10 common rookie mistakes beginner runners should avoid

With too much running-related information floating around, it’s difficult to filter out what actually works. Rich Benyo, editor of Marathon & Beyond and author of the book, Timeless Running Wisdom, offers these 10 tips on avoiding the mistakes that beginner runners make, centred around the theme of “too,” as in “too much” or “too far.”

1. Too much “stuff.” Running is the simplest of all sports, yet you wouldn’t know it by looking at today’s runner loaded down with iPod, heart-rate monitor, GPS, hydration pack strapped to back, gel-belts, fanny-pack, etc. Astronauts being shot into space go with fewer gadgets. Every piece of equipment you carry complicates an eminently simple sport. Life is already too complicated. The key word in long distance running is “simplify.”
2. Too far too soon. Patience is becoming an archaic word in today’s fast-paced society. Folks want instant everything. In running, it just doesn’t work that way. Although a new runner can get the cardiovascular system into a semblance of shape in roughly two months, other body systems (especially the joints and ligaments) take more time; and realistically, the older you are and the more out of shape you are when taking up running, the longer it takes. Slow and steady increases in mileage with periodic “easy” weeks pay off better in the long run. Remember the admonition: “When in doubt, do less.”
3. Too fast too early. Every long distance runner should know the name Lydiard. Arthur Lydiard, the famed New Zealander coach, laid down the ground rules for getting into shape and then improving — rules which just about every running coach over the past 50 years has borrowed and then modestly modified. Lay down a base of slow running before adding speed. And keep speed at 10-15% of your weekly mileage. Speed judiciously applied greatly improves a runner’s performance; injudiciously applied, it can make a runner’s career extremely short.
4. Too soon for the marathon. In days of yore, experienced runners gradually worked their way up to the marathon, spending sometimes years running 10Ks. Today it seems as if at least half of the new runners want to run the marathon as their first — and sometimes last — race. Not to say that it can’t be done. It’s occasionally even done well. But not often. The same way you wouldn’t want a pre-med student performing brain surgery, you don’t want to rush into the marathon without building toward it using shorter events.
5. Too new shoes and apparel. Never race with new shoes or clothes. It’s nice to sport just-out-of-the-box shoes and running clothes with the tags still attached, but they should be broken in during training runs, where if they have shortcomings or need adjustments, they won’t undermine a perfectly good race.
6. Too many carbs. While carbohydrates are the fuel on which long distance runners run, carbs also have calories; calories lead to weight; the more weight, the harder it is to run well. The night before a marathon you may want to carbo-load, but you don’t need to carbo-overload. Remember that race cars are faster the lighter they are. And we’ve known marathoners who loaded on beef stroganoff and red wine and did just fine.
7. Too much water. Somehow a decade or so ago someone started the rumor that if you were going to run long distances you needed to be waterlogged. Not so. Too much water is more dangerous than too little. Too much water can cause hyponatremia, which can cause death. More runners have been injured from hyponatremia over the last decade than were injured from dehydration over the previous century. Remember that the Boston Marathon didn’t put water on its course until 1978 and the runners weren’t dropping dead all over the place from dehydration prior to that. When you hydrate, alternate a sports drink with water to avoid hyponatremia.
8. Too much breakfast. Don’t eat right before a long run or a race. Don’t drink sports drinks right before a long run or a race. If you are going to eat or drink anything, make it bland and make it at least two hours before you start running or racing.
9. Too far forward. When you enter a race, seed yourself in the field at roughly the place you figure you’ll finish up. That will keep you from getting in the way of faster runners and will help you avoid being sucked out too fast once the race starts. Start conservatively, saving your best running for the second half of the race.
10. Too much advice. These days, everybody’s an expert — in everything. Which, of course, is nonsense. If everybody in running were such an expert, everybody would be running much faster times than they are. Get your advice from sources who have the results to prove their theories or from sources where the information has to be filtered through the cheesecloth of at least one editor. And don’t sell your own common sense short. Before embracing a piece of advice, ask yourself how and why this might work. There’s no such thing as too much common sense.

And finally, a “do” – do enjoy your running, Benyo says. “Keep it simple to max out the joy. Life is way too complicated as it is, and getting more so all the time. Your running can be a welcome escape from too much of everything else in your life.”