Early Morning Runs

It’s normal to feel sluggish on early runs but with a regular routine of running early, your body clock will start to adjust.  Before this you need to go to bed at a reasonable time to get adequate sleep; otherwise you will feel exhausted, which makes early runs feel worse then they really are.  Try to give yourself ample time before you run rather than rushing out the door. 

On the Monday and Wednesday early morning runs I get up at 05:30am.  My aim is to be wide awake before I meet up with my running buddies at 06:45.   This allows me to properly wake up, hydrate and perhaps have time to eat a small snack, such as a banana to raise the blood sugar levels.  I always prepare my kit the night before so you can feel relaxed and wide awake. This also includes looking up the following days weather to make sure I have the right kit for the run.  

Before I start the run I go for a short walk around the block as part of my warm up before meeting the rest of the crew for the run.  When we start, Strava goes on and we all walk about 1km to warm up before starting off slowly to give ourselves more time to reach our planned pace. When it’s feeling particularly tough,especially in the winter, I think of the great reasons for getting out early. It’s nice to make use of a more peaceful time of day, and it will give you a boost physically and mentally in the long term.

it is challenging to run first thing in the morning and it is mostly because our muscles are cold from sleeping all night and blood sugar levels are low as well as our minds booting up for the day.  The good news is there are a few tricks you can use to combat getting up early in the mornings. I find that once I have got the run in in first thing, you are running on a high for the rest the day.  I am fresh to start a days work after an early morning 10km and set up for the rest of the days activities.

All those that have joined me have experienced all these benefits and compared to an evening run after a full days work, find it more refreshing to complete the early runs.  If you want to join us, we meet at Saintbridge Surgery, Monday and Wednesday’s at 06:45 for a 10km run, everyone no matter what the ability is welcome.