Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Couch to 5k

So I've been doing the "couch to 5k" programme. It's supposed to be a 9 week thing, but I've taken about 6 months on it what with sickness and injury and laziness.

Anyway.. I ran exactly 5km without stopping for the first time yesterday! I was pretty stuffed by the end, but my legs were still moving. Totally stoked that I got that far - this is the most fit I've been in my life.

Being the gadgeteer that I am, I recorded the track (incl. warmup/cooldown walks)

Next target: 10km.

(edit: make the link link..)

7 comments:

Zuzanna said...

Shiny! Well done :-D

I've considered doing the "Couch to 5k" program before, but have never seriously committed to it. Did you find any bit of it particularly easy/hard?

Nice hilly run you went on there - was that on purpose or just a side effect of Sydney topology?

MattD said...

For me it was really easy in the first week, then about the 3rd week I started getting a bit of pain in my heels, apparently that's common if you haven't run before. It passes.

I then went well, but got stuck for quite a while in the middle of week 6. It looked really hard going to 25 minutes non-stop, I didn't feel ready for it so I just kept doing the 10 minute runs. When I finally tried it, it was way easier than I expected.

It didn't help that I was having trouble actually getting out 3 times a week, so I'd normally do the first two then have other stuff on.

So I guess the hardest things for me were having the confidence to step up, and having the commitment to go out 3 times a week.

I probably wouldn't have done the whole thing without Robert Ullrey's podcasts telling me what to do. Do the itunes subscription thing so you get the proper versions.

As for the hilliness, that's just Sydney.. it's about the flattest possible track from my house.

brent said...

Well done Matt.

Did you notice a significant change in your waistline? Because I've heard conflicting reports on running-as-weight-loss without resistance training as well.

Z - unfortunately it's always going to be true that there's a certain amount of JFDI involved in these things... I'm doing well with the FI, but not so well with the J and D at this stage..........

MattD said...

Almost no change in my weight, but my BMI was already "normal" when I started so I don't have all that much to lose. Was hoping to lose just a few kilos to make climbing easier ...

Mostly what I've noticed is the change in fitness. Really noticed it when we went for a walk in the blue mountains last week - went down the giant staircase at the 3 sisters, then walked for 2k and climbed back up near the railway. I wasn't even puffing after climbing all the stairs - felt like I could have turned 'round and done it again.

brent said...

I really want to redo my comment. I want it to read more like:

Wow Matt, that is so awesome. I'm so impressed, I could never run that far. Well - I _COULD_ but first I'd have to do all the training that you've already done. Well done to you.

I have to ask though - is it true that you only lose so much weight just doing cardio exercise?

Oh, and Zuzanna - you totally CAN do it, you just need to HTFU :-D

brent said...

!!! jinx!!

I know what you mean - being fit feels great.

tania said...

Ya, good one! I've been trying to go out running, but negative degrees with a cold wind a-blowing is painful on the nose, other uncoverable bits, and the lungs. So I'm going snowboarding instead... Although I will have to start training if I want to run 5km or 10km in the midnight run in June!