Women Run Arkansas — Batesville

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By BRUCE OAKLEY
Women Run Arkansas — Batesville Co-director

Welcome, ladies eager to learn about running. These pages are an outgrowth of Batesville's annual Women Run Arkansas running clinic, a supportive 10-week program that helps beginning runners finish their first 5K and more experienced runners go farther and faster.

After coaching at the 2011 clinic, I helped several ladies who continued running throughout the year. As we went along, I wrote a series of blog posts with advice for beginners, strategies for improving and notes on injury prevention. My wife, Suzy, also wrote a number of running posts in her blog from the new runner's perspective. The clinics helped her so much that she now shares these lessons with beginners as a clinic coach herself.

Links to my posts and brief summaries follow. Each post stands alone, but if you read them in order, they'll take you through the journey from "couch" to "can't get enough."

There's more on my Run-Coach page, and the Running category lists the posts below and later additions in the opposite order (from newest to oldest). Feel free to use the comment boxes or Facebook to ask questions or suggest new topics.

Posts to get you started on your road:

First steps: Let's begin.

Dress for success: Running gear advice.

At Suzy's blog: How to buy a sports bra

Best foot forward: Choosing shoes.

On balance: Getting it together.

Efficiency in a nutshell: Keep it simple.

Making honey: It's easy if you do it naturally.

Against a sea of troubles: Handling or avoiding injuries.

A turn to tables: Safe mileage increase and hydration charts.

Hurry up and wait: Patience! This takes time.

Fast talk: How to improve.

The more the merrier: Get yourself a posse.

A bit of a stretch: Guiding principles and key areas to work on

Getting up to speed: 8-week mile speed training schedule

We need more speed: What do all those numbers mean? How does that training schedule work?