Thanks that is great feedback! I don’t know if it would have occurred to me that my form was off. I might have thought of that straight off in lifting, but not in jogging. I just figured that as a newbie, I would have cramps at first. I couldn’t tell you for sure either way, but now I’ll pay attention.
For me, muscle cramps, especially in the legs, are often associated with dehydration. So I’ll just suggest that you make sure you’re drinking enough fluids. I typically lose around a pound of water weight per mile of running. Of course, this will vary. But that helps me to remember how much fluids I need to take in to stay healthy.
Either way - keep up the good work.
I’d try to mentally turn it around into a positive. Think of it as him encouraging you to keep going, because if you do, eventually you can just jog straight through instead of doing walking breaks. He’s trying to say, “awesome! Keep it up! You can do it!” 
When I first did the C25K as a decidedly unathletic, naturally-hourglass* young woman, I’m plodding along, slow as crap, huffing and puffing, at 6am before work. One day, I’m practically crying because of how frustrated I am with how slow I am, that I’m never gonna be good, dammit…
… And I slooooowly jog past a walker, feeling embarrassed at myself, when the walker says to me, “I just wanted to say I’ve seen you run by my house for weeks. And I thought, ‘if she can do it, I can get out and walk’. Thank you!”
D’awwwwwwwwww! :D:D:D:D:D That totally changed my entire attitude that day!
- not lean and mean, heh.
**Kiber **I drink a lot during the day - but it still could be, I guess. One of my bp meds is a diuretic. Still, I have a lot of water each day.
zweisamkeit cool story. As an aside, the story is also a reminder of how small things each of us can do can make a person’s day better (or worse.) Such little things and they make the world brighter.
I do find, by the way, that the first half mile always, ALWAYS sucks so hard. Your legs hurt, you haven’t gotten into your rhythm yet, if your favorite sports bra was in the wash your second favorite one hasn’t quite settled in yet, you’re realizing that you jiggle way too much in these shorts, etc. Push through that and it does get better.
In fact, somebody told me some good advice here when I asked once if I was overtraining - they said they knew they were okay if the last quarter or so wasn’t worse than the first quarter.
I just thought of something else, at least something that works for me. I train much more effectively and can go a lot longer, regardless of my current ability, if I run in the late afternoon/early evening. If I run in the morning, I feel like my legs are completely leaden, they’re tighter and take longer to warm up, I sweat more and I’m more tired during the day. But, if I run later, my body is already warmed up from being active during the day, I don’t sweat as much, my legs feel looser and I sleep better, giving me more energy for the next day. Some people experience just the opposite effect and find that they have more energy to run in the mornings, while some notice no difference when they run; I guess it just depends on how you’re built.
So, although it does sound like you’re just having growing pains with running (you know, those pains everyone goes through as they get started), as you train, you might play around with the time of day you work out if you have that luxury. For me, it makes a huge difference.
OK, every thing I’ve read and everyone I talk to all say the same thing: get good shoes.
But what does that mean? Must I spend hundreds of dollars? I don’t want to skimp, but I don’t want to overspend either.
When you ambulate, your foot pronates. The arch collapses, the foot rotates inward and the lower leg twists slightly. This is how you absorb the shock of landing.
Running shoes do two things:control pronation and absorb shock. If you over-pronate, the twisting goes too far and sets up stresses in the foot and leg that leads to injuries. The appropriate **motion control **shoe brings the pronation back to an acceptable range.
Over-pronation-motion control/, neutral-stability/under pronation/cushioned.
A good running shoe store can watch you run and recommend shoes appropriate for your foot.
Good running shoes are about $60-150, generally you won’t need to go higher unless you need orthotics.
Shoes are usually good for about 300-500 miles.
runnerpat posted a link to this site in the C25k thread. It has some basic advice on what type of shoe you need so you know what to look for when you go to the store. I don’t think you need to spend hundreds of dollars, but dropping a c-note on a pair of shoes so you don’t end up injured down the line isn’t too bad of an investment.
And beaten to the punch.
So I finished a full training session today. Hooray! Go me! No cramps or anything.
runnerpat, thanks for the advice. I do believe that I have a tendency to hit toe first, especially when I start to get tired.
So, I will consider this to be my first week, and start from here. My legs still hurt some, heck, my calves still hurt from Thursday’s cramps, but things are much improved.
I haven’t decided if I’ll keep reporting. I don’t want the dope to become a blog, nor people to think I’m post-padding.
Thanks all for the advice and the encouragement.
Khadaji, look through the previous threads, some of the posters had 15-25+ posts.
It’s not post padding, other C25Kers take encouragement from the progress of others.
So smack down in the middle of today’s run I had another very bad cramp in my calve. This time I know I was not hitting toe first, as I was paying very close attention throughout the run. :mad:
In the past I would have walked the rest of the way back, but today I went ahead and finished. The calve was pretty tender, but I finished the today’s schedule anyway.
My ankles and just above them are still struggling with the runs, but I am not struggling so hard to breath as I was.
On your cramping, I had the same issues the first four or five weeks on this program. Frankly mine I think was that I just had weak calves. My doctor recommended that I take calcium (so I took Tums) and eat more bananas for the potasium but in hindsight I think he was just humoring me! But I figured it couldn’t hurt and eventually the calf pain went away.
I also concentrated on a few calf exercises at the gym for a couple of weeks and I haven’t had any cramping for months now.
But if was a mutha for the first few weeks, enough that I almost quit. Don’t quit, don’t run through the pain either, the pain is your body telling you something. You may have to go slower, but eventually you will get strong enough that you can get past the cramping.
I also endorse the good shoes. I love my shoes. The first pair I got were okay, but I love the second pair I have now. They ‘fit’ me very well and I immediately noticed a difference when I ran with them.
Twice now when my heart was in a-fib they found that I was dangerously low on potassium, so I now take a daily supplement that has plenty (the over-the-counter stuff only has 3% of the DRA, but these are more potent.) Also the post-surgery dietitian told me to take calcium daily, so I have a couple of those as well.
I just got a new pair of running shoes and although I didn’t spend hundreds, I did buy a new pair.
I guess I just have to keep working at it.
OK, I made it through the entire run without a cramp! However, today’s complaint: pain in the left foot just below the ankle. It didn’t hurt while I was walking, but as soon as I started running: yow! We’ll see how it is by Sunday. If there is no pain, I’ll go to the next level. If there is pain, I’ll take the week off and regroup. There comes a time when you have to decide if you are doing more damage than good.
On the plus side: I’ve lost 7 lbs! (The doc wanted 20, I averaged up to 22 so I’m almost 1/3 of the way there.) Of course that isn’t just the running. It is concerted effort to cut back as well.
My left foot/ankle has improved, but is not pain-free. A quick little test shows me that I *might *be able to run today, but would likely come home limping again.
I have decided to give this idea a rest until my feet/ankles are completely pain free. I have bought some orthotics for my shoes and I’ll give them a whirl when/if I heal.