Running/speedwalking 3 miles every day…. I’ve been speedwalking with occasional sprints of running for 3 miles every evening for the past month, and it’s helping me to lose weight and tone up… but I have to ask… I see so many people post about running three miles during lunch at work or doing 3 miles before breakfast and another 6 at night (yikes!) that it just blows me away that it still feels like SUCH hard work to me, and 3 miles seems so far.
PLEASE tell me it gets easier, or at least let me in on it if it’s this hard for the rest of you!~ 
)
3 miles. everyday for a month should be just like walking to the kitchen by now, I also walk fast 3 miles every morn and another mil at night.(I do not run or jog)but when i started, just walking a hundred yards was work.Getting good shoes that my feet enjoyed was the hardest thing, i finaly settled on Dickies work shoes. My counter says that i use between 850 and 900 cals a day. I just eat no meat,flour products after 3 PM and i stay away from all refined sugar products. I’ve took off 37 pounds since June 29th.15 to go, then i can live again.
It takes me about 40 minutes. And I don’t know where your kitchen is, but 3 miles sure feels further away than that!
I have good shoes, and my legs and feet feel fine during the run, but my chest sometimes feels tight when I push to go faster.
I’m about 20 lbs overweight, btw.
Is 40 minutes OK for that distance?
That’s a fast enough clip that you should have. worked up to it. You shouldn’t start attempting to cover that distance in that time frame. I walk a lot and always have. If I’ve taken time off for a while, I’ll take six weeks to build up to what you’re doing. And I’ll probably burn as many calories as you do doing it that way. I know of no upside to pushing as hard as you are.
I’d encourage you to go out for the same distance and see what speed your body naturally gears up to. Slow down if you’re pushing too hard. Get to the point where you are comfortable covering the distance that you’re covering (and three miles is a short course) and then begin adding in the speed. You want to hit your targeted heart rate for twenty minutes, and other than that, you should be doing what you find fun to do and you’ll find it much easier to stick to. Exercise is not atonement. you don’t need to punish yourself or prove that you’re as mighty as someone who isn’t 20 pounds overweight.
Exercise needs to be fun. If you’re as uncomfortable as you describe, you’re doing it wrong. You’re risking injury, muscle fatique and burn out. And doing less aggressive exercise probably burns the same amount of calories as what you’re doing. If it takes you more than five minutes to recover when you get home, then slow down some more.
You build up to a real solid exercise routine. You don’t start there. You don’t start off doing 6 sets of the heaviest weight that you can lift. That’s the equivalent of what you’re doing here. Start slow and build up to where you want to be. It’ll be so much more fun that way.
Ask your doctor if you have. exercise-induced asthma. That may be why your chest feels tight. I’m told that well over half of Americans have it, and that running is the most likely way to activate it.
My driveway is 3/4 mile long, each way…and my dog insists on walking the entire distance, many times per day. Yep, it gets easier.
it takes. me an hour to turn 3 exactly miles and i’m a 70yo 6′ man, you better go to a dr and have a stress test and see if something else is wrong.
I’m confused.. Are you saying you run at a pace of 3 miles an hour?
that’s what confused me, too. 3 miles in an hour is a casual walk, like walking at the mall type speed. At a fast jog someone would still need about 30 minutes to go 3 miles, 3 miles in 40 minutes seems perfectly fine to me. And the idea that one conditions themselves in just one month???? Psshhh. Even military boot camp can’t have those kind of results.
No, 3 miles in 40 minutes walking with a little. sprinting thrown in. It’s not real fast, but that’s apparently the distance they started at, and it’s too far too fast for a beginner that isn’t in shape.
maybe you misunderstood what i meant. I was supporting the OP. They are doing an EXCELLENT job, yes, perhaps even too fast. Another poster was implying that they were going much too slow, and i was disagreeing with that person. Perhaps you didn’t have a chance to follow all the threads.
Perhaps you didn’t read what I wrote.. I responded directly to your confusion as to whether it was 3 miles in an hour or in 40 minutes. I pointed out that that three miles in forty minutes is a bit too fast for a beginner. I didn’t disagree with you on anything or cast aspersions.
I think you may be misleading the OP a little. There’s a BIG difference between 3 miles in an hour and 3 miles in 40 minutes. I am in pretty good shape, not overweight at all, but not a big runner. I only do about 3.25-3.5 miles in 40 minutes, and I feel extremely winded when I finish, and have been working out regularly for 2 years.
That being said, I could easily WALK 4 miles plus in an hour and not be even remotely winded. I think that you are being a little overly critical of OP. Again, 3 miles in 40 miuntes is a much faster clip than 3 miles in an hour. And I understand that you are 60, but my mother is 65 and works out regularly, as well.
This makes me feel a LOT better
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Is that a typo?. I just turned 80 and can jog as many 12 minute miles in a row as I want, even up to a Marathon…although I’m wasted for a week if I do something foolish like that. Three miles happens for me in about 25 minutes.
3 miles an hour is 20 minute miles…my older brother can do that in his walker.
Do you do marathons?. I have 2 friends in their 80s who still run marathons (one was recently featured in Runners World) and they are such an inspiration to me!
Last one was two years ago. I was never “fast”, there’s a guy my age who is quicker in all the races I entered.
I’d kind of like to do at least one more, but it’s now work. I used to just do it for fun, but now, at about 15-18 miles I am really really tired…and it was never “work” for me before, just time consuming. And time is worth spending.
I run 6 miles every morning §.
That’s wonderful. You must be in great shape!
You should be considering. what you are doing right now, “living”. The fun is in getting there, not being there.
been there, done that. back when I was 40 lbs. over, I started running 3 miles every day. After seven weeks, I got terrible shin splints and had to stop for months. Did a little research and learned that it’s better to run every other day. In a nutshell, that achey sore muscle feeling you get (this according to my website research) is actually caused by tiny tears (as in rips) in your muscle fibers. These microtears take 48 hrs. to heal. They heal because the muscle fiber grows. This is how your muscles get stronger. If you exercise too much every day, you never give your muscles time to heal. I decided it was better to cut back on my regimen so I would let my muscles build up and so I wouldn’t hurt myself. Because when I hurt myself, I quit exercising. Counterproductive.
more …. I won’t bore you with my long history of running and trying to lose weight. It’s taken me many years to find the right mix of exercise and diet AND commitment. In the end it was my determination to eat well and to exercise consistently that finally helped me.
Over time, I finally lost 50 pounds. I can now run 7 miles on a good day, but I usually go 4 or 5. I try to run every day and I try to include some hills. It’s not easy, but it’s a lot easier at 200 pounds than it was at 240.
I still get sore and achey after a 6-7 miles run. But I can do 4 without any soreness at all. If I do 4 without hills, it’s like a walk in the park. (Not really that easy, but incredibly easier than my 3-mile runs 10 years ago when I was overweight).
The trick for me was to add distance in small increments over a long time. Don’t overdo. Don’t hurt yourself. Don’t give yourself an excuse to quit.
my diet. oops .. wiped out a long message by mistake.
well, I don’t feel like rewriting the whole thing.
Gist was that I lost 30 pounds in 6 months. The running made me much more conscious of my food choices and my portion sizes.
I stopped eating out. I stopped eating pizza, ice cream, soda, french fries, and chips.
I made sure I had fresh fruit and vegetables (salad stuff) around the house ALL the time, and nothing to snack on that was bad for me.
I ate an apple and an orange every day.
My pants went from a tight 42 to a loose 36.
I got a lot of compliments and I felt way better about myself.
That was two years ago, and I’ve kept the weight off. I try to run every other day.
I’m 56 and I’m in the best shape of life. Yay for me…
no no no … shoot!. I do NOT try to run every day. That was my whole point!!
I try to run EVERY OTHER day. The consistency helps me stay focused on making proper food choices.
But if I ran every day, I’d risk hurting myself. Then I’d stop running altogether.
Every other day gives my muscles time to grow. I’m so much stronger today than I was two years ago, my legs especially. And I can now run a good long way without getting sore.
lots of possibilities, here. A 3-mile run/walk at an average pace of 4.5 mph is a solid workout. Don’t feel as though you’re not as good as other people or that you should be doing more unless you want to.
That being said, it sounds like you want to. My question is, do you want to be able to run 3 miles faster than what you’re doing now, or do you want to be able to do more, mileage-wise? Because these goals would require separate approaches. If you want to run 3 miles faster, you’d have to do several shorter, faster workouts every week to build your speed. If you want to do more mileage, you’d probably have to run slower, longer runs during the week, building up to a longer and longer distance every weekend.
I’ve been running for about four years now. I ran my first marathon (26 miles) this year. I have to say, there are a lot of days when a 3-mile run is really hard for me. Every person is different, every run is different and will provide its own challenges. Don’t sell yourself short or let anyone tell you that what you’re doing isn’t good enough.
assuming that. what you want to do is run, I would suggest you work up to it incrementally. The couch to 5K program has worked well for many people:
http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_3/181.shtml
Thank you so much everyone!. I am so grateful at the time you all took to write and give me tips and encouragement. My muscles feel pretty good after a run, and I do enjoy it, but I will take everything you have all said here into consideration. I want this to be a lifelong change, not a crash course.
I will ease up on my speed when it feels like too much, and yes, I wouldn’t be surprised if I don’t have some asthma. I’ve had terrible allergies my whole life. I also have a heart murmur, so I just take it a bit slower when the chest pressure starts. It goes away a few moments after I quit sprinting.
I appreciate your input!
For the first several years that I ran, the. first 3 miles were always tough. I felt like crap, I wanted to stop, etc. One time, I accidentally went 4 miles, and realized that the last mile was wonderful. I ended up finding a regular running route that was 7 miles, and I still felt like crap for the 1st 3 miles of that route.
I’ve talked to a couple of my running friends about this and they had the same experience. It no longer happens to me — I don’t know what happened or why it stopped — but I’ve definitely been in your shoes!
Funny you should say that…. I have found that I start out OK, but then it seems to get harder, then easier again as I get to the end. A few times, I have just kept going and it wasn’t any harder than getting through the first three miles. I thought that was odd.
One day I just kept going for an hour and it felt pretty good. I would think I covered about 5 miles by then.
I’m just happy to know I’m on the right track and that I can expect that it will get easier over time.
Walking would be nothing, I could go on forever, but I try to take in some inclines and keep my heart rate up during the run/speedwalk. I also pump my arms pretty good as I go and that has really helped tone them more than I expected it to.
I think you’re doing great!!!! Keep it up!!! §.
Thank you! I am happy with the results so far.. I tend to go a tad overboard when I get into something, but luckily, I haven’t had any problems. I’m just glad I’m not a wimp for going only 3 miles a day!
Yes, until your endorphins kick in. the first several miles are not fun.
What adds to this “problem”, at least for me, is that from my driveway, I can go east – or west – and don’t get a chance to pick a different route for another 2 miles. So, I’m stuck with this route or that route the first 2.5 miles or so, and THEN I can put some variety into it.
I can see where that would be dull. I’m trying to find new routes and times to avoid traffic somewhat. That is the biggest hassle I’ve found around here.
If you’re already doing 3 miles,. something else that might help make things a bit more exciting for you would be to do a 5K (3.1 miles). You can run/walk/any combination, but it can be really inspiring to be around a bunch of runners.
I ran for years before I did any races, and I really wish I would have started doing them earlier.
I’ll look into that, thanks! §.