1. Keep Smiling!! (Smiling helps you feel good about your run, and releases pleasure hormones called endorphins, natural painkillers and antidepressant hormones such as serotonin!!! You'll love it!!)
2. Keep Flexible!! (Keep your hands loose, your arms freely swinging, You need flexibility in your muscles, your tendons, ligaments, and joints so you don't get injured!)
3. Chin up! But not too far up!! look straight ahead - have Good Posture!! (The efficiency of your running is completely impacted by your posture - so important to ensure everything is aligned)
I glance at my watch. I'm not nearly through the checklist and it's time to walk again. Today is my last 1 min walk, 1 min run. Today I will go for 40 minutes... ooops time to run again!!
Concentrate on that posture - direct quote from the CHI RUNNING website (an excellent book to read - website blog found here) "According to Yoga teachers, along with many other mainstream body movement disciplines, good posture involves having a reasonably straight spine with not too much straightness and not too much bend. The more you slump, the more your body’s muscles need to work to hold you upright. Poor posture not only restricts the circulation of blood to your muscles and organs but also inhibits the oxygen supply to your brain."
4. Keep the Pelvis level ! You want your pelvis level from side to side. Remember those sit ups and crunches you hated doing ?? Keep doing them and right now, while you are running, engage them. Hold that pelvis level!
5. Lean forward! Let gravity take you there and simply keep lifting up your feet to propel you forward! If you want to run faster lean forward more.. to slow down, lean back - simple right!!
Check watch - still a few more seconds but lean back because I'm back up at 160 again and I'm NOT supposed to be pumping blood that hard.
6. Notice your breathing - I'm definitely going too fast, deep, slow breaths. I count.. in 2, 3... out 2, 3 and I slow my pace to align with my breathing... In the beginning you can DEFINITELY expect to be out of breath - it is our muscles not yet equipped to take in enough oxygen to move as fast as you are moving them... watch your heart rate, and slow it down - don't worry - I promise.. in no time we'll be able to up our pace.
Walking is wonderful - I'm loving the little breaks every minute.. makes the time go by so fast. In fact I'm already half way (20 times completed) and on my way back home.
7. Kick your feet to your bum! Use your heels to kick back instead of your calves to pull up - it'll seem weird at first but trust me - it will save you many calf cramps!!
8. Squeeze your bum! yes, using your quads (front of your thighs) to pull up your leg and engage your glutes as you are leaning forward will truly improve your posture and form... CHI RUNNING has practices in it that coach you into the correct form. I've loved the advice from this book and definitely notice a difference.
9. Stay Relaxed! So important to continue to check in with yourself... how is your neck? is it tight and full of tension? How are your shoulders? Relaxed, down and loose? How are your arms? Swinging easy beside you? Not crossing in front? How are your foot steps? Should be light and short... not long and causing unnecessary force to your frame...
10. Be proud - just going outside in running gear is motivation to be proud of. DID I say to Keep SMILING!!!!????
Today's run was excellent. I didn't feel great, honestly.. but I enjoyed completing it - and I hit 5K. Results for your interest below.
I let my heart rate get up a little too high on this one but the good news is how quick it came back down. Also you'll see my pace a few times got pretty quick (likely was crossing the busy intersection then!! But it's exciting to see some improvement.)
The rest of this week I'll start to reduce the walk times and increase the run times. 30 second walks and 1.5 minute runs.. Come on out with me. You can do this too... Here we go!!
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