Free Alternatives to Running
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healthhappiness2014
Posts: 13 Member
Hello, I have been running to lose weight, and also as a form of relaxation. It has worked well for both of these things. However, I am finding that my knees are now starting to hurt. Any advice about free forms of exercise that will help me to lose weight, but would not negatively impact my knees would be greatly appreciated.
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Replies
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Weight loss happens in the kitchen. Exercise is for fitness and extra calories. eat less than you burn and you will lose weight.
read this:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1235566-so-you-re-new-here0 -
do you know of anyone with a pool?0
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Before giving up running you may want to consider cross training to strengthen glutes & hips (these are the most common reasons for knee pain) and check your running form.
You may also be using the wrong (or old) running shoes. If you haven't done so already visit your local running specialty store to have your gait analyzed.0 -
If you're having problems with your knees it's likely to be due to bad fitting or the wrong type of running shoes.0
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I agree with going to a running specialty store for shoes if you haven't already.0
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Not sure where you live but maybe your city has a parks and recreation website that offers free exercise options. I would also look into the shoe issue as well, I never had problems with my knees until I bought a new pair of running shoes that didn't work for me. Bought a another pair and no pain when running other than my feelings because I don't like running0
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Before giving up running you may want to consider cross training to strengthen glutes & hips (these are the most common reasons for knee pain) and check your running form.
You may also be using the wrong (or old) running shoes. If you haven't done so already visit your local running specialty store to have your gait analyzed.
This.
I found that I got sore knees for a while, I got new shoes and started doing a few squats etc and then really thinking about the way I was running and all good now.0 -
Have two blown out knees. ACL and torn meniscus. I ride bike. No harm to my knees and I have gotten to love it so much I hardly can let a day go without riding. If I miss a day, I get really down. The endorphins are awesome. Plus, I get to sit on my butt and exercise and lose weight. Started with a cheap Target bicycle and have now gone to an Domane 4 Series. Love it. Did 37 miles today and burned over 2700 calories.0
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Go talk to your PCP, explain you have been running and HOW and WHEN it starts to hurt.
Pool exercises and resistance bands are great. Light inversions against a wall and ankle weights, and "jog" at a slow steady pace works well.0 -
Thanks so much for all of your tips. I am on a very strict budget, and cannot buy new shoes right now, I am afraid. I also cannot cross train, because that requires money to join a gym. I was running/walking about 9 miles per day, and really loved it. On a good week, I would do this 5 days a week. It helped me to drop weight really fast. However, my knees are starting to hurt, and I will not be able to buy new running shoes until next month.0
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Have two blown out knees. ACL and torn meniscus. I ride bike. No harm to my knees and I have gotten to love it so much I hardly can let a day go without riding. If I miss a day, I get really down. The endorphins are awesome. Plus, I get to sit on my butt and exercise and lose weight. Started with a cheap Target bicycle and have now gone to an Domane 4 Series. Love it. Did 37 miles today and burned over 2700 calories.
I do not know how to ride a bike. I see people in the city that I live bike riding, but, in all honesty, it is a bit dangerous, because of the crazy and aggressive drivers we have out here.0 -
You can do a lot of cross training for free by watching youtube videos. Look up Melissa Bender, she has awesome videos that usually only require your body and a timer, sometimes she incorporates some free weights or kettle but you could modify them.0
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Walk. It's that simple. Walking is excellent exercise - all of the benefits of running (if you go fast and far enough) without the joint crunching of running. I lost over 100 lbs in about a year and a half by counting calories and walking. I've maintained for about 4 months now by being mindful of calories and walking. I average 25 miles per week at 4.5 mph.0
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Walking- definitely. Less impact than running and if you get a good pace up, its a great calorie burner.
Then when you can afford to, get some new shoes and try walk/running again.
I try and walk everywhere, its so easy and it is free and of course much nicer in the summer, not so easy in the winter!0 -
I run but am conscious of the knee thing too. So I limit myself to one longer run (under 5 miles even at that). And a couple of shorter runs (usually some kind of interval trainng). Other stuff I'll do besides running is rowing maching and walking (usually with my dogs).0
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I've just started dancing!! I was doing it using the Just Sweat programme, but am just free-dancing along to the music I put together on my iPod for this ... really enjoy it AND get a bit of a sweat on doing it. Was surprised to discover that 45 minutes had just disappeared, singing along to some of my favourite songs. It's probably not as energetic as running, but you can stay in the dry!0
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Thanks so much for all of your tips. Running has been my go-to exercise when I want to lose weight because it is such a big calorie burner. I lost 70 pounds the last time that I wanted to lose weight, and this was largely due to running and counting calories. I have lost about 52.5 pounds from my highest weight this time around, and I can say that the weight loss really accelerated once I started running, but I will try walking. I know that this may sound strange to some, but it is a bit of hit to my self-confidence for me to be going walking, when I always go running on the route that I normally go on. As it is, I live in a really hypercompetitive city - New York City - and the area that I go running in there are a lot of desperate (I am sorry, but that is the only word that I can think of, because this is the air that they give off), women who are clearly running out of a fear of being fat in a city that is full of actresses, models, and lots of other beautiful women. Now, I am not talking about women who are superathletic, and are clearly running because they love the sport. I understand them, running is really addictive. Those women always breeze right past me, and I congratulate them for their physical fitness and admire them for taking good care of themselves. I am happy for them. They are setting a good example for others, and they give me a fitness ideal to aspire to. No, I am not talking about those women. I am talking about women (and yes, I use that term, because it is only on occasion that a man will engage in this behaviour, even there are a few men who do it as well - again, it is often overweight men - the superfit just breeze right past me) who maybe are not in such great shape, and see a fellow fattie (myself) who is running slowly, and think that it is ok to cut in front of me and running slowly blocking my path for five miles. Its always the fellow fatties who try to race me!
I do not understand this mentality, because I truly believe that the best way to move forward with being healthy is to compete against oneself, and not against others. Maybe it is their way of feeling better about themselves. I hope that these people will not begin to harass me even more now that my pace will drop now that I am walking. My one consolation is that many of the people that I see walking are MUCH slimmer than the women who try to outrace me on my morning runs. I think that this proves that 80% of weight loss is really about calories. It also gives some credence to the points made by many on this board about the dangers of eating back too many calories after exercising. I could not understand why so many of the women who would try to race me were so overweight, and also could not understand how people could run so fast for so long (remember that I often run 9 miles a day, and these women were at least doing four miles) and still have BMIs that appeared to be higher than 28 and even in the 30s (and they were not bodybuilders), until I found My Fitness Pal. It was only then that I figured out that it is possible to spend a lot of time exercising, and still be overeating.
I apologize if I have offended any people with this post, but I really had to get this off my chest, because it is one of the issues that had blocked me from exercising for some time. People give very large people a hard time when they are exercising (I cannot tell you all of the disgusted looks I would initially get), and I find that women are often really nasty to one another, and are often the ones who will try to race me off the road. When I am stick thin (I am quite tall, so when I am at a normal BMI I look like I weigh much less than I do, and people will ask me if I am a fashion model), some women will shoot daggers at me, and when I am quite heavy both men and women will give me nasty looks. Maybe this is just the city, that I live in. I find New York to be a really competitive, and unfriendly city at times. What is needed here, as is needed in the world in general, is more kindness.0 -
Walk. It's that simple. Walking is excellent exercise - all of the benefits of running (if you go fast and far enough) without the joint crunching of running. I lost over 100 lbs in about a year and a half by counting calories and walking. I've maintained for about 4 months now by being mindful of calories and walking. I average 25 miles per week at 4.5 mph.
It is good to hear from someone who lost such a large amount of weight be walking. As I posted earlier, I will definitely try it.0 -
I run but am conscious of the knee thing too. So I limit myself to one longer run (under 5 miles even at that). And a couple of shorter runs (usually some kind of interval trainng). Other stuff I'll do besides running is rowing maching and walking (usually with my dogs).
Is that you in the picture? Further motivation to try walking.0 -
Walking- definitely. Less impact than running and if you get a good pace up, its a great calorie burner.
Then when you can afford to, get some new shoes and try walk/running again.
I try and walk everywhere, its so easy and it is free and of course much nicer in the summer, not so easy in the winter!
Great advice, and great plan. Thanks for your input.0
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