Graduate snail looking to become tortoise

[Languid_Lil]

Hi there Bridge community.

Languid_Lil here aka Nia from Llandudno. Just graduated (yay!) at my first Parkrun (double yay!) with a time of just under 50 minutes, 213th out of 216 (still yay!)

Now I'm in Big School I want to keep going and get faster - we're not talking 30 minutes here - 45 would be good for me. Any tips, oh wise and whizzy ones?

[Mckennamark Graduate10]

Congrats well done. Follow the magic 10 post. You will see it on here. Brillant achievement.😁

[Oldfloss Administrator Graduate10]

Hi there.. welcome... check out my reply to you on C25K... Yes... I am here too

[Dexy5 Graduate10]

Congratulations on graduating c25k. Glad to see you over here at big school, just take Oldfloss‘s advice and get some consolidation runs in first and then you can start thinking about increasing speed and distance. Let us know how your post grad runs are going. 🏃‍♀️👏

[UpTheStanley Graduate10]

I think you might focus on 30 minute runs for a bit, looking to get further each time. With a Parkrun every so often for the fun of it, and to remind yourself you can get that far when you want to.

Well done, and welcome 🍾

[telford_mike Graduate10]

Hi Nia, welcome to big school. For my consolidation I just ran a little longer each run until I got to 6k, then started the Magic 10 programme (which really is magic!).

[pinkaardvark Graduate10]

As you have just graduated I would just focus on running regularly 3 times a week. Running is like juggling in that to get good at it you have to do it lots and there is no shortcut to that. In the first few months you'll find speed gains purely come from just running regularly and letting your body develop around that.

Moving on from there or if you find yourself getting bored, you want to try some faster running techniques ie intervals or fartleks, or simply just throwing a 100m full on sprint every km. As long as you are pushing things you will help build speed. But when you are ready for some speed work, make sure you mix up your week with nice slow runs also, so best if you are doing 3 a week is to do only one of the three runs as a speed session.

Also don't get fixated on the 5k distance, it isn't really a speed distance, it is somewhere between a track distance and an endurance race, so feel free to try 3k runs and of course don't be afraid of running longer too