Do the Couch to 5k running plan

Decide at the beginning if you’re going to do the running on a treadmill or not, or do both from the beginning. You work your legs in entirely different ways with both methods, and it was mighty discouraging to get halfway through week 6 on the treadmill, only to discover that I SUCK while running outside.

It’s been a month or 2 since I last wrote about doing the c25k program on here, so here’s an update.

Since my first post, I’ve completed weeks 1-4. I may not run fast, and I generally take more than 3 workouts before I feel comfortable enough advancing to the next week, but as they say, “a bad run is better than a good sit on the couch.” I’ve lost 17lbs, I feel better, and I’m just a helluva lot happier doing this. I’ve learned that running for 90 seconds won’t kill me, nor will running for 3 minutes, or 5 minutes, and I can be pretty sure that come the end of week 5, I won’t die from running for 20 minutes straight.

My ultimate goal is to complete the program, keep running, and get myself a Garmin Forerunner watch as a reward.

I admit it. I’m 32, I’m either working all day or playing World of Warcraft at night. I’m terribly out of shape. When I saw this my immediate thought was “I could probably do this.” I was determined to start this year because I live right next to a bike path, however it’s either snowing or raining around these parts.

And then my mother bought a treadmill.

(insert a chorus of angels singing and a golden beam of light here)

So far, I suck at this exercise thing. I can handle about ~20 minutes or so of Suz’s week one podcast before my legs are screaming at me. Looking into this, I discovered that I’m a stereotypical underpronator and that trying to do this in a pair of $20 Walmart sneakers may not have been the brightest idea that I’ve had. I haven’t run since last weekend because I hurt for 3 days after my last run.

So today I bought a pair of those funky Nikes with the chip that can talk to my ipod. I figure that if I spend money to do this, I’ve got no excuse not to do it anymore, and come Monday I’ll be right back to doing it in the mornings before work.