Did you make any mistakes as a newbie runner? (Read 225 times)

You could probably go to runnersworld, buzzfeed, women's health, mens health, competitor, or generic mom runner blog, and change a few words on the 400 times this list has been compiled and call it a day. Would save you a crapload of time.

My biggest mistake was treating running (in my late 30s off the couch) like soccer practice (of my early adulthood): if you're not exhausted by the end of practice, you didn't work hard enough.

So, I ran all my runs at 80% effort, or the equivalent of what I'd now call tempo runs, but without the slow warmup to that pace.

After two months I was busted and couldn't figure out why I was getting slower.  This forum put me right.

Mine was really worth a Nobel Price for n00bness: 

When I decided to start running the first thing that I did was to go buying a pair of shoes. My experience in sport until then was limited to mountain climbing and I knew how these shoes called "catpaws" felt like and that I had to buy them one size smaller.

So, I went to the local sports store and got myself a brand new pair of Nike Pegasus +  (can't recall the model). I tried several until I found a pair that felt exactly like climbing shoes: small and with my toes pressing against the front of the toebox. I was wondering why my feet hurt but I thought it was because that was how it was supposed to be. Even worse: Fearing to reach the dreaded 500 miles mark at which shoes suddenly become radioactive and cause foot cancer (if we have to believe the shoe industry) I bought myself a few more pairs including a pair of flats and a pair of trail shoes... truth be told, I bout all of them at discount prices. 

I actually ran my first half marathon after 6 months with the Nikes. For then I already knew the truth and bought myself a pair of K-Swiss Natural Running Ironman II (yeah, that's a long name). It felt like heaven. I actually retired this pair a few weeks ago, the "official" mileage here on this site is above 1000 miles but it must be more in the range of 2000 ~ 2500 as I just stopped taking care of logging the equipment. Hell I even stopped logging at all. 

Yeah.  My freshman year of HS I went out for cross country.  There was this other freshman kid who looked like he was already in his mid 40's and I made it my mission in life to beat him.  We had an intrasquad triathlon, and I figured I had to get a lead on him during the bike portion or else he would beat me in the run.  I came out of the pool just behind him.  Midway through the bike, I came even with him and tried to pass him on the inside.  This lead me to riding my bike on the gravel, and my front wheel started to wobble and I totally took a digger.  I ended up getting several chunks of gravel stuck in my elbow and had to go to the doctor to get them removed.  Moral of the story.  Try hard, but not too hard.

Does that count as a newbie running mistake?

A couple of mistakes:

First, I bought a pair of shorts that I really liked with mesh stash pockets,  They worked really well, so I bought a second pair so I could have two pairs in rotation for my longer runs.  I forgot to wash the second pair before I went out on a 12-mile run in the heat and humidity of a coastal South Carolina summer day.  I was unaware of it at the time until I returned to the condo, but I really chafed my inner thighs where the seams rubbed my legs.  So much so that  my legs were bleeding.  Lesson:  wash before using.

Second, my first marathon was going to be run on a hilly course.  Being concerned about running enough hills in my training, I ran my last longish run three weeks before the marathon on the hilliest course I could find.  The stress on my hamstrings was so great that I was in pain for the three weeks of the taper and I wasn't sure I was going to recover.  As it turned out, my usual runs had enough hill climbing that I was probably well-enough prepared and really put my first marathon at risk.