How fast do you walk/run?

[Alex_Duggan]

Hi there,

I'm on week 2 of the programme and I have a question. During week one I walked at 5.5 mph and ran at 7. I am about 5.3 in height (to give you an idea of my stride). Does this sound average? Slow? Fast? Thank you!

[SC1472 Graduate]

Speed is an individual thing that you can't really compare. Unless you want to be competing with the Mo Farrahs of this world I wouldn't worry. Just get out there and enjoy the experience of the great outdoors and revel in the sense of achievement of running for a period of time. Your speed will change as you do more running and build your stamina.

[iain-strachan Graduate]

Did you mean km/h not mph? Walking at 5.5 mph sounds very fast. I normally walk at between 5 & 5.5 km/h, and run at around 8 km/h (given my first parkrun time of 37:36). This is not at all fast, but the key is to go at a pace you can sustain; a friend of mine reckoned that a time of 40 minutes for your first parkrun is respectable, and that if you do that you can get a PB the next time!

So if your figures are actually km/m rather than mph, I would say that's absolutely fine. If they are really mph, I might suggest it's a bit fast to sustain for long periods - you are only on week 2 and so only required to run continuously for 90 seconds. 7 mph would correspond to doing a parkrun in 25 minutes, which would make you a very experienced runner - I would say you're killin' it!

When I looked at the Strava traces, I found that in Week 1 I was running at a peak of about 6:40 per km, but by the end it had dropped to around 7:30 per km.

[ju-ju- Graduate]

It soundsfast to me, but please be mindful that its NOT about speed... this programme is about getting you running for 30 minutes. You can work on speed later

[GoogleMe Graduate]

Are you on a treadmill? If not, you are better off not knowing at this stage (well, you'd still be better off not knowing on a treadmill, it is just not avoidable)

[Alex_Duggan]

It is mhp and I am on a treadmill. I now selected '1' on the incline to make the difficulty similar to running on the road. I'm not asking because I want to be a fast runner. I'm asking to check that I'm not being lazy and going too slow. Thank you very much for all the answers!