Slow running in the news!

[MissUnderstanding]

Hello fellow snails! There’s a great article in today’s Guardian all about the rise of slow running and how more and more people are just enjoying the positive effects of runs instead of chasing the pace..

Well worth a read!

It’s available here…

amp.theguardian.com/lifeand...

[PeggySusi]

Thank you for posting. Definitely worth reading.. and my running pace will definitely never be slow, only sexy, from now on..😊

[cheekychipmunks Graduate10]

Haven’t read that yet, but I will. I’m all up for not chasing pace! Any excuse in my book. 😅

[Bluebirdrunner Graduate10]

Great, thank you for sharing.🧡

Running should be fun!

🏃‍♀️🐌🏃‍♂️🏃‍♀️🐌🏃‍♂️🏃‍♀️xxx

[cheekychipmunks Graduate10 in reply to Bluebirdrunner]

Yes it should Bluebirdrunner ! Up the snails 🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌

[Frankenfoot23]

Thanks for posting this, what a great article. Quite happy as well as my usual 5k time is around the same as the average park run time Not that I've been running lately - I have a phsyio appointment tomorrow as it just isn't feeling right. Ran for a few seconds to test and it soon starts hurting again. Fingers crossed for tomorrow. I hope you are much better now and well over the cold

[ChannelRunner2 Graduate10 in reply to Frankenfoot23]

Keeping my fingers crossed for you 🤞!

[Frankenfoot23 in reply to ChannelRunner2]

Thank you!

[Shake-and-run Graduate10]

a great read thank you for sharing xx

[SueAppleRun Graduate10 60minGraduate]

It's great isn't it? And if we go slow we can run for longer

[AlMorr Ambassador Graduate10]

A great read MissUnderstanding, I think the term tailwalker at the London Marathon was borrowed from tailwalker at parkruns, 50 tailwalkers at the London Marathon seems an awful lot.

[BlackCountryLee]

Great article - thanks for sharing the link 😀

[Sax64 Graduate10]

Fab, but why wasn't C25K mentioned in the article? I think this is the joyous home of the slow runner 🏃‍♀️🐌🐢🏃‍♀️🐌🐢🏃‍♀️🐌🐢

[Mummycav Administrator Graduate10]

oooo, thank you for sharing this MissUnderstanding I’m feeling much better today so maybe this will make my day even better x

[Vespina Graduate10]

Thanks for sharing. I’ll read that after work. I’m getting stuck into MAF training so nice to hear that it’s all the rage 😆

[Sandraj39 Graduate10]

Great article - thanks for sharing! 🙂

[Oldgirlruns Graduate10]

I loved this article MissU! As a really slow runner myself, it’s comforting to know that a)I’m not alone (although I know there are loads of us here on the forum!) and b) it’s OK! Although I’m not sure about the sexy bit!

[Folkylass Administrator]

Thanks for sharing MU. I’m definitely going to read that.👍🥰🥰x

[Folkylass Administrator]

Just finished reading it. It’s so brilliant ! 👍🥰🥰🏃‍♀️x

[CBDB Graduate10]

great article. That community looks new to me, I wonder how many members they have.

[Dexy5 Graduate10 in reply to CBDB]

I will answer you here as I have deleted my post. I hadn’t realised MissU had got there before me.

When I clicked the links for the club, it mentioned $0, so I suspect it’s American . But it seems to run very much on the same lines as HU does. They’ve probably seen this and copied. 😂

What I was impressed by was that Race Directors are starting to take note that runners come in all shapes and sizes and run different (slower) speeds.

[CBDB Graduate10 in reply to Dexy5]

yes, definitely. I also saw another article recently penned like a letter to race directors, asking for consideration of slower runners .

[Dexy5 Graduate10 in reply to CBDB]

I have had to contend with getting the wrong size race shirt when faster runners have taken the size I ordered, but far worse is when water runs out before the slower runners have reached it, or they are feeling pressure by people wanting to re-open the streets

[ChannelRunner2 Graduate10 in reply to CBDB]

The article states that the founder, Martinus Evans, is in New York and "Evans set up, and is now in charge of the Slow AF Run Club, a virtual club with more than 10,000 members, and his book of the same name came out last month." (my bold...)

[CBDB Graduate10 in reply to ChannelRunner2]

10k runners. Wow.

[Dexy5 Graduate10]

whoops I didn’t see this. I’ve just posted it too. I shall go back and delete it. An excellent article! Really pleased to see that the London Marathon has changed its policies to help slower runners.

[Lumaca0112 60minGraduate]

Great article - thanks for sharing, MissU!

[Reggit Graduate10]

that’s a great article. Good to see that London is considering us err non-prime (or should that be sexy) runners. Let’s hope other events follow suit. … let’s start with Manchester marathon next year please 😂

[Scruff55 60minGraduate]

I really like this article it accepts that running is a joy not a stress. Thank you for sharing it MU. 🌈🏃‍♀️🏃‍♀️

[RunBrianRun Graduate10]

Slow running has never been my thing but it is just this that I am considering introducing into my sprint training.

I’m thinking of restarting park running except this time the goal is to stay slow and run/walk it instead. Parkrun has a place in my heart and I’m missing it too much not to do it at all so this method should work.

Great article 👍

[misswobble Graduate10]

I love slow running. It’s just one of life’s pleasures. Healthy and guilt-free 👌🏃‍♀️

[Dendev75 Graduate10]

This is interesting reading and I definitely fall into this ‘new’ slow category and I’m happy to be here. When I look back (in my short running journey) at the races and parkruns I’ve taken part in I have thoroughly enjoyed the ones where I’ve been having a good old chat to a fellow runner - the ones I haven’t enjoyed are the ones I’ve pushed myself and I’ve learned from this.

I’m glad to be a snail 😊 🐌 thanks for sharing 👍🏻

[Reggit Graduate10]

I don’t consider myself as slow, or fast - somewhere in the middle as a hobby runner.

However I’ve entered a marathon (stupid me) next year and am not actually sure I’ll make the cut off time 😂. If they’d take that stress away I’d be far happier 😆

[Cmoi Graduate10]

As I mentioned over on the (soon-to-be-known-by-another-name) marathon forum, I find the article interesting but still pretty limited in its perspective.

If you're genuinely not bothered about times and pace (or distance, elevation, heart rate or whatever) then don't use a watch or any other timing or recording device. It's still a run.

[ChannelRunner2 Graduate10 in reply to Cmoi]

When I started reading the article I literally thought "Damn! I could've saved the money for the sport watch!" 🤣

Then I realized, though, that the primary reason I got it was to slow myself down as I realized I was running too fast for my body at this point in time. For some reason, as a data geek, getting the visual feedback of my heart rate is helping me a lot... Still, I might incorporate your point and remove the pace from the during-the-run display.

[Cmoi Graduate10 in reply to ChannelRunner2]

If you're a data geek and find that the numbers are helping you, that's great. Personally I very rarely find them helpful. I know that running by perceived effort (and even then I never rate it on a numeric scale) works much better for me, so that's what I do.

[ChannelRunner2 Graduate10]

Thank you so much for sharing this great article, MissUnderstanding ! I very much enjoyed reading it. I find it so fascinating that there are so many slow movement things now: Slow running and slow food, for example. It seems like we're trying to slow down in this world that seems to be speeding up. Maybe that, too, gives some hope that a different, at least in my mind, more humane world is possible...

I was a bit annoyed about the statistics they included The average pace might be getting slower and what about the spread? Even the linked source doesn't provide a comparison based median pace. That would be far more interesting. Of course, the average will go down if more and slower people participate. It might still be, though, that elite runners, for example, or those focused on pace, are getting faster. That gets lost in the average...

[Cmoi Graduate10 in reply to ChannelRunner2]

I agree with you about the statistics ChannelRunner2 . And for an article that claims to discuss why pace isn't the only way to measure running, they don't half wang on about it.

[Tetleyteagirl Graduate10]

hello fellow plodders, interesting reading MU, the amount of times I’ve felt the need to say “I’m a plodder” to folks that have stepped aside to allow me through, maybe now I’ll pluck up the courage to say I’m going at my sexy pace 🤣🤣

[CBDB Graduate10]

I just googled and found the page with the AN OPEN LETTER TO RACE DIRECTORS FROM THE BACK OF THE PACK and it’s a great read. I so empathise. One thing which keeps me from running in public races is knowing most races are not designed for my slow joggling speed.

Link 300poundsandrunning.com/an-...

It gets my thumbs up! Support all snails, tortoises and all slow runners! 😊😃😊😃😊😃

🐢🏃‍♀️🐌🏃‍♀️🦥🏃‍♀️🐢🏃‍♀️🐌🏃‍♀️🦥

[Archerygoddess 60minGraduate]

Life has knocked my confidence to an all time low this year and my running has suffered as a result. At the moment I'm running really slowly and enjoying it more. Sad to say that I haven't been on this forum for a while, because seeing people posting their times just made me feel worse, and I don't want to be a killjoy when someone's excited about a good run. This post has cheered me up, though, especially as I can now tell myself I'm sexy! 🐌🐌🐌🐌🐌

[MissUnderstanding Administrator Graduate10 in reply to Archerygoddess]

So glad the article was encouraging to you. It can be hard reading pace and time numbers. I can totally relate to that-I know logically that my pace is my own and my run is my own but sometimes my head doesn’t want to listen. You are absolutely not alone in feeling like this.

We love the slow and steady here. I wonder if some of our proudest snail-pace runners are the ones who are least likely to post their times so maybe you’re just not spotting there are loads of others who are slow runners too!

Really hoping that the new month with being some new positive things into life for you ❤️❤️❤️

[Archerygoddess 60minGraduate in reply to MissUnderstanding]

Thank you x