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You don't have to slow down when you reach 40!
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I've been running since June 2001 and I must say that I do not subscribe (yet) to the notion that you get slower as you get older. I am setting PBs at every race I take part in: 1/2 marathon, marathon, triathlon (all distances). I heven't got below 37 minutes for 10k yet, but there is still time!
What works for me? Train smarter not harder. Take rest days but make it active rest. Vary the types of training you do. ENJOY IT!
Rich.
What works for me? Train smarter not harder. Take rest days but make it active rest. Vary the types of training you do. ENJOY IT!
Rich.
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No matter how old you are when you start you'll improve for approximately 3 years. There's no secret formula. Its just the way it is. Come back in 2005 and tell us how you're getting on.
Happy running all!
Sorry Richard. I'm particularly sorry if, as I suspect, you're new to the forum. Whatever my thoughts on the subject there was no excuse for rudeness.
I started running about 30 years ago when I got too feeble to play rugby anymore. (and it wasn't so rough in those days either).
I improved for around 7 years as I gradually realised I could train more and harder before eventually getting an injury which sidelined me for about 6 months every year. Eventually I found that by standing on one foot while shaving every day I cured the injury and had another golden spell of PB's (they had changed the distances of most races while I'd been injured). About 2 years after I hit fifty I started the inevitable decline but still run because I enjoy it. After all who runs if they don't?
The answer is, Don't start running until you are seriously old and you may be able to keep on improving until you die. For one thing your joints aren't completely knackered.
Sorry Chimp, I seem to have revealed me true colours, must be the vitamins.
I only run 2-3 times a week on average
(one often being a race) so I think I ought to do more , and I guess you only get out what you put in.
I would imagine that after a few years I may find I do not improve , but that is hopefully a long way off.
B
WOW
(37, running for 6 months)
You can improve no matter how long you have been running or how old you are.
I'm 48 -less 21 days - and overweight, but fairly fit. I started to run in Sept this year, my aim is to do the Manchester Run for Women and the GNR all in the same year as my 25th WA.
I'm doing this for me, but as luck would have it I'm really enjoying it, times and distances don't matter to me - but I know I have to reach a certain level to manage my goals.
We certainly ain't past it folks!
My advice: remember to savour every PB, because you never know whether you will be able to better it in the future...
Now nearly 42 and enjoying my running and probably never been fitter! Would love to get under 60mins for 10k in 2003 but if not doesn't matter so long as I maintain my fitness level.
Also, have found that having children seems to have given a level of stamina I didn't realise I had before (could be the impact of raising my pain threshold though. I know Sonia O'Sullivan encouraged Paula R to have kids. She might just have been right - anyone else found this?
Midwives both said it was the bluest birth they had attended!
I've entered the GNR.
Being a tight Aberdonian I will not waste the money so now I have to do it!
Better go and lie down to recover spending money!
Just maybe not at running.
Heh heh!!
grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
But really, and to get away from birth stories, I do think there is something in the idea that women strengthen physically as they get older and particularly after childbirth. I'm sure there are medical studies on this. And to be purely anecdotal, I know a number of women who have started running or taken up some other strenuous exercise who wouldn't have felt capable of it when they were younger...I'm certainly one of them.
Good luck with the GNR.
amuch stronger netball player when I started again in my 40's. I was also told I was a much better rider in my 30's than as a younger person.
Possible we have more determination and sticking power?
All I know is I'm enjoying my sport more now than I ever did in my youth.
If you get a lot of feedback it could be you are training too hard and too soon after eating. Exercise restraint at all times.
Grass-Hills-Pavement-Slow-Fast-Left Foot-
Right Foot-10k Half Marathon etc etc
Just get out Love it- Feel it - Be it
...just be a runner.