By Hayden Shearman // One of running’s eternal impediments is that people just don’t like to run. Plain and simple. It's painful, it chaffs, it bounces, it sweats, it smells, it injures.

At face value running doesn't have much going for it for the beginner runner. Hence why only 5.5 per cent of Londoners run regularly. 

So if you're new to running and you've heard all these tales of blissful runner's highs and magical marathon experiences, how do you work your way through the mire to find the elusive pot of running gold at the tip of this seemingly endless rainbow of running pain?
 
As a running coach, I've guided hundreds of new runners to their goals and I'd argue that three things help people develop a lifetime love of running:
1. Running in beautiful paces
2. Running with great company
3. Running with a goal
 
Thankfully, London is a place that can easily meet all three of these goals.

Beautiful Places
Thanks to its flat-to-rolling terrain and its abundance of great parks, it has truly world-class running routes. Bushy Park, Richmond Park, the Thames Path, the Green Chain, Hampstead Heath and I could go on—all of them are fantastic and just waiting for you and your trainers to enjoy their trails.

Great Company
London also has a wonderful running community with over 40 parkruns, 100s of running clubs and running groups to suit all abilities and speeds, and races every other day. There are almost half a million runners in this city, so there are bound to be at least one or two runners out there who happen to share both your running speed and your unique sense of humour! 

Goals
The great thing about running is that you can track your progress very easily. Unlike looking in the mirror or weighing yourself on scales, the stop watch is a trustworthy and objective measure of your fitness. However, before you get to the stage of beating personal best times, it's a good ideas to challenge yourself to complete distances.

After a few weeks of running you might start with completing your first non-stop 5k (or 3mi). Then step up to something longer like 6mi. A great inner city route to do 6mi is to start from London Bridge and run a loop out to Westminster Bridge and back (4.4mi), then complete the figure-of-eight by running over Tower Bridge and back to London Bridge (1.6mi).

Putting Them Together
The fun really kicks in when you combine scenery, company and a distance goal. And with so many beautiful parks around London, why not set about rounding up a few friends to complete a perimeter of the park and gradually tick them off your bucket list?

Greenwich Park (2mi), Regent's Park (with Primrose Hill, 4.0mi), Hyde Park & Kensington Gardens (4.3mi), Bushy Park (6.6mi), Richmond Park (7.25mi)—plus many more (here's a list of park perimeter distances).  

Falling in Love
Now you've got these three weapons in your running arsenal (of scenery, company and goals), aim to achieve one goal on every run you do. So if you're running three times a week, the first might be a social run with a friend chatting the whole way, the next run might be a venture along a canal on a sunny morning or an autumnal explore through a nearby woodland, and the final run of the week will be a parkrun where you either go for distance (first 5k non-stop) or for time. 

Try utilising one of these tools during your three runs each week and keep it up for three weeks. After that I guarantee you'll be starting to get a wee sniff of that elusive runner's high!

Let me know how you get on!


-- Hayden Shearman

By Hayden Shearman // London doesn't handle hot very well. The Tube bakes, the Thames smells, the Lidos overflow, and us runners stumble through the incredibly sparse connect-the-dots network of London's drinking fountains. 

But all is not lost … there are plenty of great places to run that escape the worst of the heat. Here are my favourites: 

Hampstead Heath
Sure there are hills that will make the heart rate crank on top of what the atmosphere is already demanding from your run, but the shade you will get from the ample supply of trees (and the pergola) definitely makes this a top running destination for a hot day. 

The added bonus of course is the cool waters of multiple bathing ponds and the Lido just near Parliament Hill Track.

Green Park & Victoria Park
The centre of London is often a few degrees warmer than the suburbs (a combo of the concrete holding the heat and being in a valley), so if you can't escape to the 'burbs, Green Park and Victoria Park are probably your best bet for hunting out the shade. 

Russia Dock Woodland
For another central city option, just south of Tower Bridge, run 1mi east (following the shade of the Bermondsey's Thames Path) through to Southwark Park and on to Greenland Dock and the shaded Russia Dock Woodland. Tip: There is a water fountain just up from the Mixed Bathing Pond on the way to the Viaduct. 

Wimbledon Common
Mid-summer is about the only time of year when Wimbledon Common's boggy trails might actually dry out! When it's hot many runners prefer Wimbledon Common over neighbouring Richmond Park. And if you feel particularly desperate, you could always cool off with a quick dip (read: mud bath) in Beverley Brook (western fence line of Wimbledon Common). (Note: I have no idea if swimming in the brook is even allowed, so better check first!) The main downer is that the only place for refreshments is at the Windmill.

Epping Forest
If you need to run long and stay under constant cover of tall, shady trees, look no further than Epping Forest. 

Pack some fluids and take the Tube up to Epping. Then run the 15mi back south to Manor Park Station. Get refreshments on the way at High Beach Visitor's Centre and Queen Elizabeth's Hunting Lodge.

Thames Path: East
Water is a great temperature regularity. So the bigger the body of water you are next to, the more temperate will be the weather. 

The biggest body of water in London is easily the expanse of the tidal Thames east of Greenwich. Follow the south bank of the Thames Path for 13.3mi all the way around to Erith (follow the barge symbol as opposed to the usual Thames Path acorn). Tip: this is a long run without refreshments or water fountains, so carry your own fluids.

Have you got your copy of the Runner's Guide to London book? 300 pages of London's best running routes. 

Julia Bleasdale calls it "a must-have guide to help you explore London's unique running playground". 

Order it here with free delivery. 

By Hayden Shearman (This post was originally published on the Get Active London blog.)

London has more green space than any other city on the planet. I learnt this the hard way when setting out to write a book about its top running spots—the book soon grew and grew because there were just so many incredible places to run. 

The following top-10 list could have included all the well-publicished central running havens (like Hyde, St James's, Regent's and Victoria Parks) and the mega parks out west (Bushy and Richmond) but chances are you already know about them and one of the things I love about running is the ability to explore new environments. So what lesser known parks should all Londoners explore?

Well, here is my top 10. I could have easily have made this list a top-40 rather than top-10, but these 10 will get you started and I'm sure make you hungry to explore more of London's hidden treasures.

Note: We've included the list below, but to read a full description of each park read the Get Active London blog. 

1. RUISLIP WOODS
Location: Ruislip (16.7mi NW of central London) 
Perimeter Distance: 9.0mi (when combined with Park, Copse, Mad Bess and Bayhurst Woods)

2. HOME PARK
Location: Kingston Upon Thames (11.8mi SW of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 5mi

3. HORNCHURCH COUNTRY PARK
Location: Hornchurch (15.8mi E of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 2.5mi

4. WIMBLEDON COMMON
Location: Wimbledon (8.1mi southwest of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 7.8mi

5. HAMPSTEAD HEATH
Location: Highgate (4.6mi N of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 8.0mi

6. GREENWICH PARK
Location: Greenwich (6.7mi SE of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 2mi (around Greenwich Park only)

7. CRYSTAL PALACE PARK
Location: Crystal Palace (7mi S of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 2.05mi

8. FRYENT COUNTRY PARK
Location: Kingsbury (9.1mi NW of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 2.3mi

9. DANSON PARK
Location: Bexleyheath (11.7mi southeast of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 2.4mi

10. QUEEN ELIZABETH OLYMPIC PARK 
Location: Stratford (5.8mi NE of central London)
Perimeter Distance: 3.6mi (following the art trail starting and finishing at Westfield) 

Hayden Shearman is the author of the new book Runner's Guide to London, which is the ultimate companion for exploring the runner's playground that is London (features over 120 London running routes and parks). www.runnersguidetolondon.co.uk

By Simon Cook // 17:00 – Southbank. Among the tourists, street-food munchers, and leisurely strollers, I spy the first of them. They look familiar yet somehow different. More purposeful, I wonder.

This trickle soon turns to a stream with the collective mass more easily carving a route through the crowd. Growing still, now a torrent. For almost an hour the Thames Path becomes swamped by trainer-clad, backpack-laden, GPS-tracked, fluorescent, sweaty, speedy people making their way home from a day at the office. 

These people are run-commuters. 

By all accounts, run-commuting is on the up: The number of people choosing their trainers over other modes of transport is increasing, media coverage is becoming more regular; political lobbying is swelling, and run-commuters are becoming more visible on the streets of our town and cities.

London, however, seems to be the centre of it all; forging the way for the rest of the world.

I am fascinated by why this is. There are no formal policies or strategies in place to explicitly encourage people to run to/from work, yet they are out there in their droves. London is also the site of Home Run London (the world’s first cycle-escort service for run-commuters) and the base for the run2work campaign (who are supported by the London Evening Standard). In many ways, London is the global trailblazer for run-commuting.

To explain why I am so fascinated by this, perhaps a little context.

I am a geographer based at Royal Holloway, University of London, researching all manner of running geographies. Currently, I am undertaking a three-year project into run-commuting and running’s potential as a transport mode.

Place is a major concept in geography and I was first posed the question of ‘why London?’ by a journalist. Ever since, I’ve been trying to come up with a satisfactory answer. It’s obviously a slippery-coming-together of many processes and qualities, but there do seem to be things in London’s make-up that especially promote run-commuting. In particular, there are a set of personal, cultural and geographical motives that I wish to suggest are important in understanding ‘why London?’.

Firstly, personal. Individuals most often take up run-commuting as a time-saving mechanism. The amount of mileage required in many training programmes can be difficult to fit into a normal week. Equally, other factors, such as having young children, may mean completing training runs in the evening is difficult or undesirable.

Run-commuting therefore allows people to harmonise the rhythms of life, work and training by utilising moments when they must travel to fit in running at the same time. Such time-constraints are exacerbated in London, with cultures of long working hours and above-average commuting durations—making run-commuting even more appealing.

Equally, run-commuters can be encouraged to take up the practice from a dislike for other transport modes. In general, London’s transport network is head and shoulders above anything else found in the country but it is certainly not without its issues. Some people much prefer the reliability, freedom and space afforded by donning their trainers over congested and temperamental public transport.

Secondly, culture. There are some broad cultural tastes that exist in London which makes run-commuting acceptable and attractive. Most obviously, there is the strong desire for a shift away from car-based transport and for people to lead healthier lifestyles.

Active commuting achieves both these aims and has witnessed a strong growth in recent years. This is most notable in cycling commuting, but all forms of active commuting help to establish a cultural environment where run-commuting can flourish. It makes lycra and sweaty bodies acceptable in the workplace, and has also encouraged the installation of many facilities (showers, lockers etc.) in workplaces that run-commuters require and can benefit from.

Lastly, geography. Urban form has a large role to play in creating runnable cities and dense urban areas offer the most enticing spaces for run-commuting. Central London’s density means that destinations are often not too distant from one another and can be traversed by running; and the street layout can allow for many (and sometimes quicker) routes to be carved through it.

Contrastingly, regular congestion makes road-based traffic slow and tedious; and subterranean transport is often hot, hurried, and squished. Under these conditions, run-commuting can be quite appealing.

Add into the mix the transport patterns that already exist in London, and reasons why it is such a hotbed for run-commuting become apparent. Huge swathes of London’s workforce arrive at one of London’s eight mainline train stations with the need to complete the last leg of their journey. The average distance to any Zone 1 train station from these is just 2.3 miles—a very runnable distance.

So next time you spot a trainer-clad, backpack-laden, GPS-tracked, fluorescent, sweaty, speedy person making their way home from a day at the office, applaud them and the city for being at the forefront of a global movement.