Cheap hobbies on a budget – Jogging

If you are looking to start a new hobby, our cheap hobbies on a budget series might be right up your street! Each fortnight we’ll look at a different hobby and weigh up the pros and cons of each. First up is jogging.

Jog on

Jogging can be a great way of getting fit and you can enjoy the great outdoors whilst you’re at it! You can run around your neighbourhood, a local park or further afield, it’s totally up to you. To start with, it is important that you don’t over stretch yourself, especially if you haven’t exercised for a long time. Remember you won’t become Mo Farah overnight!

Fitness Magazine recommend that you start out jogging for twenty minutes, three times a week and gradually build up from there.

If you’re out of practice when it comes to exercise, you may find yourself slightly out of breath during a run, and that’s totally fine! You can just walk (as quickly as you can) for a minute or so before speeding up into a jog again. It’s important that you don’t push yourself too hard to begin with, as although you want to improve your fitness – you need to have a little fun as well!

Take inspiration from1984 Olympic Marathon Winner Joan Benoit Samuelson who famously said: “When I started running, I was so embarrassed I’d walk when cars passed me. I’d pretend I was looking at the flowers.” Even the pros have to start from scratch!

Challenge yourself

It’s important that you set yourself challenges so you don’t become bored. You could try to up your pace with every run, or try to run a little bit further each time. If you do the same route every time you might find it boring, so mix things up a bit. Even running the same route but the opposite way round might make things more interesting. You could do a mixture of jogging and sprinting to get your heart rate pumping, or try running up a hill.

Equipment

You’ll need a pair of decent running trainers, but before you shell out, why not see if jogging is something that you’re going to enjoy long term by trying it for a few weeks first. Once you are confident that jogging is the hobby for you, you can check out the running trainers for sale on sites such as Ebay. You could find just what you’re looking for, for a fraction of the price!

If you are planning on running in the evening, you may want to consider investing in a reflective jacket and/or armbands for safety. Again, Ebay might have something suitable, or you could try a sports shop like Sports Direct.

Female runners might want to invest in a sports bra too, to make sure you are getting the support you need.

Ready, set, go!

It takes will power to get off the sofa and go for a run, so if you can, why not ask a friend if they fancy joining you? You could set yourself a schedule to help motivate yourself and get you into a routine. Motivating yourself to exercise at the beginning of the week is often easier than motivating yourself to exercise at the end of the week, as you’re likely to be less tired when you’ve not done a full week of work!

Another option is to join a local running club, and run with people of all abilities. To find out where your nearest club is and when they meet click here.

There are lots of free apps you can download onto your smart phone too, which will allow you to map your run and set yourself goals. Some of them include Runkeeper, MapMyRun, Runtastic, UP by Jawbone and Pumatrac.

If you really want to motivate yourself, why not set yourself the challenge of running a 5 or even 10K race? You’ll need a few months to get fit for it, but setting yourself a goal like this could give you a boost on those days when you just want to be lazy!