When trying to improve your health with regular exercise, it’s important to do something you actually enjoy. There’s little point in signing up for a month of Pilates if the thought of core exercises makes you shiver.<\/p>\n
Actress, writer, director, and producer Sharon Horgan started running about six years ago. Since then, she has “pushed it up to two or three times a week” and says it’s one of the “only things exercise-wise that I actually like”, so now she takes her running shoes<\/a> all over the world, whether for work or play.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n “I pack my stinky trainers and my running bra<\/a>, and I’m off!” she told Talkhouse<\/a>. “It gives me the greatest pleasure, and it’s also so unexpected.”<\/p>\n The star ran cross-country at school and enjoyed it, but it still surprised her when she started again and found that she continued to “love it”.<\/p>\n Running is “the best way” to get to know a new city – and Sharon counts spots in Norway, Spain, and Rome among her standouts, she told Television Academy<\/a>. It’s also helped her physically and mentally in the last few years.<\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n After dealing with challenging menopause symptoms <\/a>(including a “frozen f**king shoulder”, per The i Paper<\/a>), Sharon decided to swap GPs and “stop drinking, get fit, [and] sort [her] hormones out”, which is when she started running more.<\/p>\n “I will go through phases of not doing it, but I generally feel better when I get out and do it,” she said.<\/p>\n The star told Talkhouse her chosen distance is 5km – just enough to reap the benefits, but not so long that her “knees start shouting” or her hips become uncomfortable. If she’s running with someone else, she may go a little further.<\/p>\n “But what running really does, even though I’m either listening to music or a podcast, is take me somewhere else mentally,” she told the outlet. “It’s not always about taking the most interesting routes; sometimes when you have to do something that takes you off on a tangent, it’s exciting.”<\/p>\n How to start running as a beginnerFind comfortable kit: Good shoes, a comfortable sports bra, and some workout leggings <\/a>that don’t fall down are all you need to get started.Entertain yourself: One of the most common complaints from new runners is that it’s “boring”. Create a playlist, download an audiobook or new episodes of your favourite podcasts to play through your exercise headphones<\/a> before you head out the door.Go slow: Most people run too fast. The key to running as a beginner is to go very, very slowly. Run comfortably enough to keep up a conversation. Known as zone 2, this builds your aerobic fitness.Run with others: Being accountable to head out the door helps, too. If you know you’re meeting a friend in 20 minutes, you’re less likely to cancel because it’s early, raining, or you just don’t fancy it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When trying to improve your health with regular exercise, it’s important to do something you actually enjoy. There’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621665,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[565,134,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-621664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fitness","tag-fitness","tag-health","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=621664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621664\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}