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learn to run

Everything I want you to know about learning to run

OperationMove · December 31, 2020 · Leave a Comment

This post originally appeared on Active Truth

Before and after pictures, we’ve all seen them, right? 

It’s easy to look at an after picture and think of it as representing determination, strength, commitment, discipline and hard work.

But my before picture is the woman who did all the work. She was the one who got herself to the gym when no one there looked like her. She was the one who gave herself pep talks in the car just to get through the front door. She was the one who persisted outside even when people gave her the stink eye up and down. She was the one who went into shops even though sometimes they asked her to leave because ‘there’s nothing that fits you here’. She fiercely did all of those things when they were hard to do. Beginnings are hard. Starting something new is hard. Asking your body to adapt is hard.

My after picture is the woman who stands on the shoulders of all of that hard work. That’s all she has to do.

Now I realise that there is no after picture, not really. Because I’m not done yet.

The most important thing about learning to run, whether you are starting for the first time or getting back into it after a small or big break is that the barriers aren’t your breathing or your running technique or your posture or your motivation.

The biggest barrier is systemic obstacles that stop you from discovering how amazing you are. How amazing your body is. How capable it is of doing everything you could ever ask it to do and then some.

It’s all the times that you are outside and someone yells ‘run, fatty run’, it’s all the times at the gym someone rolls their eyes at you. It’s all the small ways that you are made to feel unwelcome, or worse undeserving. It’s the way that there are a billion campaigns to ‘fight obesity’ but outrage if anyone dares to make plus-sized active wear. It’s all the times you say in passing you are a runner and someone screws up their face and says, ‘really?’

You deserve to take up space, in any way you choose. If running is in your heart to do, that fills my heart with so much joy because running changed my whole life. Or it felt that way at the time, but maybe running just allowed me to be who I was always meant to be. My whole self.

You already have a runner’s body. You already have everything you need. You don’t need to change to start, you can just start. I know in the beginning you might think ‘this would be so much easier if . . .’, but if it is challenging that’s just another ingredient to make you stronger, more resilient and more capable.

It’s not that you don’t try hard enough, it’s that you don’t have enough support. Most of us aren’t a victim of not working hard enough, of not putting in our full effort. The problem is much more that we don’t have the context or the feedback to appreciate what all of our work means. You can find support in lots of places from in-person communities like parkrun to online communities or coaching groups. We need people to tell us that we are in fact doing amazing, progress isn’t linear (no matter how much we want it to be) and that what we are doing matters. We need to be around people who appreciate not just the results, but all the hard work and consistency that went into them in the first place.

Running is not a calorie burning exercise. Yes, technically anything you do burns calories. But if you look at running as some kind of energy exchange, you are short changing yourself. If you want to run well, you need to fuel that running to perform well, to adapt well and to recover well.

It can be anything you want it to be. Some people train to run faster, some people train to run further, some people run to be outside or to be with friends. You get to decide what it means for you. You get to make your own rules and follow your own path. That’s the fun part.

Often, what you get out of it has very little to do with running. I was a truant at every cross country run, every athletics carnival, every sporting endeavour at school. After a while I started to believe that story about myself – that I wasn’t capable, I wasn’t athletic or coordinated, I just wasn’t enough. Learning to run re-wrote that story for me and it challenged so many other stories I’d told myself about what I couldn’t do.

You might not believe that you can learn to run yet and that’s okay. I believe it enough for the both of us.

 

This is Learn to Run: Helen’s Story

OperationMove · April 1, 2019 · Leave a Comment

It is such a pleasure to bring you Helen’s Learn to Run story. There’s no greater power than investing in yourself, every day. Even when you don’t feel like it, even when it’s hard. And along the way, Helen inspired so many other people to do the same. It was such an honour to see her progress over the three months in Learn to Run and to see her continuing to build on what she achieved in Run Club. 

Zoey


Wangaratta 5k Fun Run 2019

I’m an “it’s better than the alternative” runner.

My running journey started back in 2013, overweight and unfit I signed up for the 12 week challenge at the gym that I had joined. The hook that got me in was training to walk a local fun run; hills, 11km, fire trails.  I seriously underestimated what was involved, and that very first walk I was hanging on to trees to stay upright trying to catch my breath. If it wasn’t for the fact that my car was at the far end I would have turned around and gone home.  10 weeks later, event date rolled round and I’d done 9 training walks. I knew I was fitter because when I got to the top of the hill it didn’t take anywhere near as long for me to get my breath back and on the day of the event I finished 34 minutes faster than the very first walk.

After that event life went back to what it had been, and next thing you know it’s 12 months later and I’m signing up for another 12 week challenge in pretty much the same spot as where I’d been a year earlier.  This time I set a time goal for the fun run that meant I had to do some running on the flat sections.  Somewhere in the next 10 weeks of training I realised that I didn’t mind this running thing; I didn’t love it, but it was way better than doing burpees or TRX rows – not that there is anything wrong with those things, I just really really don’t like them.

From there I moved onto parkrun. I loved it and worked my way up to being able to run the whole 5km.  Somewhere along the way I tried to leap from being a once a week 5km runner to a 10km runner and collected myself an injury although I didn’t have a clear reason why. I couldn’t tell any of the health practitioners I consulted what I’d done, there was no I did X and now Y hurts.  I tried to keep running, but things weren’t improving because I was treating the symptoms not the cause, and this was the start of a slow downhill slide to long periods of no running.  With hindsight, I know now that I just tried to do too much too soon and too fast.  One thing I did learn was that I’m pretty much a 5km girl who’s prepared to step up to a bit of a longer distance for special occasions.

Eventually my injury led me to a local physio group with a clinical Pilates class and a fiercely persistent massage therapist. It wasn’t a quick fix, but after a couple of program cycles I stopped worrying about my symptoms returning and started to think that maybe I could try running again.  I had some intermittent attempts to start again but never had a proper plan or a clear goal so each time I would fizzle out and give up. And I’d still be at the same point as when I very first started, overweight and unfit.

Around this time advertisements for Learn to Run started appearing in my Facebook feed and in the ads that google tossed at me, I guess because I had googled Couch to 5km apps. I ignored them at first but these things can be a bit persistent and niggle in the back of your head.  I was a bit interested. The idea of having a plan to follow was really appealing, but I was going away on a holiday and wouldn’t be able to finish if I signed up for the advertised program.  I sent Zoey an email to find out when the next program would be, and discovered I would be back from holidays just in time; and even better, Zoey followed me up with an email a couple of weeks before the program started.  Personal contact is so much better than just downloading an app.

Learn to Run was absolutely what I needed. There was a clear plan for the week, and explanations about why there are differences in the plan across the week.  The Monday check in and posting each of my sessions was great accountability that I would never have found had I gone down the Couch to 5km route.  Knowing that there were others having similar issues as I was (why can breathing be so hard!) actually helped me keep going, and of course being able to ask questions either in the Facebook group or of Zoey directly was fantastic.  I was home from holidays in time to do half of the pre-program walks which I think really helped, particularly going from doing not much to 3 run/walk sessions a week. Even more important was the gradual progression through the weeks.

Of course it wasn’t all roses. There were some days when I really wondered what the hell I was doing, when my huffing and puffing was so bad I couldn’t finish an interval, or when my legs felt horribly heavy. This is when the feedback in Learn to Run really kicks in, because well, sometimes running just sucks and it’s good to have someone to remind you of that, but running never seems to suck as much as burpees do!

Before I knew it, 12 weeks was done, and no injury issues.  As well as confirming for me that 5km is my sweet spot, Learn to Run taught me that I really need to have a goal sitting out there that I’m working towards, and a plan to get there, because I’ll never be the person who exercises just because it’s good for me.  So this year, because being back running is a special occasion, I’m going back to that very first event, 11km, hills and fire trails and I’m pretty excited about it.

 

 

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Podcast: Episode 93 – Back to the Beginning

Zoey · February 8, 2019 · Leave a Comment

Back on my podcast, and back to the beginning!

Whenever Learn to Run starts, I have the opportunity to reflect on where I started and how my own experiences have helped me to shape and change and evolve Learn to Run. This week I’m talking about what learning to run was like for me, and how it slowly grew into something bigger than myself. There are things I learnt as a runner, and things I learnt as a coach from where I started and the points where I succeeded and where I failed.

Resources I talk about:

How to rehab shin splints, because resting isn’t enough!

Learn to Run starts on 11th February, you can dive in here. And all the payment options are viewable here.

Since 2014, I have taught 1,257 women how to run and this is what I learnt

Zoey · March 28, 2018 · Leave a Comment

It’s easy to feel discouraged in a vacuum.

Most people start Learn to Run because they’ve had the self belief beaten out of them. Maybe it’s the voice in their head that says they’ll never be able to do this. Maybe it’s the voice of that person who meant well but didn’t realise they were telling you that you weren’t good enough. Maybe it’s just that the thing that everyone else seems to find so easy, just seems hard. Chances are they have tried Couch to 5k and stopped after three or four weeks because it got too challenging. And instead of viewing that as a programming problem, it’s viewed as a personal failing. It’s hard to feel motivated, when you don’t have a context to view what you are doing. Things that might look like a failing in a vacuum are actually people putting in maximum effort. And once you shine a light on that, everything else falls into place.

Belonging is more important than achievement.

Because running is so measurable (sometimes too measurable!) it’s easy to think of that measurement as a definition of how good of a runner you are. But the fact is that the two things aren’t connected. Pace will vary depending on genetics, long term training background, the time in your week, what kind of training you like to do, the weather, how much you ate last night, what the humidity is like and which way the wind is blowing. It’s the commitment to the process that makes you great. And finding other people to share your joy with is worth far more than anything you can measure in minutes per kilometre.

What you learn in failing is more valuable than what you learn in success.

Often, you’ll have a week or two off because you get sick, or have a niggle that needs fixing up, or have some other commitments that need your attention, or maybe you just fall into some old habits. But that is the best thing that can happen. Because it teaches you that there is no end point, no failure point, as long as you are willing to pick yourself up and continue.

When you spend time encouraging others, you start talking to yourself in a different way.

One of the most fantastic part of having a support group, is the support that you receive. But one of the most amazing things is when you start supporting others who are going through the same doubts and insecurities as you are, the way you talk to yourself changes too. Suddenly, you aren’t your own worst critic all of the time.

What you get out of it at the end might be different than what you hoped for.

Many people will start Learn to Run with a goal of losing some weight and getting moving again. But what I’m most proud of is that people leave Learn to Run with a love of training that goes far beyond exercise or a means to an end. It forms a part of their identity that wasn’t there before, and a deep appreciation of the importance of their achievement.

I love programming, but . . .

I’m geek enough to absolutely love training programming. I love program design. I love personalisation. I love seeing what people can achieve with the right training plan. But mostly, I just love that I get to believe in people and find out how amazing they are.

Meet a Mover: This One Time When Running Saved My Life

OperationMove · February 28, 2017 · 1 Comment

We are so privileged to be sharing Jane’s story. She joined us for Learn to Run in 2016 and has gone from strength to strength. You can now find her being her generally awesome self in Run Club and she’s inspired so many members of our community along the way. This originally appeared on her blog: Almost Jane and is republished here with her permission. 


And no, I wasn’t being chased by a bear.

I have never been proud of myself. I have never felt that I made anyone else proud.

I was smart. I got good grades at school. I aced my VCE and got in to Melbourne Uni. I never felt proud though. Most people saw me as just a ditsy dumb blonde. So many people told me that Cher from Legally Blonde reminded them of me. I cared too much about what other people thought of me, if they wanted a dumb blonde I gave them a dumb blonde. My parents told me I’d be lucky to get a job at McDonalds. I would never amount to anything.

My mother loved telling everyone about how I got in to Melbourne Uni but ‘threw it all away’ because I couldn’t be bothered. Conveniently forgetting that she used to kick me out of home every second week, until I packed my bags and left home for good at 18. I couldn’t continue with my degree because I needed to get a full time job to support myself.

My ex-husband told me that the only reason I got good grades at school was because I went to a private school and they ‘spoon-fed’ me the answers to protect their reputation.

I was not proud of myself for being smart and getting good grades at school. I didn’t feel I deserved to be proud.

I had a really great job once. I held a coordinator position within local council, a job I secured by my own merit without any official qualification. I wasn’t proud of myself though. The money I earned I spent on heroin for my drug addicted boyfriend. The one I was certain I could save, if I just loved him enough, if I could just make him love me enough. I couldn’t save him.

My professional appearance hid the cuts that I inflicted on myself several times a week and the bandages I used to conceal my self harm.

I was not proud of myself for my job or the respect my colleagues had for me. They don’t know who I really am.

They didn’t know my dirty dark secret. The fact that my own parents aren’t proud of me. The fact that my own parents can’t see enough good in me to love. The fact that my own husband wasn’t proud of me. That my own husband who I had dreamed of my entire life, the one that would save me from the loneliness and despair of my childhood could not see enough good in me to love.

No. I have never been proud of myself.

I am lucky for second chances. I met a man who is kind and good. He married me and has never made me feel less or small. He tells me that he is proud of me, but it’s hard to believe because he is kind and good and I am just me.

I have an amazing and beautiful daughter, who overcomes hurdles every day and is stronger than any five year old should have to be. I am so proud of who she is, despite of me.

I had been treading water for a while and just keeping my head above the surface, when I contacted Katie. I have met her a few times via blogging events and knew that she had gone through a bit of a metamorphosis through starting to run and developing the Learn To Run program. To be honest, I still can’t really pinpoint the moment when I thought that learning to run was something I should try. I have never run or attempted to run. I was quite adverse to any kind of exercise really. I can’t therefore I won’t.

Yet something pushed me. I felt like I needed to try. Sometimes when your life feels so out of control you will do anything to try and regain some of that control back. Previously the control that I tried to gain over my life was destructive and negative. I didn’t have those choices any more. This wasn’t just about me; stupid screw-up Jane. I had people who needed me, who depended on me now.

So I started to run.

In March I signed up to the Operation Move Learn To Run Program. And I kept running.

 

I kept running even when I didn’t want to. I kept running even when I didn’t think I could. I kept running when my muscles were burning, my breath was short, I felt like I was going to drown in my own sweat. Just. Keep. Running.

I kept running when my eyes filled with tears and I thought ‘Fuck this. I cannot do this.’  I kept running when I wanted to give up so bad, when my head said to me, “No one will know. You don’t have to do this.”

Just. Keep. Running.

As I run, I think about all the people that wouldn’t have thought I could. I think about every person in my life that hasn’t had faith in me. I think about every person that has thought that I wasn’t good enough. That I wasn’t worth anything. I think about the fact that they had convinced me that I wasn’t good enough, that I wasn’t worth anything. That I believed them, that I spent years punishing myself for not being enough.

Every time I finish a run, every time I don’t give up, even though it’s hard and it hurts and I’m not sure I can do it; I feel proud. I feel proud of myself. I feel proud that my body can do things I never thought it capable of but most of all I feel proud that I don’t have to believe the things my broken brain tries to tell me.

I CAN do this. I am not what other people think of me. I am in control of my mind and my body. I am in control of my life.

I am learning that maybe I am enough.

(This is in no way a sponsored post, I paid to be part of the program. Just sharing because seriously, I run now! Who’d have thunk it??) 


 

If you’d like to read more about Learning to Run, you can check out:

The one question that gets asked the most about Learn to Run

11 Things that Learning to Run will teach you that have nothing to do with running

How to make a diamond

Podcast: How to support a friend who is learning to run

You deserve to take up space

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