Why you’re not as crap as you think you are (and neither am I)
On unrealistic fitness standards and the Couch To 5K reality
Like most people who’ve got into running in the last few years and weren’t simply born wearing a top of the range Garmin, my gateway drug was the Couch To 5K app.
I think the programme is amazing and it does an incredible job of making something as hard and hideous as running feel accessible and fun… but it has a fatal flaw.
By the end of it, it’s quite unlikely that you’ll be able to run 5K in the allocated half an hour.
In fact, “Couch To Hopefully Being Able To Run Continuously For 30 Minutes Over An Unspecified Distance” would be a more accurate name but you don’t have to be a tone of voice consultant (hi!) to sense that this doesn’t have the same ring to it.
I know quite a few people who’ve completed the programme and felt a bit deflated because they still can’t run 5K in 30 minutes. I followed it very diligently and I think 30 minutes covered under 4K for me when I finished and it was another 18 months of running three times a week before I hit the coveted “sub-30” - yeah, check me out with my fancy runner lingo.
The sub-30 5K is a goal for lots of runners, not just newbies, and one I have hit only about five times in my three or so years of running relentlessly regularly.
Most people I know who can reliably run 5K in significantly under 30 minutes are:
Men (but #NotAllMen)
Leggy women
Women who weigh quite a bit less than I do
People who’ve been into running for-literally-ever
People who are just weirdly naturally good at running, mainly to spite me
People who didn’t miss parkrun this week because they accidentally drank tequila and danced until gone 2am in Brixton of all places and then did a tiny bit of sick on Saturday morning because they’ve fallen into a bad crowd of seemingly respectable school mums who have no off switch
Dogs (I know I said people but loads of dogs can knock out a sub-30 and they deserve credit)
If you go to parkrun, AND YOU SHOULD IT’S AMAZING I LOVE YOU PARKRUN PLEASE MARRY ME, you’ll find the average stats are skewed by the fact that some extremely fast people go to parkrun, who can run 5K in like 16 minutes. I mean, it’s hardly worth them leaving the house is it? So, it takes you double or three times that? Well, great, you’re just getting more exercise!
Before I did my first parkrun, I pored over the stats of my local ones to check I definitely wouldn’t come last if I finished in 30+ minutes - and I didn’t, by a long way. You actually can’t come last in parkrun anyway, because there’s a tail walker whose job is to always be behind you, but the back of the pack also tends to include walkers, very old people being incredible, people balancing multiple children on buggies… and plenty of totally mediocre runners like me.
I was discussing this with author, influencer and fellow SE London running nerd (and soon to be pro fitness trainer!) Bethany Rutter and she shared this enlightening post with me by ultra marathon academic Bethan Taylor-Swaine which reveals that the average 5K finish time across all groups is, in fact, 33.54 - which is roughly where I’m at right now too.
, who writes a nice Substack about all sorts of interesting things, also made me feel so much better when she talked about this a few months ago, as I have seen her IRL and she looks really sporty.And this all checks out with this table below. I’m showing the women’s one, since approximately 75% of my devoted readership are women, but for men the times pretty much all squidge over a column, so an advanced woman is a bit like an intermediate man (only when it comes to running, you understand). You can read more here about what that actually means - but in short, even a “beginner” is more of a runner than most humans.
The fact is, most people in the world don’t run at all so if you’re giving it a go then you’re doing brilliantly. When you pop London Marathon on the telly while lounging at home with your granola it might look like an awful lot of people are there but according to some more shit I just googled, only 0.01% of the global population run a marathon each year, and only 0.5% of UK residents take part in organised races of any length. It probably just feels like more because we all wang on about it so much.
But when things are called Couch To 5K as if it’s as easy as that, it can make you feel pretty self-conscious about looking slow.
When you try to run you might say things like “Why does my chest hurt? Why can’t I breathe? Why do I feel like I’m going to puke?” and this is almost certainly because you’re running way, way too fast off the bat, even if it’s not “very fast” by experienced runner standards, and then you feel even worse about how “slow and shit” you are and so don’t try it again for months, years or ever.
I only recently got really nerdy about running, and it turns out Proper Runners who are training for big races and stuff do most of their regular runs at “easy” pace, which means they keep their heart rate low. Their “easy” pace might be your “I think I’m going to die” pace which means two things:
You should almost certainly slow down even more.
Nobody gives a damn that you are slow. If someone passing is a Proper Runner, they might just think you’re “running easy” and if they are not a Proper Runner, they’re probably just impressed that you are running at all, even if they have a funny way of showing it.
It was National Fitness Day last week, which meant lots of articles came out about how sedentary we are as a population. Unfortunately some of the stats feel a bit shamey as they’re accompanied by quotes on “stubbornly high levels of inactivity”.
Quite often the powers-that-be wheel out elite athletes to illustrate these points, as if those are attainable ideals for the average person juggling work, caring responsibilities, financial stress, and who likely doesn’t feel super-confident about exercising for a multitude of reasons - and not least all the unrealistic fitness standards and goals they’re presented with by the very people attempting to inspire them into action.
People are not being “stubborn”. They just don’t know where to begin. If you’re not very fit, it all looks and feels completely impossible and impenetrable.
Running isn’t the only thing people think they should just be able to do, and therefore feel like failures if they can’t. Stock photos of people working out often show someone effortlessly doing a push-up. Push-ups are really hard! I’ve been strength training at least twice a week for three years, and I am pretty strong - I can leg-press 1.5 times my body weight goddammit (no idea if this is technically good, but it sounds like it) - but I still can’t do a proper push-up.
But guess what? This is normal! Go to a gym class and you’ll see that most people, even some who look pretty fit, do a variation - either on their knees, on an incline, or both. You can be really quite strong and fit but if you’re also not particularly light, it is bloody hard to do anything involving lifting your own body weight.
And as for pull-ups… as IF! A light person with reasonable upper body strength is much more likely to be able to do pull-ups than a heavier person with good upper body strength. It is just physics and it does not mean you are unfit or weak. A lot of fitness types make these look like attainable goals but I’m confident that I can do all the bench presses in the world but unless I lose about five stone, which sounds very boring indeed, I am never going to be able to do a pull-up. I have made my peace with it. Ultimately, I am not a chimpanzee.
Trying and failing to do these things over and over again is MISERABLE. On the one hand, practice is the only way to get better. But on the other, how about practicing stuff you can feasibly enjoy until it gives you a bit more confidence, and perhaps a bit more strength and stamina, and then maybe the next time you try to run, or do a push-up, with or without a member of the Kardashian dynasty lounging on your back, it’ll be a tiny bit easier?
Just do what you want to be more active if you can, and remember most of the people visibly exercising are the ones who are the best at it. You are not crap, you are normal. One of my reasons for starting this Substack is to show that you can visibly exercise, and even visibly enjoy exercise, even if you are not the best at it at all.
Progress is personal. Enjoy being performative about it on Strava or wherever? Me too! I am desperate to be able to run a bit faster and I also LOVE seeing my pals smash their PBs. But I also know that nobody gives as much of a shit about my stats as I do.
And here are some Instagram accounts that make me feel better about being mediocre…
@nobsapp: Nobs is a fitness app “actually designed for beginners” and here its very nice and normal founder Lucy answers the questions you feel embarrassed about asking at the gym. Like, which end of the bench is for your head? And what the eff are your hamstrings anyway? A lot of fitness pros, even the ones supposedly trying to make it accessible, assume a certain level of knowledge that the huge chunk of people who’ve never set foot in a gym simply don’t have. Nobs genuinely keeps it simple.
@thehaveagos: Fronted by the ever-charming Em Clarkson, The Have A Gos are “bringing FUN to intimidating sporting events!”. I found this account really motivating when I first got into running, as it just looked like a load of women of varying shapes, sizes and fitness levels not taking themselves too seriously, subtly breaking down a lot of barriers in the process.
@michaelulloapt: An excellent antidote to image-obsessed fitness content, Michael is a PT and coach who does some crucial debunking of the diet and fitness industry, and makes it funny.
@itsmehelenthorn: If you’re a runner or aspiring runner, you absolutely need to follow Helen, half of comedy duo Scummy Mummies. Her fitness journey has been immense and is inspiring beyond belief (I’ve followed her for ages and she used to be slower than ME! Imagine!). Just this weekend, her plans to run Berlin Marathon in under four hours went awry, and she handled it all with so much humour and humility. Warning, you might cry.
Oh, and you can also of course follow me if you want to be caught in an endless cycle of me promoting my Substack on Instagram and then promoting my Instagram on Substack. Enjoy.
Quality article. Genuine and honest. Lovely stuff.
So good and funny! I did couch to 5k and ended up at about 4k in the time allocated. And then gave up. I’m wishing I could love running like you do, Isabel. I keep hoping that reading your Substack will kick me into action.