I have finally started to use my treadmill. My goal is to be able to jog, so I started by doing a walk/jog interval. I briskly walk (3.5mph) for 3 minutes and then jog (5mph) for 1.5 minutes. I do this 5 times a week and I am just starting on my second week. Has anyone had experience with this? I was just wondering how long would it take to be able to jog much longer than 1.5 minutes. Thanks.

That is how I started out, but I did it outside on the sidewalk and path near our house. I was surprised at first how little I could jog without being out of breath and not being able to jog further and having to walk again. I did about the same as you 3 minutes walk, 1 to 1.5 minutes jog.

Now, 3 months later, I am able to jog for more than 30 minutes without needing to stop. It took awhile, but I just kept pushing and made myself go longer and longer each week. You can do it, just keep it up. The body adapts quite nicely.

A little tip that helped me: Jog outside. You will keep going if you see other people out there. I kind of felt if they saw me stop jogging and walk, it would be embarrassing, so I kept jogging, LOL. That helped somewhat.

Joey

Check out the www.coolrunning.com web site. They have a Couch to 5K training schedule for beginners and other training schedules for more experienced runners.

Hi - I'm in week 6 of the Couch to 5K program. I found free podcasts set to great music for this program:

http://www.ullreys.com/robert/Podcasts/pag...category-2.html

I downloaded the podcasts to my mp3 player and each session, Robert tells you when to walk, when to run. The music has a great beat that keeps you going.

Good luck!

Karen

I am training for a 1/2 marathon doing a run/walk. Well, I already did one but ended up walking most of it. I live (and trained) in Chicago and the 1/2 was in Nashville. Nothing in Chicago could have prepared me for all the hills. Yuck! So since I was disappointed in myself I am doing another one. I did a Google search for a training program (10 weeks). I started at 3/2, then to 4/2, 4/1, and 5/1. This time around I am doing/did 4/2, 5/2, 5/1, and 6/1. I did a 10K last weekend at 5/1 and finished with 11:40 miles. Not exactly speedy! I got a picture of me today and it was so obvious how slow I am!!! I know I can run more than 6 minutes but am sticking with it because I don't want to get too tired on this try. After this 1/2 I am going to just run and see how far I go. I would like to run a whole 5K eventually. Walking outside or on an indoor track is so much harder than a treadmill so if you do use one, put it on a 1% incline, they say that is more comparable to running outside.