The Ultimate Beginner’s Running Guide: “The Key To Running Inspired”
by Ryan Robert

This short and sweet e-book is packed full of information in a small package. It covers a wide range of topics a beginning runner would need to embark on a running program, as well as good reminders for those who are already into running or who are returning to the sport after time off.

It consists of 5 chapters:

• Getting Ready to Run
• Raising the Bar and Staying Motivated to Run
• Nutrition, Hydration, Running in Adverse Conditions and Common Injuries
• Running Inspired
• Training Schedules

The first chapter breaks down form and mechanics, the gear you need, stretching, warm-ups and cool-downs.  It talks about having the courage to get going and how to determine the right intensity for your fitness level.

The next chapter is full of tricks on how to improve, from speedwork to hill training and strengthening recommendations.  But it also has ways to increase your motivation.  Once you’ve started out and have been training consistently for a couple of months, you may have seen great improvement for a while but then it starts to level off.  By coming up with little games you can increase your motivation and it offers some tips on this area.

Chapter 3 goes through the common running injuries that occur and how to (hopefully) prevent and treat those, as well as how to run in varying conditions.  If you’re worried about how to deal with heat, cold, precipitation, this chapter spells it out concisely.  The nutrition information isn’t really in-depth, but then again you don’t need that in this book.  It offers a few suggestions on simple snacks to fuel your run and some goal nutrient targets.  However, everybody is an individual… so this content can’t be the ultimate panacea, everybody needs to figure out their own nutrition/exercise prescription.

Chapter 4 is super short, it talks about how you can stay inspired with running… the big message being to have faith in yourself.

Lastly we’ve got some sample plans: plans for beginners who are already active, those who are sedentary, those who want to lose weight and those who are over 50.

The book is easy to read and approachable to all audiences.  My favorite part is that there are visualization exercises at the end of the first 3 chapters.  You always hear about elite athletes doing visualization exercises and I think that’s a good practice.  I just wish there were more of these in the book.  Or maybe a whole book of running visualizations.  Or maybe a whole podcast of them!  (Anyone out there with a smooth talking voice and a PhD in psychology want to work on that? )

You can get the Kindle version of this book for just $4.99… or if you’re an Amazon Prime member it’s a freebie Kindle read!