CHAPTER 4
A Running Program
RUNNERS TO YOUR MARKS…
Some of you walkers will want to read on here, as there are plenty of overlapping tips, just as we advised runners to look over Chapter 3 before settling into this chapter.
Get set…
How do you run? The answer seems obvious. You put one foot in front of the other. Right? Yet it is one of the most frequently asked questions because running is not quite that easy. There are a few guidelines to follow.
First, you have to move from walking to running. How do you get started? Try this method. Go outside and start walking. Walk a bit faster. Then pick up the pace some more and sort of shuffle along; you’re moving as quickly as you were in the first walk, but it’s actually easier. Shuffle just a bit faster, landing on your heels and rolling forward. Now you’re jogging, but it should feel just as easy as fast walking.
Running Form
Run with your shoulders back and your arms and hands relaxed. Bend your elbows at your waist with the palms of your hands facing each other, as if you were getting ready to put your hands in your trouser pockets. Keep your hands loosely cupped; don’t clinch your fists.
Let your arms swing naturally, forward and back, parallel to each other. Don’t let your arms cross in front of your torso, because this tends to twist your body.
As you run, try to swing your legs out in front of you, following your arms. Keep feet and knees facing forward.
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TIP If you’re having trouble keeping your arms straight in front of you, imagine that you have a pelvis-wide string tied to each wrist and that you keep the string somewhat taut as you move. If your arms continue to cross over in front of your body, try jogging in place at home in front of a mirror with your wrists actually tied in this manner—but don’t try this outdoors! |
Keep your head erect and your eyes focused about ten to fifteen meters in front of you. Don’t look straight down at your feet. Your chin should be parallel to the ground. Keeping your head up helps your form and allows you to see more of the scenery. It also allows you to see any obstacle that is in your path before it’s too late.
Nobody wants to say she’s jogging; everyone wants to say she’s running. Right now, you probably feel foolish calling this action running, but in time, when you start jogging longer and longer, you’ll be calling yourself a runner. And you’ll be right!
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A personal note I began running as a young girl with the very method described here. I thought I would never get beyond the one-mile mark, and then later, the three-mile mark. My body would progress, and then it would just seem to hit a plateau, and it was a while before I could get it to progress again. Eventually, I became a marathon (26.2 miles) runner, and the plateau effect began again as I started a program of getting faster. Most elite runners have plateaus too; they have to work very hard for a year or two before they suddenly make a breakthrough. |
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TIP Don’t feel depressed if your progress seems slow at this early stage. This is all new to your body, even if you were very active sometime in the past. It is far more important to build a strong, healthy base, even if it takes longer, than to try to progress too quickly and be discouraged or even injured. |
Go!
After you have done the beginning walking and running program for a few weeks, and are comfortable with your workouts, you may be ready to take the next step. The following schedule is designed to turn you into a continuous thirty-minute runner in ten weeks. Try to run three or four days a week. On the days you don’t run, either rest or do some other training—biking, swimming, or weight training—to give your body time to recuperate from running.
Not everyone can complete this program in ten weeks. If you need more time, take it. You’re on your own schedule, and nobody is judging you!
| HOW TO BECOME A 30-MINUTE RUNNER IN TEN WEEKS | |
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| WEEK 1: | Walk 30 minutes a day, at least three times a week. |
| WEEK 2: | Continue week-1 workout, but pick up the pace, pump your arms. Break into a sweat! |
| WEEK 3: | Walk 8 minutes. Run 2 minutes. Walk 1 minute (repeat this 3-minute session 5 times). Walk 8 minutes. |
| WEEK 4: | Walk 6 minutes, run 4 minutes. Repeat three times. |
| WEEK 5: | Walk 5 minutes, run 5 minutes. Repeat three times. |
| WEEK 6: | Walk 3 minutes, run 7 minutes. Repeat three times. |
| WEEK 7: | Walk 2 minutes, run 8 minutes. Repeat three times. |
| WEEK 8: | Walk 1 minute, run 9 minutes. Repeat three times. |
| WEEK 9: | Walk 1 minute, run 14 minutes. Repeat twice. |
| WEEK 10: | Run 30 minutes. |
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TIP Unless you are a competitive runner, you should always be able to carry on a conversation while you’re running. If you can’t, you’re going too fast. Having to stop and walk because you are out of breath is discouraging, so just slow down. |
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A personal note I can’t stress enough the need for you to make a commitment to a routine, even though I also believe that you shouldn’t feel guilty about missing a workout. Yes, I said this before and I will again and again! If you know that you usually run on Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday, you focus on those days. Putting off your running for a day or two can start a pattern of procrastination. You miss days, mess up your schedule, and become discouraged. If it’s on the calendar, you’ll do it. Even when you think you’re tired, doing your run energizes you! |
Getting Longer, Getting Stronger: Becoming a One-Hour Runner
Becoming a thirty-minute runner may be your ultimate goal, or you may want to revise your goal and crank it up a notch or two.
One of the best new goals for the thirty-minute runner is to try to run for a longer time. Not only is it easily measurable but it also gives a tremendous sense of satisfaction. Once you’ve finished a longer run, it’s a real kick to drive over the same roads and see how much distance you covered on foot. You’ll feel a sense of ownership over the territory you’ve run.
Treadmill runners don’t experience this same kind of claim to territory. However, you can get a similar sense by seeing the treadmill odometer register more mileage, or by watching the clock and seeing your staying power grow from workout to workout.
Even if you think you plan to be a thirty-minute runner every day and leave it at that, give some thought to increasing your distance for the following reasons:
- Being able to run for forty-five minutes or even an hour gives a tremendous sense of confidence and power. If you feel good doing thirty minutes, you’ll feel a hundred times better doing an hour!
- Being able to run longer is a safety factor; if you get lost, you can keep going longer.
- Thirty minutes a day raises metabolism and begins a process of gradual weight reduction. But when you run for an hour or more, you get into real fat-burning territory. That is one reason why a long run once a week is so critical to many serious training schedules and is an important component of a good weight-loss program.
- Once you have safely and gradually worked up to it, being able to run for an hour is a good means of creating leg strength. When you have strong legs, you can work more easily on getting faster. Strong legs also have better balance, and better balance means less falls.
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A personal note Running is incredibly addictive—not only because it feels good with all those endorphins in your system, but when you accomplish a distance, you are often instinctively challenged to try to go farther. Many women have never attempted this kind of physical test before. Once you know you can do it, you become curious about how much more you can do and thrilled by the excitement of trying. |
Becoming a One-Hour Runner
The key component of this program is the one long run per week. It builds up endurance and lays the foundation for further progress.
| WEEKS 1-3: | Right now you are running 30 minutes a day, three days a week. Your weekly commitment of time is 90 minutes. Continue this for three weeks, until it feels easy. |
| WEEK 4: | Run 30 minutes, 29 minutes, 35 minutes. Weekly total: 94 minutes. |
| WEEK 5: | Run 30 minutes, 32 minutes, 38 minutes. Weekly total: 100 minutes. |
| WEEK 6: | Run 30 minutes, 33 minutes, 41 minutes. Weekly total: 104 minutes. |
| WEEK 7: | Run 30 minutes, 34 minutes, 45 minutes. Weekly total: 109 minutes. |
| WEEK 8: | Run 30 minutes, 36 minutes, 49 minutes. Weekly total: 115 minutes. |
| WEEK 9: | Run 30 minutes, 38 minutes, 54 minutes. Weekly total: 122 minutes. |
| WEEK 10: | Run 30 minutes, 40 minutes, 60 minutes. Weekly total: 130 minutes. |
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A personal note When you are trying to increase your distance, some days feel good and others feel awful, often for no apparent reason. Listen to your body. Be willing to back off. There is no hurry. These schedules are designed for the best possible circumstances, and sometimes you just need more time to adapt. Never move on to the next higher distance until you feel totally comfortable with the one you did today. I can remember once doing the same mileage for three weeks before I felt I had the strength to add a bit more. |
Running Tips for Increasing Time and Mileage
- Running every other day is important in the early stages because it allows for recovery. Progress is made only when you push yourself a bit farther, but to make a gain you have to recover from it. This principle is known to all athletes as ‘hard-easy’ training.
- You may want to start running more than three times a week. This helps break up the amount of time that you have available. For instance, in week eight, you may have two days available for twenty-minute runs, but not a solid thirty-eight minutes. That’s okay. In this program, there are only two important components: total weekly time and a weekly continuous long run.
- After your long run of the week, always take a day off from running.
- Even if you normally run alone, finding a partner during this building-up stage can be a big help because there will be times when you can use some moral support. It’s also nice to have a partner for the long run because it makes the time go faster. Doing longer runs with a partner adds to your safety. You may be going farther than ever before and you can’t be a hundred percent sure of how you’ll react or how tired you’ll get, so it’s nice to have someone with you.
- If at any time you feel like walking during a run, do it. If you were swimming, you’d sink, but in running many people walk to catch their breath or ease a side cramp, or because they are suddenly very hot. Brief walks are not cheating, nor are they a sign you are a wimp. On the contrary, a few minutes of walking can be the pause that refreshes or a moment of time that restores your energy for the rest of the run. From that point of view, walking can be a valuable training aid.
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A personal note Sometimes I find myself walking for a few seconds or even a minute during a workout without quite realizing why. I’ve ceased to worry about this; it seems to have to do with getting my body into a better rhythm or adjusting to heat or perhaps an early too-fast pace. And going uphill! I often walk part of a hill, especially when I can see that walking it is just as fast as running it! |
Converting Time to Mileage
I take the approach that running for time is more important than running for mileage since our lives today are so dominated by time. The easiest, but not always the most accurate way to find out how far you are going is probably to check your Garmin or GPS on your phone. For accuracy, go run on an outdoor or indoor running track. Outdoor tracks are a standard 400 meters (440 yards), and four laps equal one mile. Indoor tracks in university field houses or in rec centers are very accurately measured and those distances are posted. Do your timed run there and simply calculate the exact distance. This will give you a great baseline. A few nature walks and rail trails have mileage markers on them also. But forget car odometers, which are notoriously inaccurate for running. This is one area where treadmill runners have an advantage. The odometers on their machines really work.
It’s nice to know how far you actually are going, if for no other reason than to brag about it! Also, if you decide to enter a race or fun run you’ll need to have some idea of how long it will take you to cover the distance. Most of these runs are 5-kilometre (also called 5K, which is 3.1 miles) or 10-kilometer (10K, which is 6.2 miles) events. It sounds like a lot, but you’ll be pleasantly surprised to find that you are probably capable of covering these distances by this point in your training without having to walk.
If you want to get a fairly accurate idea of how far and fast you can run, do the following: Go to your local athletics track and time yourself with a stopwatch as you run one mile (four laps) at your regular pace. How long did this take you? If it took you ten minutes, for example, you run at a ten-minute-mile pace. So if you run thirty minutes a day, you run three miles a day. If you run a total of 120 minutes a week, you can assume that your weekly mileage is about twelve miles. Therefore, you can easily calculate how much more you need to do to be ready for a fun run or race, and you can estimate about how long it will take you to complete the race. A schedule follows, using mileage instead of time.
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TIP Real runners talk about their mileage in terms of weekly, not daily, mileage. The novice always asks you, ‘How many miles a day do you run?’ and the regular runner always has to stop to figure it out. Almost all runners train on some version of the ‘hard-easy’ principle, rarely doing the same number of miles or time every day. So when runners talk to each other, they know that it’s the week’s accumulated mileage that counts. Be cool—quote your weekly mileage! |
Getting Ready for a Fun Run or Race
A good rule if you want to enter a race and you’re not sure you can cover the distance is to triple the distance of the race and make sure your total weekly mileage exceeds it. For instance, if the race is a 5K (3.1 miles long), you should be doing at least 9.3 miles a week in training. The training guidelines show you how to accomplish this. Run the race distance at least once in practice before you toe the starting line, even if it is just a fun run.
Here’s how to do a 5K (3.1 mile) fun run or race:
- Go back to your training chart by time.
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If you can run:
• thirty minutes at a ten-minute-mile pace, you can run 3 miles right now. You can easily finish this race.
• thirty minutes at a twelve-minute-mile pace, you can run 2.5 miles right now. The thrill of the race will undoubtedly carry you through, but for your own confidence, you will want to build up so that you can run thirty-seven minutes, which is about the time you will need to cover 3.1 miles. - Continue to calculate based on your per-mile time.
Here’s how to do a 10K (6.2 mile) fun run or race:
- If you can run thirty minutes at an eight-minute-mile pace, your can nearly run 4 miles (3.8 to be exact). You are quite fit, so building up to a 10K run will not be too difficult. See ‘Becoming a One-Hour Runner,’ by week eight you will have done sufficient training to complete the race. However, if you carry on with this program for the full ten weeks, the chances are that the increased mileage will make you stronger and faster by race time.
- If you can do thirty minutes at a ten-minute-mile pace, you can run 3 miles. You will need to be able to run for about sixty minutes at this pace to get through the event comfortably. See ‘Becoming a One-Hour Runner.’
- If you can do thirty minutes at a twelve-minute-mile pace, you can run 2.5 miles. You will need to be able to run for about seventy-two minutes (one hour and twelve minutes) at this pace to get through the event. This is a long time to be on your legs, so you need to follow the instructions in ‘Becoming a One-Hour Runner,’ and add two more weeks to the program, increasing the time incrementally.
Note: all of these calculations are on the cautious side. Once you are in a fun run or race, the excitement and companionship of the event almost always carry you through, even when you are shy of practice time and mileage. We all know of plenty of women who never ran more than 3 miles who easily completed a 10K run, or of a fitness walker who easily jogged a 5K race. But women over forty should take a conservative approach—make sure you do the proper training so as not to strain muscles, overheat a body that is not used to extra running time, or fatigue an untrained body.
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TIP As soon as you start calculating your mileage and times and start eyeballing a local running event, you’ll be curious about how fast you can go or how much you think you can improve. See ‘Getting Faster,’ below. But remember, just doing it is what matters. Don’t put pressure on yourself to become faster, and don’t let anyone else push your pace unless you want him or her to. Husbands and boyfriends are notorious for doing this, not necessarily because they are trying to act superior (though sometimes they are), but because men in general run a lot faster than women and are more competitive. (To know why, see ‘Women and Men Running Together: Our Differences, Our Relationships.’) |
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A personal note The thrill of a race or fun run brings out the best in you. Even when I am there just to jog along for fun and not racing at all, I am astonished at how much better I run in these situations. It also feels much easier—to do the times I do in a fun run would take a lot of effort in practice, and when I look back at my quality race times, I remember that I could never duplicate those in a training session. That’s why I always like women to enter running events. It is fun and inspiring, and you always amaze yourself. Never discount the benefits of getting excited! |
Going Really Longer
After you’ve become a one-hour runner, you may start thinking of entering a longer event. They are very alluring, particularly the ‘romantic’ distances of the marathon (26 miles, 385 yards) or the half marathon (13.1 miles). Almost anyone can achieve them if they are willing to put in time and the steady work. Women are particularly good at going longer as they have exceptional endurance capability. To see if you are ready to move up into this distance, check out the sample training programs that are online at runnersworld.com and see if they are within your capability. Then, if you are serious about undertaking the training, I strongly suggest you join a group, whether it is a local running club or a charity-sponsored organization that has coaches and a regular series of group training sessions. There are also many good online coaches, but working in person with experienced people is the best system.
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TIP Going longer takes time and steady application. It does not happen quickly. Don’t make the marathon a ‘bucket list’ item in your life. It’s a beautiful but arduous event, and you should train for it properly so that you don’t drag yourself through it and say Never Again. |
Getting Faster
The only way to go faster is to go faster! You cannot expect to run a 4-mile fun run in twenty-four minutes (eight-minute-per-mile pace) if you do all your training at ten minutes a mile. When it comes to speed, wishing won’t make it happen. And no matter how old you are, you can remember a time when you ran too fast in gym class and found yourself breathless and weak-kneed. It’s not a comfortable feeling.
To run faster, you have to develop your heart to pump more blood, you have to train your lungs to transport more oxygen, and you have to condition your muscles to move faster and better utilize the blood and oxygen you’re sending them.
Most of us want to go faster because faster is usually equated with being better. That is not always the case, and women in particular are discovering that the health benefits of running seven minutes a mile do not appreciably outweigh the benefits of running eight minutes a mile. In fact, for the beginning runner, quite the opposite is true. Fortunately, we usually know when we are going too fast—Mother Nature leaves us breathless.
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TIP Is there really a ‘runner’s high’? Yes, but sadly not always! When your conditioning is good enough to run steadily for a half hour or more, you sometimes feel fabulous, like you can run forever. Steady, rhythmic exercise often secretes opiate-like brain chemicals—called endorphins—and they both reduce pain and bring on a feeling of well-being; even euphoria. It’s one reason why running and walking really help break stress. |
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A personal note For the average person, it is far better to run for a sustained period of time at a target heart rate than to try to go faster. That is why in this book I emphasize distance and routine over speed. |
All things being equal, your target heart rate for exercise is when your heart is working at 60 to 80 percent of your maximum heart rate. The general rule of fitness exercise is to keep moving for thirty minutes three times a week within this zone. However, if you wish to increase your level of fitness, your heart rate must be elevated between seventy and eighty percent of your maximum heart rate for thirty minutes, or you need to increase the duration of your workouts.
Interestingly, the more you train, the easier it is for your body to work efficiently. Soon you are able to go farther without raising your heart rate and without getting tired. You are also able to go faster because your heart, lungs, and muscles are all better trained and working more effectively. Only when you reach this stage should you attempt to go faster.
Interval Training / Speed Development Workouts
One of the easiest ways to get faster is to do speed work called intervals. You run faster for an interval of time and then rest for an interval of time. There are many different interval workouts favored by runners and coaches. Here are three that are fun and simple. Spend only one day a week on speed work. Speed training should be incorporated as a part of your normal workout time. If you run for forty minutes, just take a portion of that time for speed work. Before you begin, don’t forget to do your normal warming up and cooling down for the workout. Then:
- Stride out faster than your normal pace, but don’t sprint, for one minute. (A good measure for the stride pace might be the about the same pace you would run for your fastest 5K) Then jog easily for one minute. Then stride out again for another minute. Start with three sets per session and work up to ten. Make sure you run for your full allotment of time during this session.
- Stride for seventy-five seconds, rest/jog for forty-five seconds. Start with two sets and work up to ten sets.
- Stride for one minute, rest/jog for one minute. Stride for two minutes, rest/jog for two minutes. Stride for two minutes, rest/jog for one minute. Stride for one minute, rest/jog for one minute. Begin with two sets and work up to four sets.
Getting Competitive: The World of Age-Group Running
You may say you are not competitive. But the moment you run a distance faster than you did before and are happy about it, that makes you at least somewhat competitive. It’s a normal human condition to want to get better and test yourself. There is a whole new world out there for the over-forty woman who wants to be competitive as a runner. It’s fun and it’s exciting. It is also the only place in our society where men and women boast about their age, and where another birthday does not depress them but instead sends them out in pursuit of new races. This is the world of age-group competition, also called masters and veterans competition.
These people compete within their age group and are awarded prizes based on performances against each other (and sometimes against international standards). Accurate records are kept and athletes vie to exceed them. Although the competition is friendly, it can also be fierce. Some of these age-group runners consider themselves very serious athletes, and their performances are truly remarkable; many would stand up well in most of the open road races.
Other age-group runners are like me: we try to do the best we can on the day, we try to catch that grey-haired woman in front of us and we’re delighted if we’ve won a prize…but we don’t train our brains out every day with competition in our mind.
Almost every race in North America now has age-group divisions (some in ten year brackets, like forty to forty-nine inclusive, and some in five year brackets like fifty to fifty-four). Just by getting fit as you get older you might surprise yourself with how quickly you can start taking home trophies! You also might be better than you think; many women who start running late in life have unknown talent and become national age group representatives. Imagine competing for a national title!
It is a beautiful sight to see men and women, some well into their seventies and eighties, looking fit and healthy and enjoying movement as if they were teenagers and competing as ferociously as if they were Olympians. Many of them are indeed past Olympians, who have a lifelong affinity with fitness. Many more are people who never had the time or opportunity to be athletes before and are finding a hidden talent. And an ever-increasing number are people who discovered running or walking later in life and got hooked. Maybe you are one of them?
This group has more than proved the adage, ‘Use it or lose it.’ They are also the group that has proved more than any other that exercise is the secret to optimum weight and health. I’ve often said that if you put bags over their heads, you couldn’t tell them from eighteen-year-olds!
The masters athletes are just beginning to get the respect they deserve, and that is not only because of an ever-increasing older population that has the disposable income to pursue fitness, but also because these people are the cutting edge of what real fitness is: the lifelong commitment to a regular exercise program and a sense of priority. They know there is nothing in life more important than health and happiness. Along the way, they’ve become, or stayed, very good at what they do. They can be an inspiration to you.
Regardless of your level of proficiency, you are welcome in almost any masters group. Like people in all kinds of fun runs and road races, they come from a huge variety of backgrounds and are open, welcoming, social, and proactive regardless of who you are. They are not cliquish. Whether they have had great career accomplishments or modest origins, most of them have made fitness the centerpiece of their lives and that is the common denominator.
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A personal note Many a woman over forty experiences tremendous personal loss in her midlife years. The kids grow up and leave; she may feel that her looks and figure start to fade; her job plateaus; her romantic life is blah. Fight back! Running and walking are not only methods for reclaiming personal self-esteem; the whole masters running/walking movement is a tremendous source of rediscovery: new friends, new challenges, new places, and even new relationships. When I ran in the World Master’s Games in Brisbane in 1994, there were 30,000 people just like me, who worked hard and played hard. And after the games, most of the people took an amazing holiday in Australia. Kids don’t get to do that. |
Making new friends through running and walking is easy. If you just show up alone at a race, you will meet men and women by just walking up to them and saying hi, but you might be too shy to do that. So here are some suggestions for meeting people, getting to know the sport and events to consider:
- Join a local running or walking club and get to know the masters.
- Ask at your local running shoe store if they have a group of older runners who meet there and go running or walking together.
- Organize a masters-only running or walking clinic in advance of the local race.
- Go with an experienced masters runner or walker to an event and ask him or her to introduce you to others.
- Read Running Times Magazine which has a regular monthly column on Masters running.
- Follow Runners World and Running Times online for the latest in running information, including masters reports.
- Subscribe to National Masters News; it covers all aspects of running and walking from clubs to competitions. Join your local masters association; go online to check out events and organizations. (www.nationalmastersnews.com)
Here’s a rundown of some of the best masters events; check out their websites for details. Note that starting ages vary, some as early as thirty-five, some as late as fifty. Virtually all major road races in North America have age categories. Go to www.runningintheusa.com for a list of events and then check out the individual race. For marathon events, go to www.marathonguide.com
For the World Masters Games, nearly thirty thousand participants age thirty-five and older (depending on your sport) from around the world compete in twenty-five sports, including a full schedule of running and walking events on the track, and a marathon and a half marathon on the road. There are no time restrictions, and with so many athletes, there’s no way you’ll feel like the oldest, slowest, or biggest. They are an Olympic-style competition held every four years (alternating with a winter sports program every other two years). The 2013 Games were in Turin, Italy and the next, in 2017, will be in Auckland, New Zealand.
The association that governs the World Masters Games is the International Masters Games Association. Begun in 1995, and based in Switzerland (like the International Olympic Committee), it is made up of the different International Masters Associations, with the global aim of promoting lifelong fitness, friendship and competition.
Almost every country has Masters or Senior Games, and in the USA, there are many of them, including major events in every state that culminate in the National Senior Games. These are for athletes fifty years of age and older, and competition takes place in five-year age groups, like fifty-five to fifty-nine. Examples of these are the Virginia Senior Games in Virginia or the Wisconsin Senior Olympics in Wisconsin. Check out the National Senior Games Association to find the games in your state.
Most senior games, and even the World Masters Games, don’t require a qualifying standard, but the big finale in the USA—the National Senior Games—does. If you make the top four in your state, or can do a minimum qualifying standard, you can participate. The next National Senior Games are in Minneapolis, July 3-16, 2015. But head’s up: you will need to qualify in 2014 for 2015.
If you are fifty and older and can’t or don’t want to qualify for anything, no problem. All the annual state games are open to everyone and so is another great event held every year in Southern Utah: the Huntsman World Senior Games, hosts ten thousand participants from all over the world in twenty-seven different events. I particularly like these Games as they hold both Race Walking and Power Walking events. This allows for the competitors in Race Walking, which has specific technique and strict rules to compete with each other, while anyone who wants to just walk fast can enter the Power Walking event. I love this inclusiveness, as it encourages everyone.
Why not take the trip of a lifetime and come to the New Zealand National Masters Games? These games are the ultimate in combining competition and total fun. They are held in February (so those of you in the Northern Hemisphere can come south into summer!). Every other year, they alternate between the cities of Dunedin (in the South Island) and Wanganui (in the North Island). Ten thousand participants from around the world participate in seventy different sports, including a full program of running and walking on the track and road for all abilities in five-year age groups from thirty-five for women and forty for men. Check the masters commencement age for your sport, as ages can vary from sport to sport. For instance, the Wine Tasting competition begins at age twenty-five. Yes, you read right. Other ‘sports’ also included are bridge, snooker, fishing and darts. There is something for everyone, so don’t let your partner give you the old excuse that they can’t come with you because they don’t run or walk.
Those wanting more serious competition should consider gearing up for the World Masters Athletic Championships, organized by the World Association of Masters Athletes. Originally called the World Association of Veteran Athletics (WAVA), this organization has been designated by the International Association of Athletic Federations (IAAF) to conduct the worldwide sport of Masters Track and Field. Thus, only running, throwing and jumping events are in the program. The winners of these championships are very good indeed, but everyone is welcome to participate. They are held every other year; in 2013 they were held in Brazil; in 2015 they will be held in Lyon, France. There are also indoor and mountain running championships in other years.
If you’d like to know how you stack up against other women runners your age or convert your current running times compared to what you could have done in your prime physical years, say age twenty to thirty-four, it’s now possible using Age Graded calculations from the World Masters Association.
Women and Men Running Together: Our Differences, Our Relationships
Women and men. We’re so alike, and we’re so different. Men are better at sports and fitness, right? No. Men are better at some activities, women at others. What’s the difference? Men have more lean muscle mass and larger heart and lung capacity. This means that in general they can run faster, leap higher, throw further and hit harder. They are also usually bigger than women, and bigger people are usually stronger than smaller people regardless of gender.
Men have also grown up with sports, fitness, and regular athletic competition as part of their maturation process. It’s not new to them, and they are most often not afraid of it.
Women are smaller, more flexible, carry more body fat, and have greater capacity for endurance and stamina. This doesn’t mean they are not as good at sports or fitness; it means they are better in different ways. They can run longer, float more easily, endure cold better, and are better at stretching and flexibility events.
Women, who until recently have looked on from the sidelines of fitness activity, are often more receptive to new information, as well as willing to try new activities and training methods. Professional coaches say they love working with women because they are more coachable, without preconceived notions about how and what to do. Women are cautious at first, but it serves them well because by working gradually they avoid injuries. Weekend warrior injuries are almost all male!
If you want your partner along for help and tips, by all means run together, as long as you don’t get competitive or contentious with each other. If he or she is constantly trying to outpace you, corrects your form, or makes you generally uncomfortable and tense, it’s probably best for you just to go it alone. You’ll both be happier in the long run.
If you run at the same pace and he or she is willing to let you shape your own program, training together can be extremely rewarding. When you run or walk together, you have a tendency to talk things out and share thoughts, just like the inner conversations you have when you run alone. Sometimes you articulate thoughts you never could in a face-to-face, static situation. This new openness often is extremely therapeutic. If the relationship is new, it’s a quick way to get to know a lot about each other. If running is a quiet time for you, that too can be shared.
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TIP I read recently that couples who take a daily walk or jog together have a better sex life. (I wonder who did this study!) The reason is that the couples felt good on the run or walk because of the endorphins they were releasing and apparently they associated those good feelings with each other. It’s worth a try! |
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A personal note My husband runs much faster than I do but warms up as slowly as I do. We often start together and then separate. When we are in strange or remote places, we have an agreed-upon meeting place and time, and we never violate it. If I am anxious about an isolated running place or a difficult terrain, I’ll ask my husband to turn back every twenty minutes on his run to check on me running behind him. It’s all still running time, so it doesn’t make a difference in the workout, and it frees me from worry. Actually, it frees us both, as it’s a good check on each other in case of injury, too. |
Regardless of your partner relationship, one of the most rewarding walking and running experiences of all is to run with another woman friend, or a group of friends. Having a training buddy is not only the best motivational device known, but the friendship that develops is tremendous. Most of us claim we don’t need psychiatrists if we have a training buddy! Running with a friend or a group also allows you to run happily in more remote places or in the dark. It reduces the intimidation factor for beginners too, since almost all beginning women walkers and runners somehow feel they are slower than everyone else.
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A personal note Since I am known as the woman who ‘gate-crashed’ the formerly all-male Boston Marathon, plenty of people have asked me why I now organize women-only races. There are three reasons for my actions. First, most beginning women runners and walkers feel intimidated by the presence of more experienced men and don’t sign up for an event because they feel they are not athletic enough and don’t want to be competitive. In a women-only environment, most of the people are not competitive and create an atmosphere of fun and camaraderie. I believe it is very important to encourage these beginners to the starting line. Next, in the front of the race, where the runners are truly racing each other for prizes and fast times, it’s important to present a women-only experience so that women learn to take responsibility for strategy and pacing, something they will never get to do in a mixed race. Lastly, it’s important for them to have a chance to really win a race, to be first, to break the tape. Not just be first in the ‘women’s division’. The psychology of success, of winning, is very important. |
