Finding Beginner Schedule too tough :(

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  • Tehuti

    When I started running I followed the beginners schedule on the Race For Life website www.raceforlife.org - why don't you give this one a go?

    As for eating I agree you are probably not eating enough for the amount of exercise you are doing. As a rough guide your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate) is about 10 cals per pound weight so if you weigh 10stone (140 pounds) your body needs 1400 calories just to function, before you take into account daily activities and exercise. If you drop below this your metabolic rate will drop which leads to all sorts of complications.

  • Thank you all so much for your advice and encouragement. About not eating enough - that's a real toughie! I'm 11 stone 6 at the moment (having dropped from 14 stone) and want to get to 9 stone 7, which is around the middle of the healthy range for my height. At my current rate of weight loss it's going to take six and a half months, and the thought of it taking even longer is daunting. On the other hand, I also want to run better...
  • Just wanted to second what other people are saying about the food, I have had similar issues with WW in the past but at least you can add extra food if you exercise (not done SW so not sure about that). I have now decided to focus on fitness and running better (plus eating sensibly), and hope that weight loss and toning will follow!

    Just a thought, if you are very achy the day after a run, are you stretching out properly?

    Do stick with it, as you can see you are not alone! ps - are you the tehuti from BCUK? :)
  • Hello ermintrude, I am indeed tehuti on BCUK, and in many other places as well :)

    Re food, SW does let you have some foods as unlimited: meat/poultry/fish on original days, pasta/grains/pulses/potatoes on green days, and all fruit and most veg on both. Eggs are also unlimited. You also get 4 portions of original freebies on green days and 4 of green freebies on original days. In addition to all that, you can have 5-15 "sins" per day, where 1 sin is more or less equivalent to 20 calories. The trouble is, while that worked for me for the first 2 stones lost, I then ground to a standstill and found I could only lose more by cutting sins down to perhaps 20 a week most weeks, cutting down the free portions to 2 a day and cutting down on free food apart from fruit and veg.

    Stretching.... ummmm..... blush.... don't know any stretches.
  • AvalafAvalaf ✭✭✭

    I used here to learn about stretches
  • Right, to lose weight effectively you shouldn't go below your daily calorie requirement by more than 20% (10-15% should be sufficient).

    If you eat too little (and as everyone seems to agree, that possibly is the case), your body will panic, think ooh it's a drought, I'm going to hang on to all the fat I can get until it passes - clever things bodies! So your metabolism slows down, becomes less efficient and you stop losing weight. Your body just learns to survive on less food.

    So boost your metabolism, eat quality to fuel your exercise, (your SW diet will be based on someone who's not doing any/much exercise so you need to make up the extra to carry on losing) get a copy of Anita Bean's Sports Nutrition book if you want some good reading on the subject.

    Good luck, sure you'll get there in the end. After all, the aim should be to develop a healthy, sustainable way of living rather than to lose lbs, that's just a by product.
  • I second Red Haired Girl's advice!

    You could also try
    http://www.runningforfitness.org/
    for an idea of your minimum daily calorie requirement. It may seem a lot at first but if you're also running you'll probably find you will lose weight more easily if you eat that amount than if you eat less. And then your running will improve, you'll be enthused and run more, and then you'll lose even more weight. It's a vicious circle in reverse.
  • Tehuti - I can't help with any suggestions on diet, but I started running when I was 50 and it was very obvious that it I found it much more difficult to get going than younger running friends. The first time I ran I seriously started to calculate how long it would take for the ambulance to reach me (9 minutes at best!)
    It also took me much longer to recover from each run, so it was some time before I could manage to run more than twice in one week.
    I was very stiff after each run and, on reflection, put some of this down to falling oestrogen levels.
    I'm pretty sure now (5 years on) that I had started "running" too fast but it's difficult to think that that could be the case when you're at the back of a pack of slow runners. It's only recently that I've started to be able to run for 6 miles or so without walking breaks.

    I have a sports massage every four weeks or so (painful but effective) and I think that has made a big difference for me. I also try and massage my feet and legs as often as possible and particularly after a run. If I'm short of time I just do feet, calves or quads, then another bit the next time, using quite firm hand pressure or with a massage roller.

    It might be worth getting your shoes checked, too - the design side of things has come a long way.

    I'm a bit self-indulgent with respect to my running - I know how much fitter I am now than when I started so the massage is a treat and an appreciation of my legs for their efforts.

    Do you keep a training log? It's nice to look back on.

    All the best. Keep at it - it's wort it.

    K2
    (3 marathons down, lots more to go!)


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