
Fastest split was 4:59/km
Very happy with that, my first ever 5k run completed! My time was 28:07 for bang on the 5k mark.
Kept it quite steady for most of it and stepped it up for the last 2 minutes or so, not by a lot though, still fairly comfortable.
Next run is Saturday night!
Great effort mate, did you believe that you'd be here a couple months ago? The program really works.
One more run for me to finish, tomorrow night hopefully
At least someone did, because I sure didn’t!! I genuinely didn’t think I’d get to even a 30 minute 5k anytime soon let alone before the program even finishes! I’m still over 16 stone so hopefully I’ll be even quicker once I get back down to a normal weight Thanks mate, definitely not, it really is a great program!
Good luck on your run tomorrow
wjb said:
Dan_1981 said:
One issue - with the NHS app on an android phone how do you stop the app resetting each time the phone locks??
Huawei p20 pro
Go to settings, apps, c25k, power usage details, app launch setting, set to 'run in background' . You should be able to play music and your companion (our Laura Huawei p20 pro
) will chime in with 5,10 20, 25 minutes etc. Let's see how Laura is tomorrow morning
Good work taxi on the first 5k run! I'm hoping to have done a 5k true run this month.
Right, week 3 run 3 completed for me today! 2.19 miles, 10:20/mile average pace. I'm still including the warm up/down walks at the moment.
On the 2nd/last 3 min run I added another 2 minutes to it to make it 5 minutes, no issues with that tbh.
Next week is a fairly big step up with 2x 3 min and 2x 5 min runs, I'll be going from 9 mins running total to 16 mins, and reducing from 6 mins walking to 5.5 mins.
My pace on the 5 minute run today seems to be around the 8:30/mile mark, which would put me at a 26:30 minute 5k. Whether that's doable for me for 5x the time, I don't know!!
Dan_1981 said:
Completed this 4 years ago.
W1 R1 today again for the first run in about 3.5 years.
4.5k in 33min.
One issue - with the NHS app on an android phone how do you stop the app resetting each time the phone locks??
Huawei p20 pro
I had the same with my Mate 20 pro, they're very quick to kill background tasks, once you've set it to run in the background (manage manually on mine) it'll be fine.W1 R1 today again for the first run in about 3.5 years.
4.5k in 33min.
One issue - with the NHS app on an android phone how do you stop the app resetting each time the phone locks??
Huawei p20 pro
Right, week 3 run 3 completed for me today! 2.19 miles, 10:20/mile average pace. I'm still including the warm up/down walks at the moment.
On the 2nd/last 3 min run I added another 2 minutes to it to make it 5 minutes, no issues with that tbh.
Next week is a fairly big step up with 2x 3 min and 2x 5 min runs, I'll be going from 9 mins running total to 16 mins, and reducing from 6 mins walking to 5.5 mins.
My pace on the 5 minute run today seems to be around the 8:30/mile mark, which would put me at a 26:30 minute 5k. Whether that's doable for me for 5x the time, I don't know!!
Edited by Tall_Paul on Saturday 4th January 16:52
So I sort of finished week 7 run 3 earlier today. I had to stop twice so ran a little longer as I think I’m coming down with a bug of sorts. If I hadn’t ran the 25 minutes already twice this week I’d repeat the session but I think I’ll be ok to move onto week 8 and get this finished.
Plans post C25K are to complete the 10K app and run the great north run in September if I get in via the ballot which opens on Monday.
Had quite a change of lifestyle recently gave up the drink, starting running and even cleaned up my diet the last few days now Christmas is behind us. Plan is to stick with it to try and lose about 4 stone and run the GNR in sub 2 hours by September...
Plans post C25K are to complete the 10K app and run the great north run in September if I get in via the ballot which opens on Monday.
Had quite a change of lifestyle recently gave up the drink, starting running and even cleaned up my diet the last few days now Christmas is behind us. Plan is to stick with it to try and lose about 4 stone and run the GNR in sub 2 hours by September...
Just got in from week 8 run 2
Went similar to last time being another 28 minute run, only this time a bit slower as I didn’t get to the 5k mark unfortunately, not far off though!
My overall average was only 4 seconds/km slower than last time but my fastest split was 24 seconds/km slower which meant even after speeding up for the last few minutes like last time it wasn’t quite enough.
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 4.96km
Average pace was 5:42/km
Fastest split was 5:23/km
Overall not too different, if I knew I was so close I could’ve just carried on running for 40 metres to make it 5k which would’ve made me feel a bit better but it wouldn’t have been true to week 8 so I’m glad I didn’t.
Next run will be Monday night!
Went similar to last time being another 28 minute run, only this time a bit slower as I didn’t get to the 5k mark unfortunately, not far off though!
My overall average was only 4 seconds/km slower than last time but my fastest split was 24 seconds/km slower which meant even after speeding up for the last few minutes like last time it wasn’t quite enough.
Moving time was 28:17
Distance was 4.96km
Average pace was 5:42/km
Fastest split was 5:23/km
Overall not too different, if I knew I was so close I could’ve just carried on running for 40 metres to make it 5k which would’ve made me feel a bit better but it wouldn’t have been true to week 8 so I’m glad I didn’t.
Next run will be Monday night!
mgst170 said:
Maybe some of the more experienced runners could comment if more endurance makes the runs become easier , or doing the same distance but faster, as that’s the point I would like to get to - being able to go for a 45/50min run, keep fit and burn some calories.
Basically you get the ability to do both. As you get fitter, you gain the ability to run consistently at different speeds. So depending on what you want to do, you could go out for an easy 10k but put in the same amount of overall effort as doing a faster 5k. A decent next step would be a target of being able to do 10k under an hour, three times a week. That’ll make a huge difference to your regular health and fitness.
Not long got in from week 8 run 3.
Tonight I decided to go out and run a slow pace that felt very comfortable, not at all focusing on times or distance and purely on slower comfort. Mostly coming from a chat I had with a mate earlier about future 10k running/training and finding a slower pace to get to it, but also due to the fact I went on a hike with the girlfriend yesterday and my knees were still niggling so it felt like a good time to take it easy!
Anyway, ran quite slow, breathing wasn’t laboured and felt fairly good. Sweated LOADS less than normal and when I stopped I was barely even out of breath whereas normally I am!
Overall it’s obviously a bit less distance ran but compared to how much less of a struggle it was it’s crazy!
Moving time was 28:26
Distance was 4.67km
Average pace was 6:05/km
Fastest split was 5:49/km
With that average it would’ve been a 5k time of 30:15 which I’d still be happy with, especially considering the difference in effort put in compared to my 5k time of 28:07 last week.
My next run will be Wednesday night and I’ll be starting my final week of C25K, my first ever 30 minute run!
Tonight I decided to go out and run a slow pace that felt very comfortable, not at all focusing on times or distance and purely on slower comfort. Mostly coming from a chat I had with a mate earlier about future 10k running/training and finding a slower pace to get to it, but also due to the fact I went on a hike with the girlfriend yesterday and my knees were still niggling so it felt like a good time to take it easy!
Anyway, ran quite slow, breathing wasn’t laboured and felt fairly good. Sweated LOADS less than normal and when I stopped I was barely even out of breath whereas normally I am!
Overall it’s obviously a bit less distance ran but compared to how much less of a struggle it was it’s crazy!
Moving time was 28:26
Distance was 4.67km
Average pace was 6:05/km
Fastest split was 5:49/km
With that average it would’ve been a 5k time of 30:15 which I’d still be happy with, especially considering the difference in effort put in compared to my 5k time of 28:07 last week.
My next run will be Wednesday night and I’ll be starting my final week of C25K, my first ever 30 minute run!
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