[music] Heather: We're taking a mini-break from our
running content of our Couch To 5k series, and we're going to be focusing on what we
can do to help our bodies adapt to this new running load. I'm going to be covering some
basic yet effective strength and conditioning exercises as well as answering some more of
your questions. [sound effect]
Heather: All right, you guys I'm afraid, are stuck with just me this week because sadly
Pippa's had to have a couple of weeks off running. She did offer me Wilma, which is
very kind, and I know you guys love her, but I didn't think she'd be that much of a help
when it comes to strength and conditioning. Now if you've been following our running program,
you've hit the halfway point last week, and it's often around three to four weeks of doing
a new sport or suddenly increasing the intensity, the little blips can start to appear in the
road. This is completely normal. If you have had to have a couple of sessions
off or maybe even a week then there's no need to stress. If you're doing well up to that
point then you can simply just pick up where you left off. If you were starting to struggle
a little or maybe you've had two or more weeks off, I would recommend going back to the beginning
and building up from there, because if you remember it does start to ramp up quite quickly
from here. [music]
Heather: I want to start with a couple of your questions from last week's videos. They
lead us nicely into what we're covering today, so this first one from Gordon Allan, "The
activation exercises look great. Would you do them just before running, just after running
or on rest days?" Well, the fact that they are activation exercises they are predominantly
designed to be done before your run, but that doesn't mean they need to be limited to just
that. You can actually do them on your non-run days and think about adding in an extra set
or making them a little bit harder so you can really get those glutes firing, and it
will still cross over to your non-run days. Glutes are usually the weak point for runners,
especially those who've got injuries, so it's a really great area to focus on. If you do
go to the gym and do some strength work, these exercises are brilliant to incorporate as
part of your warm-up there too. Right, next question comes from Lord Noodle,
"After I cool off I feel a bit of pain in my knees. Took a week off, doesn't seem to
go anywhere. Any tips?" Well, running or any intensive type of weight-bearing exercise
is going to have your legs obviously working much harder than they're used to, and this
will result in your muscles getting a little bit shortened and having that tight feeling,
which is pretty common to start to lead to little niggles, especially in your knees when
it comes to running anyway. We've actually covered this in a lot of detail in a video
called Runner's Knee, so you can check that one out if you want. If you make sure you
follow a pre-activation routine and then do some post-run stretches, it's the best way
to get on top of these sort of problems. On that note, I want to cover some bodyweight
strengthening exercises that you can add in that will complement your running, and we're
going to finish off with some post running stretches.
[music] Heather: Right, the squat is where I'm going
to start, because this is one of the best exercises that basically engages all of the
muscles in your legs in purely one exercise. We're keeping everything bodyweight to start
with today, but basically I want you standing with your feet just wider than hip-width apart,
toes pointing slightly out, just in a very natural position, and from here I want you
to simply bend your knees, flex your hips, so you're dropping your bottom down towards
the ground, trying to keep your chest nice and upright. You can put your hands on your
hips or out in front of you, whatever feels more comfortable, and go down as far as you
can and then come straight back up to standing. You can aim to repeat it 10 times to start
with, take a rest of around a minute and then do another once through or even twice through.
If you do want to progress this further or have a gym nearby, you can start to think
about adding in some weights, but for now, just concentrate on body weight.
A nice progression on from this is the split squat, so start with both feet together, take
a large step forwards as though you're into a lunge, and from there make sure your hips
are square, so they're facing forwards. It's quite a good idea to put your hands on your
hips to make sure, it also reminds you that you're in the right position, and you're simply
going to lower yourself down towards the ground. Your back knee will be going down towards
the ground, and then you're coming back up, so your legs are straight into that split.
Then if you repeat that, if you aim for eight on one leg, come back to the start and then
put the other leg forwards and do eight on the other side, and again, aim for two sets,
maybe even three. Now to focus a little bit more specifically
on the posterior chain, so those muscles at the back, predominantly your glutes and your
hamstrings. We're going to be repeating, but progressing an exercise we did last week,
so the hip bridge. The basic version is starting off lying on your back with your knees bent
and then simply lifting your hips up towards the sky or the ceiling. You can progress this
by taking it to single leg, making sure that your hips are still level and you're basically
repeating the same, but on one leg. The next step further would be to actually
put your heels up on a chair or a bench or something that's above the ground, from there
lift your hips up, and you'll suddenly find that much harder again. If you're still able
to progress, you can do one foot on a bench or the chair and then you're basically doing
that in a single leg version. For this exercise, aim for, I'd probably say six on each leg,
because it's quite hard if you're doing single-leg, and then two to three sets.
I know we're focusing on running strengthening exercises, so you might be slightly confused
by these next two, but we're going to look at upper body as well, because believe it
or not, when we're running we do actually need to engage our upper body and our core,
so it's the good old press up that covers both of that. It's not one of my favorite
exercises, but it does definitely tick all the boxes. The good standard press up with
your hands, just wider than your shoulders, elbows nice and in by your side and you're
going to just lower your body down towards the ground as close as you can and push back
up again. If you find that too hard it's perfectly fine
to do it on your knees, just make sure that you have a straight line going from your knees
through to your shoulders and your bottom is in line. For this one, it's a bit of a,
basically how many you can do, but if you start off by aiming for three sets of five,
and then build that up so you get up to three sets of ten.
Finally, this exercise might need a little bit of imagination if you don't have a gym,
but we've done the pushing version of the upper body. I want you to try and engage the
muscles at the back and the pulling side of things, which is especially important for
running because you think you're pulling your arms backwards, which is going to help propel
you. It's a version of the upright row. Now, if you have a TRX or some sort of cable,
you can simply do that. You'll want to have it in front of you and you're going to be
pulling your body weight up. The further you put your feet underneath it, the harder that
will be. Alternatively, if you've got a rucksack or a bag of some sort that you can fill with
something heavy like some books or some wine bottles, and then you can do an upright row.
Standing with your knees slightly bent and having your arms straight holding whatever
items it is and you're going to be simply pulling that into your chest, so you'll be
engaging all those back muscles and working your triceps as well.
[music] Heather: We've covered strengthening, so now
it's time to look at stretching. Just make sure you always do these after a run or after
some sort of exercise when you're nicely warmed up. For all of them, hold them for a minimum
of 30 seconds to get the full benefit. Let's start off with the calf muscles. You've got
a choice here of either standing with your hands against the wall and pushing your weight
down into your heel to feel a stretch that way.
Alternatively, you can stand on a step with the ball of your foot on the step dropping
your heel over the edge, and you'll start to feel a stretching feeling in that muscle
belly part of your calf. If you then want to bend your knee slightly, you'll feel that
stretch move further down and that's moving into a different part of your muscle.
Now moving up the leg, staying at the back we can look at the hamstrings. You've got
the option of either putting one leg out in front of you and bending the opposite leg.
If it's a straight leg, you'll start to feel a stretch as you bend your hips down towards
that leg, you should feel a gentle pull at the back of the hamstring. Alternatively,
I actually prefer to put my heel up onto something like a chair and then lean over that. You
can just get that stretch a little bit deeper into your hamstring. Now, front of the leg,
we've got the quad, so we want to try and isolate the quads to start with.
A really simple one is standing up for this, find something to hold on to so that you're
not challenging your balance, so you can really focus on the stretch. Get a hold of your foot
with a hand on the same side and pull that foot towards your bottom, but the key here
is making sure your hips stay facing forwards and you're not tipping your whole body, because
then you're not really getting a stretch. Also, make sure your knee stays parallel to
the opposite knee, and then you'll really start to feel that stretch isolated at the
front of the quads. Progressing this one onto hip flexors, and
it's a little bit different, because it's still the front of your thigh, but it's moving
further up, and this is a really key one for running. For this, take it into a lunge position,
so you've already got a stretch on at the front, and then you can start to drop that
back knee down towards the ground to make the stretch a little bit deeper, or even raise
your arms up, anything that's going to be lengthening out this area at the front.
Glutes are obviously a key area which we've spoken about a lot already, so we need to
do some stretching as well. There's a couple of options and you might need to work out
what works best for you, but start off sitting down and with both legs out straight, take
one leg, bend it, and put your foot on the outside of that opposite leg. Then try and
hug that knee in towards you. You can even start to rotate your body away from that knee
and you'll start to feel a gentle pull down the outside of your leg and into your glute.
That works perfectly for some people. You might want a more intense version when
you need to actually lie on your back, and you're going to rest your ankle over the thigh
of the opposite leg, and then that bent leg, you're going to thread your hands through
the triangle and pull that thigh towards you, so you've got a triangle
it's a bit of a chest opener so a peck shape and you'll start to feel the stretch in the
leg that's resting over the top of the one that you're holding. Hopefully, with the demonstration,
it'll be much clearer and just make sure you swap it over onto the other side.
Then finally just a quick one for upper body which irrelevant of whether you've done the
strengthening exercises is great to counter out the postures that a lot of us spend our
time in sat at computers, for example. It's a bit of a chest opener so a peck stretch.
For this one, you just simply need to find a wall and then place your hand and maybe
your forearm on that wall as you're facing it, and then rotate your body away from your
hand and your arm until you start to feel a nice pull across the front of your chest.
It's quite a pleasant stretch this one. All of these stretches are just ideas to get
you started, you might find that some areas need more work than others or you want to
bring in different ones but experiment with what works for you.
[music] Before we round-up, there's just a couple
of comments that I want to share with you guys. This first one from Michael Gainsford.
"Hi, what pace should we be doing for the walk and the jog? At the moment my jog at
week four is 7:15 and my walk is 9:30." Well, Michael, I just want to reiterate, I think
you won't be alone on this, I've had quite a few people wondering about pace but it's
something that I don't want you worrying about too much. We've touched on it in the past
that I do need to see a difference obviously between the walk and the run, but the fact
that you are running and you're walking will happen naturally.
When it comes to the walk, I want it to be at a power pace. If you are walking with friends
you could still talk but you're definitely walking faster than you would be just doing
a stroll in the park. When it comes to the run, at this stage, it's purely about just
running. I do not mind how slow you are going as long as you are physically running and
moving forwards. Once you've reached week eight and you've managed to run for that set
of time, then you can start to think about improving that pace but at the moment, it's
running for a set amount of time and it's just about building that base up.
Really, don't stress too much about it and I think you'll soon get to feel if you're
working hard enough. If anything, it's making sure you don't walk too slowly but the run
will be waking you work naturally as it is. Final point or comment here and it's quite
a nice one. This comes in from JJ from Honolulu. "Pippa," this is a message to Pippa, I hope
you Pippa's watching this one. "I feel your pain but remember, part of this is a mental
game. When I feel like I just can't run anymore I tell myself "10 more seconds" then after
that "10 more" and I try to stretch it out beyond the "I can't do this" moment. I listen
to music when running and will often focus on the lyrics as a distraction. That sometimes
helps. Just do your best." I'm sure many of you can relate to those wise
words brilliant to hear. Make sure you guys leave any comments whether they're suggestions
or whether they're questions in the comments section below and hopefully you are still
on track. Remember that the session plan is in the Pdf which is in the description below,
we've not covered it this week so we have had a little hiatus. If you are still on track,
do progress onwards if you're struggling a little bit, then now's a perfect time to rewind
and join us when we're going to be covering weeks seven and eight in our next video.
Hopefully, you've enjoyed it and you're still on track. Give us a thumbs up if you've enjoyed
it and remember you can follow us on our social media channels too.
[00:13:20] [END OF AUDIO]