How can you tell how far you've run....?!

[CathCakes]

I'm such a novice when it comes to all this.... but is there some way of measuring how far and how fast you're running? I have tried driving my road routes in my car, but this obviously isn't much good when it comes to going across commons or through woods!

I'm going to be starting Week 9 next week, to my complete delight and amazement, and I know i'm NOWHERE NEAR 5k yet, but I would like to aim towards it... is there some sort of nifty not-too-expensive measuring device available...?!

Thanks...and apologies if this is a really daft question....

[Greg_M Graduate]

Week 9 is definitely "you deserve a treat" week and was about the point where a treat started to mean a nice new technical top or a good pair of running socks ....... I don' t know when the rock and roll life passes me by =)

There is a few options including:

1) If you have a watch you don't mind running in then you can get a timing and their are a heap of web sites where you can mark out your routes though some ate not that good at trail paths so you need to experiment with a few. Google "running routes".

2) If you have a smart phone there are a number off "apps for that" that use the phone gps and update web sites to keep a history and a alysis but you have to run with your phone.

3). You can get one of those wrist devices (Garmin, Nike etc do them) and they can do loads of funky stuff and range in price from "not too much" to "bloomin loads" but give you more analysis than you can shake a stick at, allow you to add heart rate monitors etc.

There are a few Garmin users here, I got the entry level ish one as my "treat" for about £100 quid and it's brilliant. Though I used the on line mapping tools and a wristwatch with Excel for a while and that worked well also.

[Greg_M Graduate]

Sorry my spelling was rubbish

[GoogleMe Graduate]

I am using the free new Walk4life app

[Tkdgirl1983]

I use the endomondo app and love it. Tracks distance and other stats like average pace, personal bests etc

[AliB1 Graduate]

Think it will be good to track distance / time. As don't want to spend loads on a gadget (yet) I'm going to give endomondo app a go. Hope it's easy to use!!!

[Scaly in reply to AliB1]

I use it on my Android phone. It's excellent

[AliB1 Graduate in reply to Scaly]

Used it today on the iPhone...very easy and good to see how far i've gone and how fast (or should that be slow). At least now will be able to keep track of improvements

[Scaly]

There's a website called Map My Run and I think you can plot and measure routes on it.

[AliB1 Graduate in reply to Scaly]

You can. There are a number of websites out there that do something similar

[CathCakes Graduate]

Thanks all...will investigate further!