Beginner 101: Your First Run
by Jason T.
by Jason T.
The night
before, you drive yourself to the nearest sports store. Looked through the vast
array of cool looking shoes on sale and picked up one for yourself. Next day, you lace yourself up. Beaming
with confidence you went out for a run. The freedom of running, the wind
blowing at your face … you’re unstoppable and you’re gonna blaze through this
road. You ran as fast as you could, who is going to stop you now?
5 minutes
in, things don’t look that beautiful anymore. Your breathing labored, legs
aching and sore, head throbbing and you ask yourself what went wrong? You have
to stop to catch your breath. No, I had to continue running, you tell yourself.
Try as you may, things don’t seem to get better. You question yourself, is
running meant for me? Why such a simple exercise is so difficult? Look around
and that seasoned runner is running so effortlessly. Oh how I wish I can be
like them someday.
If the
scenario above describes your first experience with running, then welcome to
your first real lesson in your running career. Every runner goes through these trials, we
don’t become good runners right on the get go but in a slow life changing
process. Sadly few will quit after a few runs. But surely there is something at
the end for all these runners right? After all, 500,000 marathoners in the
United States alone can’t go wrong year after year. Those who are patient
enough to stick around will find out by themselves why these people are
obsessed with running, completing those long distance runs and keep coming back
for more.
So if you’re
here in search for information to be a better runner, then I would say you’ve
landed in the right place.
Some Running Tips Before You Go Out For Your First Run
1. Focus on going longer rather than faster
If you’re
going out for a run the very first time (and indeed through the early few
months), my simple advice is to forget about how fast you need to go, but
rather concentrate on building the strength on your legs. This meant going
slower but longer in your regular runs. For a newbie, if you can continue
running for an additional minute is a great milestone. Adding all these
additional minutes and sooner or later you’ll be running 5km and 10km races
without stopping or walking.
2. Keeping it in 'conversational pace'
Your
running should be at a comfortable pace. Try to talk to someone (or very often
to yourself) during the run. You should be able to complete a full sentence
(with some degree of difficulty) without gasping for air. This technique is
known among runners as the ‘conversational pace’ and is often a good idea to
find out if you’re running too fast. If you’re gasping for air, you should slow
down to the point where you can resume your conversation with your partner.
3. Take walk breaks
There is
also no shame in taking walk breaks in your runs. Each step you take during a run is
putting pressure of your entire body’s weight on your joints and muscles especially on your legs and feet. Walking reduces the total pounding of feet vs road, which your muscles are not accustomed to. Different sets of muscles are also engaged if you alternate between running and walking hence your 'running muscles' are less fatigued during the run. One great run and walk training plan that you can adopt is the Couch-to-5k plan (http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_3/181.shtml). This plan trains you to run and walk with the ultimate goal of completing a 5k run at the end of it.
4. Breathe right
A lot of runners, even the seasoned ones, think that running is all about building leg muscles and neglect their breathing techniques. Our muscles go into an overdrive for oxygen during an exercise. To put it simply the more oxygen intake, the less fatigued your muscles are during a run. You need to train yourself to take deep breaths rather than rapid short breaths. One technique used by runners is to breathe from the diaphragm (the part between your ribs and belly which expands as you breathe). Try it at home: if you take a very deep breath, you will feel your diaphragm expanding while if you take short breaths it barely moves. The diaphragm like any muscle, needs to be strengthened to be sustained for the whole duration of a run. Another technique is to breathe using both your mouth and nose. Your mouth provides a larger volume of oxygen intake than your nose and if you utilize both inlets, you'll have more oxygen intake into your lungs in 1 breath.
5. Hydrate, hydrate and hydrate somemore
It goes without saying that proper hydration is important in any form exercise. Our body sweat to cool our core temperature which gets heated up during an exercise. That process of sweating at a prolonged period will cause dehydration and electrolyte imbalance in the body. Whenever you feel thirsty, that's your body telling you to drink up to replace those lost fluids. If you ignore these warning signs from your own body, it will lead to serious health issues. You should stay well hydrated before a run by drinking about 500ml of water 1-2 hours prior. During a run, try to get small regular sips of water every 15-20 mins (100-200ml of water is recommended). You can supplement your drinking water with sports drinks or with electrolyte tablets (can be found in all sports store and nutrition outlets) to replace any electrolyte losses from sweating during your run.
6. Keeping yourself motivated
Sometimes you will feel reluctant to go out for a run. It could be a combination of tiredness from your daily routine or just simply lack of motivation to go for a run anymore. Keeping yourself motivated for a run is a struggle every runner go through on a daily basis. One way to keep the enthusiasm going is to join a running group. Running groups are people who meet up on a regular basis for runs, provide companionship for those lonely long runs and motivate each other to achieve their running goals. If any of you have trouble finding a running group to join, do email us or send us a message and we will help you to locate one. Signing up for a race is also a great way to keep that 'running fire' burning. You'll start to run and train more with the hopes that you're prepared to race when the day comes. In Malaysia, we're blessed with plenty of running events (almost on a weekly basis). Those races range from 3k to ultra marathons (more than 42km) to suit the needs of different level of runners.
7. Take it easy
At the end of the day, running is a sport that is supposed to let you break away from the monotony of the daily grind of life. Don't fret it too much and get overly stressed about running. In essence, running is the simplest form of exercise with zero barrier to entry. Everyone knows how to run (except for babies) and shouldn't get into too much trouble to start running. Take it easy and enjoy the process, don't rush it. I promise you'll come to love running and look back at the day you started running with fondness.
Good Luck!
I hope that these advise will help you towards your first step into running - something every one of us at Saucony Malaysia have come to enjoy and love over the years. This will be the first of many more articles from us to share our experience with you. Do come back and check this blog often. Let us know which topic you want us to cover in our next blog post.
Should you have any questions regarding the article, about running or Saucony products, please do not hesitate to comment on this post. Let us know which topics on running do you You can also follow our updates on our Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/saucony.my).
Until then, keep on running!
** all photos are taken from the Internet and credited to their original owners.
