Making progress, nice and slow...

[AnyUser]

Today was W3R3. I’ve been pleasantly surprised with how it’s gone so far although I appreciate there’s a way to go yet - and next week sees a bit of a jump of total running time.

As a chonker with dodgy knees, I was apprehensive about starting but it’s been really comfortable and I’ve had no pain. In fact, I feel much stronger already.

I’ve been doing a lot of brisk walking over the past six months which has improved my cardio fitness and I’ve found that with the running, I’m not yet coming anywhere near running out of puff, it’s much more that my leg muscles are really feeling it when I get to the end of three minutes. I guess because I’m using muscles differently for running.

I am jogging very slowly and am not at all tempted to speed it up just yet. I have noticed that at the beginning I was getting lots of peak heart rate zone minutes, while in the last few although I’ve upped the length of time running, the time in the peak zone has decreased substantially - is this what would be expected at this stage? I’m not too worried about how much effort I have to put in as I’m trusting the programme to get me to 30 mins running and I’m presuming at that point once I’ve got stamina and endurance I can then work on speed.

I’m keen to do a park run but I think now is too soon as I may be tempted to run too far or too fast for where I am in the programme. I have seen comments from people saying they wish they’d started going sooner, but is there something to be said for waiting until you can run 30 mins?

I had a bash at the NHS knee strengthening exercises and I think I might have bitten off a bit more than I can chew with the squats as my thighs are pretty tight even two days afterwards - presumably I should be building up to the total reps rather than just diving in?

I am more normally a lurker rather than a poster on the web but this forum is so welcoming, knowledgable and encouraging that I have broken my usual silence. Thanks everyone - reading your experiences, questions and responses have been really helpful.

[SueAppleRun Graduate]

Well done it sounds like you are progressing nicely, squats can make you a bit sore in the beginning but i much prefer them to planks which i find really tough

[runwithdog Graduate]

sounds like you are doing very well.

parkrun is a great community.

many use the app for their 30 min workout then walk the rest of the way.

maybe volunteer too before actually doing it?

i do not worry about speed,i think 30 mins continuous OR 5k in any time is the aim.