Running Principles

As well as being chief executive of Athletics Ireland, Brendan Hackett is former coach to several Irish international athletes including James Nolan and Maria Lynch, and completed several marathons.

He has three principles on how to get the most out of running.

Principle 1:"People are always concerned about pushing themselves too soon and thus sustaining possible injury. So for anyone starting out, the first principle is to evaluate where you are. If you're starting out from scratch that could mean visiting your doctor if you are concerned about lack of fitness or other health issues.

"The other one is self-assessment, to simply gauge your own level of fitness and take it from there. But you do need to think a little before you start running."

Principle 2:"Once you have developed a regular running routine you'll want to start overloading the body a little. The very fact that you're running places a stress on your body, so the key is not to overload too much too soon. The best guideline is to run at 'conversation pace', in other words you're running too hard if you can't talk.

"The ideal measure of overload is to make sure nothing is increased by more than 10 per cent each week.

"So if you're running 20 miles a week, weekly increases should be no more than a couple of miles, and likewise, if you're running, say 30 minutes, you don't want to increase by more than a few minutes at a time.

Principle 3:"Once a regular running regime is under way and the body is used to overload, there are three main ways to ensure further progress.

The first is to increase the frequency of runs, say from three or four times a week to five or six; the other is the intensity or effort, in other words run faster; and the third is to increase further the duration of the run, especially if the marathon is your ultimate aim."

More on the Fit4Life programme can be found at www.athleticsireland.ie