Anyone have experience with C25K?

goldentamarin

Hello! I've finished the program in December last year and was consistently running 14 minute miles in January, but then injured my back thanks to poor shoes. So I was inactive February, with some yoga sprinkled in recently. This and more stretching has done wonders, so I finally went out for a run today. I did W1D1 for comparison and it was very easy. It flew by. So I'm wondering if anyone has any advice on where to resume the program? I'm not sure if i should just jump back into running for 30 minutes again. I have completed the program a few times in the past few years, although I have been inactive for months in between these times. Thanks!

loulouowens

I have never run until a few weeks ago. The group i joined had already started the program, so i started on WK4 and im finding it okay.

dkabambe

You may not need to go back to the beginning, but difficult to give advice as it's different for everyone. Try going out for a two-part run - jog for as long as feels comfortable (don't push it), walk until you feel recovered then jog again. Based on what times you achieve try to match that to somewhere that's a little bit easier than that in the program.

TavistockToad

if you've already done the programme, i would just go out and run, slow to a walk as necessary and maybe start with 20 minutes, not half an hour.

heiliskrimsli

You may benefit from fartleks for a while. That's where it's less structured than the C25K and you kind of pick points and vary pace while you're out running. You may decide to run to that telephone pole, and then walk a bit, or try to jog up this part of the hill and then walk.

Fartleks are kind of like the intervals that C25K is giving you but they're not time structured and it's OK to get to that telephone pole and know that you can run a little further, so you do. It's common for runners to do fartleks; I'm doing them now training for a half marathon, basically varying between my anaerobic pace and recovery pace, and I do a fair bit of it by feel.

jelleigh

Personally I always started back at week 3. It's not so easy to have no challenge but it's before the hard week 4/5 where they increase run length each run. If you can handle week 3 ok, then you'll be ready to move on.

apullum

As someone who did C25K, got injured, took a year off, then restarted it and has been running regularly ever since, my advice is to start slowly. There's absolutely no reason to rush, and you don't want to risk re-injury.

If you were comfortable with running for 30 minutes pre-injury, try starting with just running a mile. See how you feel (and perhaps more importantly, see how you feel the next day). If everything seems fine, you might add five minutes or so to each run to gradually get back into it.

goldentamarin

Thanks everyone for your answers! I was very comfortable running 30 minute pre-injury, but like approaching things with caution, which is why I thought I'd try and see what others experiences have been. Very helpful That said, I think I'll take apullum's advice and try running a mile. I got new running shoes which really help. I'll try this out tomorrow and see how it goes!