Crazy Evening Runs – Just can’t sleep. Do you all feel the same?
I have always been a morning person. I use to do all my exercise in the early mornings. Since Ramadan started almost four weeks ago I had no choice except to run in the evenings two hours after breaking the fast. I really didn’t want to lose the momentum of running so I wanted to continue even in Ramadan, I felt I should perhaps reduce the minutes so I decided to follow Week 6 Run 2 of the program but without the three minutes walk break. So I would do a total of 23 minutes running straight through and 5 minutes of brisk walk before and after the runs. This worked out tremendously well for me. I have now almost completed the program and have only one more evening run to do on Monday.
When I get back home, I cool down my steaming body with a cool shower and have plenty of water to drink and a bite. THE REAL PROBLEM is when I try to go to bed, by this time my system and my body is fully alert, full of energy and ready for anything except sleeping. I could even go to work and would feel great about it. It would take me hours to get to sleep. Last night I tried for three hours until I finally got to sleep at 2am in the morning. I love my sleep and never had any problem before. I just don’t know what to do in these circumstances. I’m glad I only have one more evening run to do then back to early mornings again. I still would like to know how I can handle this issue in the future. Any suggestions from you fellows?
Written by
azharalkindi
Graduate
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Well Done for finding a way of working around Ramadan and this scorching weather. That's some real commitment you're showing there and I'm glad it's working out for you
As an evening runner I do have this problem quite often. I think it's just adrenaline from your run that keeps you awake once you've finished. Having said that, where I used to have it every run I now only seem to get it if I have a really good or hard run. Maybe my body got used to the adrenaline hit to some extent. Sorry not to be more helpful and suggest a way around this- I haven't found a solution yet!
Kind of! Not exactly your situation, but I'm an extreme owl sort of person and if I didn't have to get up for work and to do stuff, my natural bedtime would be around 2-3am. So I'm in the habit of doing this sort of thing to get me sleepy earlier:
1. Make lights really dim in the room where I am.
2. Nice cup of mint tea/lavender scented candle/relaxing music
4. Read a book that is interesting without being very exciting - have had a book on the history of the French Revolution on the go for ages now, only get through about 3 pages before dropping off.
5. Yoga deep breathing exercises - breathe in over slow count of 8. hold it for count of 8, breathe out for count of 8. Repeat until feeling very relaxed and a bit spaced out. Then carry on while relaxing each bit of your body starting with toes and ending up at top of head. Don't forget to relax your jaw!
9. If all else fails, just resign yourself to having a late one and feeling a bit tired the next day...I find that stressing about it only makes things worse and sooner or later your body will make up the sleep deficit anyway.
Best way to get to sleep I've ever found is to recite your times tables very slowly, going back to 1x2=2 if you make a mistake or your concentration wanders. It's so boring it works every time. Alternatively, count back in 3s from 500, again returning to the beginning if your concentration slips. Repetitive mathematics, the king of insomnia cures. Hope you never need to try it out
I had it, couldn't sleep a wink as I was so excited, thinking about running. I am over it now thankfully. Still running, but now I'm more used to it, it's not keeping me awake at night
I think it might be something to do with your body being relatively new to exercise. It's almost as if your body still thinks you're running when it's actually at rest. It will soon get the hang of it
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Do you run in the rain? 
To all you new runners. Run run run!
When running is all you have 
How do you guys feel about hills?
