It took me about 2 months to stop hating running. Then over the next month, I started noticing that I was able to zone out and not think about running for every single step. I'm doing my own modified version of C25K, and I realized it was time to up my intervals again because I was running past the walk breaks, even though I have the cues over my music. The first 1-2 miles are still harder for me, but it gets easier each week.

Omigosh, last night I did W4D2 - I did it! And it wasn't quite as difficult as W4D1 two days earlier. I can't believe I'm running for a full 5 minutes at a time. I started C25K in September - obviously I'm taking it really slow, lol. But it is incredible to see how my fitness has increased - two months ago, 1 minute of jogging was really hard, and a week ago, 3 minutes was the hard part.

All of you are so inspiring. I keep thinking, "if those 3FChicks can do this, maybe I can too!" I hope I can get to the end and actually run a whole 3 miles at a time. It seems impossible but I never thought I'd get to Week 4, so maybe I can make it to Week 8 too! Reading these posts are really encouraging, so thank you everyone for posting!

I'm actually not as worried about running in the cold as I am worried about slipping and falling. I am a terrible klutz, and I'm terrified of falling on the ice. I fell on black ice at work several years ago and landed smack on my elbow - ruptured the bursa. I also tore my ACL slipping on beer on the floor (St Paddy's Day drinking & dancing incident).

But running through snow or while it's snowing doesn't sound much fun, either.

Personal best today - all my miles were under 13 minutes, and my 5k time was under 40 minutes! 3.54 miles in 45 minutes total - yay me!

[QUOTE=Riddy;4522746]I'm actually not as worried about running in the cold as I am worried about slipping and falling. QUOTE]

That is a good point and something I didn't really think about!!! Now I'm more worried about this than the cold and I hate the cold. I think I have enough layers to get me through that and running warms me up anyway.

I ran wk2d3 last night and it sucked. I'm so embarrased by the fact that 90 seconds is killing me. I know it'll get better but right now it still sucks, I just have to make sure i don't quit. I'm going to go out again tonight and hope it gets better if not I may be stuck on this day forever.

I also have no idea how to quote someone properly, whoops

Thanks for the support and advice, especially about eating. I gave it a shot, and I found that eating just a little and not drinking anything seems to be perfect.

After last Thursday's bad run, I skipped my Sunday run (I had a good excuse, operative word being excuse). Then when Tuesday came around, I realized that I had also skipped Friday laundry (I was out of town), and I didn't have anything to wear.

Wednesday I went back out for W8D1 (for the third time), and I finished it successfully! Today I went out and did W8D2; a little slower, but still a good finish. That means I'm on track to finish either Sunday (if I take my running shoes out of town with me) or Tuesday.

I had a major revelation in the almost-week that I took off; the biggest cause of my unplanned stop and walks was neither my body nor my willpower (at least not directly)– it was boredom. In his book "This is How" Augusten Burroughs talks about how discomfort and boredom magnify each other, and this is definitely what I'm struggling with.

I'm not totally sure how to combat boredom; the two most recent runs I did "backward" from my normal route, and that helped quite a bit, but after that I'm out of ideas. Any and all suggestions welcome.

If it makes you feel better, 90 seconds kills me too, and I'm almost done with my program. I remember being shocked when I went directly from 90 seconds to 3 minutes and I found 3 minutes so much easier. It's almost like that's the amount of time it takes me to get in the right rhythm, and it's made worse when I'm also wondering if it's time to stop yet. You can get through it!

Don't be! Back in Aug, 90 seconds was killing me too. Now I can run 7 miles using 5/1 intervals. I can run longer intervals than 5/1, but I can't maintain them for 7 miles.

Like Paja, I find some of the longer intervals easier. If I drop down to 3/1, my legs kill me on the walk intervals.

And don't feel bad if you have to repeat weeks. C25K had me jumping up to 5 min runs too quickly. I just held firm at 3/1 until I felt ready to move on. If the longer runs never feel good, then keep rocking the shorter intervals. I'm training for the Disney Princess Half Marathon, and there are plenty of people planning on doing 1/1 intervals the entire way.

Hey everyone

I'm wanting to begin C25K but not until the new year. I've been doing a bit of research into it and it confuses me on how it works. So, I was wondering could anyone answer any of my following questions please?

Is it simply following a plan like this for 9 weeks?
Do you prefer to jog or run the 5K? (Once you reach the 5K)
Could you spend two weeks doing the same workouts?

I don't know if it would be cheating or not to alter the plan or not. I'm not sure if people follow a specific plan or just make up their own plans. Any help/advice would be appreciated

Hi, y'all! I will be starting C25K next month (12/1) in preparation for my first 5K in February. I'm going to give myself a "soft start" until then by walking for 35 minutes 3x/week on the days I plan to run so that I get in the habit of getting out of the house for a few weeks before I actually start C25K. Reading about your progress is very inspiring. Keep up the good work!

Hi guys, thanks for all the support, especially Paja and Nikel. It's always nice to know that other people had the same trouble but were able to get through it. I'm going to use both of you as inspiration.

I ran wk2d3 on Friday and found it a bit better. I was going to run it again last night but I was way too exhausted after a weekend away. I'm going to try and move up to wk3d1 tomorrow and see how it is. I can always go back if I need to.

Dreamer, I follow something similar to what you posted however I edit the schedule to fit my abilities. I usually will run each day twice so it's going to take me double the amount of time to finish. I know other people who have finished and they also altered the schedule to fit them better, just do what you can!! Good luck once you start.

I hope you don't mind a long-ish answer. To give you some background, I finished the program a few years ago, and kept running until a bicycle accident took me out for about a year. After the year, I found I no longer enjoyed running, so I stopped. I've intermittently used various parts of the program on their own. I started again from the beginning at the beginning of August, and I'm on track to finish this week.

Yep, the plan that you linked to is the "official" C25K plan, so it's what a lot of people mean when they reference it. Other people do C25K inspired plans. (For example, I use the Ease Into 5K app, which alters the official plan to avoid copyright issues; having done both now, I like Ei5K a little better, but they're effectively the same.)

I prefer to never use the word "jog." I have a negative visceral reaction to it. I say if you're not walking, you're running. You may be running slowly or running quickly, but it's all running (provided it's not, you know skipping or some other human powered locomotion). I run between a 10 and 11 minute mile for the 5K, which is considered too fast by some people who are way more scientific than I am. It's comfortable for me, so that's what I do. Do what works for you to start, and if you need to bring science in to improve your performance or reduce injury, you can think about that later.

You can absolutely spend two weeks doing the same workouts. My rule has been that I repeat a workout until I complete it successfully (not walking during the runs), and then I move on to the next one. With three weeks out for sickness, the 8-week program has taken me about 14 weeks. I made it a rule to always try the next run if I successfully completed the last one (even if it was a struggle), because I often surprise myself with my abilities. But it would also be totally fine if you just decided from the beginning to do every workout twice, or whatever it is that makes you comfortable.

Finally, you can't really cheat on C25K as long as you're happy with your own progress (and you're not in some kind of competition or something).

Thanks so much for the information and advice, Changergirl and Paja. I look forward to beginning C25K in the new year. It's just not a good time to begin a plan at the moment.

Jumping from 3 minutes to 5 minutes scares me a lot. Not gonna lie. And I've found that I usually quit at that point. I'm nowhere near those intervals (I still have a few weeks of 1', 2', and 3' intervals) but looking at that jump is already getting me a bit discouraged.

So thank you Paja and Nikel1979 for your advice and experience. Maybe I shouldn't be so scared of it.

I also struggle with boredom, even now with the 1 minute intervals. Any suggestions for fixing that?

As for my running progress...
I took a week off from running to bike and since I was just finishing up week 1 anyways I decided to start the whole thing over. Based on my times, I didn't lose any run fitness and actually got faster! I was able to get all my running intervals under a 10-minute mile pace, with most being well under a 9:30-minute mile pace.

I often struggle deciding on when I'm ready to move onto the next week so maybe this could be a good marker...repeating until I can get under a 10-minute mile pace. In the past when I was in worse shape than I am now, I was at 10 minutes or around 10:30 even for the longer runs, so this could be a good way to get faster and go longer. We'll see.

Congrats on finishing those runs and figuring out your pre-exercise eating! And good luck with this last week of the program. Sounds like you're on track to rock it!