Saturday, October 1, 2011

Couch to 5K Program



Hi! Welcome again! I’m going to delve a little bit into the program that I’m using to prepare for my first ever race, “Couch to 5K” (C25K). If you’re a beginning (like me) competitive runner or someone coming off an injury or someone that just enjoys being outside and enjoying your surroundings this program is an excellent place to start.

First of all, it’s free! Granted it is somewhat of a one-size-fits-all type of workout program but so are most of the programs that you’ll buy in a book or workout regimen online. Even if you were to invest in a personal trainer the workout regimen, as far as running goes, would be pretty similar.

Second, this program does a pretty good job of starting you off slowly and moving you from walking the vast majority of the time to running full time over a nine week period. Here’s a quick look at the way the workouts progress.


Week Workout 1 Workout 2 Workout 3
1 Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes. Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes. Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 60 seconds of jogging and 90 seconds of walking for a total of 20 minutes.
2 Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes. Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes. Brisk five-minute warmup walk. Then alternate 90 seconds of jogging and two minutes of walking for a total of 20 minutes.
3 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
  • Jog 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Walk 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 400 yards (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 400 yards (or three minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
  • Jog 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Walk 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 400 yards (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 400 yards (or three minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then do two repetitions of the following:
  • Jog 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Walk 200 yards (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 400 yards (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 400 yards (or three minutes)
4 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 2-1/2 minutes)
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 2-1/2 minutes)
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 2-1/2 minutes)
  • Jog 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Walk 1/8 mile (or 90 seconds)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
5 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 3/4 mile (or 8 minutes)
  • Walk 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Jog 3/4 mile (or 8 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog two miles (or 20 minutes) with no walking.
6 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Jog 3/4 mile (or 8 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Jog 1/2 mile (or 5 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then:
  • Jog 1 mile (or 10 minutes)
  • Walk 1/4 mile (or 3 minutes)
  • Jog 1 mile (or 10 minutes)
Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2-1/4 miles (or 25 minutes) with no walking.
7 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.5 miles (or 25 minutes). Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.5 miles (or 25 minutes). Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.5 miles (or 25 minutes).
8 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.75 miles (or 28 minutes). Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.75 miles (or 28 minutes). Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 2.75 miles (or 28 minutes).
9 Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3 miles (or 30 minutes). Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3 miles (or 30 minutes). The final workout! Congratulations! Brisk five-minute warmup walk, then jog 3 miles (or 30 minutes).

I’ve completed the second week of the program and have enjoyed every outing so far. I’m hauling around quite a bit of weight and I’m pushing myself but the jump from jogging 60 seconds to 90, while a challenge, wasn’t a brutal as I thought that it’d be. Towards the end of this week and specifically during today’s workout at a local trail we’re working on completing a review on I noticed a lot more burning in my muscles. I’m attributing this to the increased amount of work I’m doing in my Merrell Trail Gloves. I think my feet and lower legs are being “preexhausted” before I start my jogging and yelling and screaming at me to stop a lot sooner than they have in the past. This is okay because despite the discomfort my mile time is dropping consistently. Today I completed my first mile in 17:57 minutes, a personal best since my sub 7 minute miles I completed at a couple different times in my high school career. So since I’m not feeling anything other than muscle pain, or growth depending on how you wanna look at it, I’m going to keep pushing on. I'll keep you posted as I do!

In order to keep things interesting for you if you’re just beginning the program, I’d recommend finding some variety in the places you do your workouts in. The change of scenery and terrain adds some spice and variety to the workouts and keeps them from becoming stale. Also, if at any point you feel you aren’t ready to progress to the next week’s regimen don’t! The beauty of this program is that you can move along at your own pace as long as you don’t have an event (ahem…Turkey Trot) coming up that you’re specifically working to be ready for.

I’ve been recording my thoughts and experiences over the past few workouts and will post them as time allows to give you a real life snapshot of how these workouts work and the progress that is possible if you’ll work to do your best and let the rest go. View every day as an opportunity to make yourself a better person physically and mentally and give each day your all. That way as you wind down at the end of the day you have no regrets!

If you have questions or comments please feel free to post them in the comments section or shoot us an email: offthebeatenpathstl@gmail.com! We’d love to hear from you!

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