My only tip is not to be afraid to repeat weeks if you don't feel ready to move on. I kind of hit a wall around week five and six and had to do some repeats... I tried not to move on until I could do a certain distance without feeling like I was DYING.

Then, I had a breakthrough around week 8 and all of a sudden it became no big deal!

Hey everyone! I've been following along with the C25K people in the 20-somethings group, but everyone seems to have mostly dropped off and I'd love to have a little bit more support.

I finished W7D1 today- I was annoyed that my shoe came untied at the exact same place that it did on W6D3, so I had to stop and tie it but otherwise it went well.

Welcome! Wow, week 7, congratulations for getting that far! I'm on W1D3 (but have not done it yet)... am contemplating buying new sneakers before I do the workout which means I probably won't get to it until tomorrow.

Any advice for us newbies in week 1? There are a few of us lingering around here still... I hope

Welcome to all the new C25K'ers. I graduated a couple of weeks ago after doing the programme on the treadmill at the gym and was SO proud of myself.
I've signed up for my first 5K but unfortunately have found that running outside is much harder for me than on the treadmill. So I began the programme again outside. I did W1D1 and found it really easy, so then did W3D1 which was easy again, and my last run outside I did W5D1 which I found hard. I keep reading more about just forgetting the time and seeing how far you can go and trying to zone out, so wonder if I should try that instead, or keep going and take it from W5 and go from there.
I wish I could find a tried and tested way of getting used to running outside and increasing my time and distance....

I'm right there with you LM... technically, I'm going to finish C25k on my next run-- I've completed all of the 30 minute runs. I tried doing distance the other night and did two one mile runs (with a potty break in between)...
I haven't been able to go outside again since I have babysitting issues.... do you think it's mostly the hills that get you outside?

I really don't know what it is that makes it so hard outside for me, I wish I could figure it out.
The grass does feel very different to the treadmill. The uneven ground makes me nervous to start with and instead of running looking straight ahead like I do on the treadmill I find I am running looking at the ground in front to check for possible problems. The elements also affect me, the wind and cold air seem to make it harder for me to breathe. And the hills are definitely a factor. It's partly that on the treadmill I am in total control, and outside the unexpected is there in front of me. I don't think it's one thing in particular, just all combined.
And again I think for me it's mental again. On the treadmill I've just been stubborn and not allowed myself to stop, but outside I can't seem to do that, it's like I know I'm going to give up before I even start.
I'm finding it frustrating to be honest right now. It seems I can do whatever I put my mind to on the treadmill, but as soon as I go outside I fall apart. I SO want to get to love running outside, but I don't know how... I think I may try running without watching the clock a couple of times and see if that helps at all.

Loving Me - would it be easier if you ran on concrete/asphalt outside instead? (You mentioned grass - I find that i get tired much faster when I'm forced to run on grass because it's so uneven that your body has to do more work to balance)

I don't know if this will help... but when I first started running outside... I put a bunch of songs on my ipod and my goal would be to run x songs... I know each of my songs is about 3 minutes long so to run 20 minutes (I think that's the first long run, correct) my goal was to run 4 songs and then turn around and run home. I ended up running longer because the songs that came up (I had it on shuffle) were longer but I found that because I wasn't actually paying attention to how many seconds I had run or how far I had run but rather how many songs I had run, it was easier.

Now I just pick a route, I know it's x miles and I run it... and hope that I don't die. lol.

I agree with jane about the grass. I can do 5k on grass in 45 minutes, and 5k on the concrete takes me 38. And I don't hurt so much (not my usual leg tired muscles, more my stabilising ones) after I've run on the footpath.

Just something to think about.

Here's the biggest thing I've taken from this so far: when you finish a week, even if it was excruciatingly difficult, before you decide to repeat the week, go ahead and try the next week instead. Every time I've looked at what I was supposed to be doing, I thought "There's NO WAY I can do that," but I went out there and tried, and I haven't failed yet. Of course, failure isn't necessarily a bad thing either, but I think I was selling myself short when I was doing the program more casually and spending a month or more on each "week".

Thanks for the advice girls.
I do want to run on concrete as well but the 5k race I'm doing on 3rd July is mostly on grass so I figured I need as much practice as possible on it before then.
I think next time I run outside I'm going to ignore the time and try the songs idea. I still don't think I'll last more than a couple of songs but I'll give it a go.
Funnily enough, last night I had a dream that I went out for a run and for the first time ever it was easy and I LOVED it. Was sad when I woke up and realised it was just a dream...

I do the song technique and I've found it really helps me too.... It's much easier to zone out when I'm not counting down minutes.

Ok, I'm intrigued to see what the results will be if I give it a try lol.
Much as I've loved the C25K programme I'm past that on my treadmill runs now (did 34mins yesterday for a total of 4.27K) and I think being aware of every second outside is making it harder for me.
The few times on the treadmill since completing C25K where I've ignored the clock and gone by songs seems to have been easier, so my next outside run I'm going to try the same again. Will go for 2 songs and if I manage that ok will try to keep going for 3. I really want to get this outside running sorted so I can feel like I'm getting somewhere. Right now I'm just scared that my race is going to be a disaster.

i get pretty exhausted when running uphill, even if i go at a pretty slow pace... :/ would this be an issue for a real 5k?

I finished C25k last week, and decided to try running outside today. I set my ipod for a 30 minute run.... I had only tried two outdoor runs before and both were depressingly hard-- I did C25k mostly on an indoor track.

So, today, I set my ipod for a 30 minute run and set out, determined to run at least 4 songs.... At the end of the fourth song, I had run 15 minutes...

I'm thinking, in retrospect that I probably could have kept going... but I walked for five minutes, then ran ten more, for a total of 25 minutes of running....

The path I was running on had some gentle hills-- it wasn't pancake flat-- but it did not seem much harder to run on the hills-- though I did notice more leg fatigue than usual. At the end, I was quite tired and felt like I'd had a good workout.

I think I'm fairly close to being able to run 30 minutes outsdie with some gentle hills-- it was not as bad as I thought.

I'm wondering, on average, how tired you all feel after a run? Today, I felt close to exhausted for about five minutes but then quickly recovered. I would prefer to finish my run with that "good workout" feeling-- invigorated but not exhausted.

Wow Uber, that's amazing You really are an inspiration, I'm still struggling with running outside although I can do 34mins on the treadmill and am slowly speeding up on it. Last week while we were away I did 7.5mins non-stop on one run outside, then the next run I did three lots of 5mins. I just can't imagine being able to run for long outside at the moment, I don't know what the problem is but it's really getting me down now.
I've got my next outside run planned for Fri or Sat hopefully and I'm going to try to ignore the time and see if I can run by songs.
As to how I feel after running, the first couple of minutes after I feel exhausted but then I'm ok. What tells me I've had a really hard workout is how I feel that night actually. If my legs are a bit achy then I know I've worked hard, but they're usually back to normal again by morning.