Treadmill usage

pairofpears

Do many people use treadmills in the winter months? My wife is on about getting one but obviously they dont come cheap for a half decent one. I cycle and have a smart trainer that I use for 3-4 months during winter in the evenings and I know of plenty of other cyclists that use trainers. Unfortunately I dont know too many runners so cant ask them.

She would be running 5, 10km and half marathons and wants to work up to a full marathon. Would the treadmill be of use for her for pacing or would she be as well to suffer the weather and run on the local roads with lights etc.?

TFBubendorfer

I much prefer running on the road rather than the treadmill, so mine isn't seeing an awful lot of use. Having said that, if I were female I am 100% I would use it a lot more, especially during Winter, because I'm sure I would not feel comfortable running alone in the dark.

Treadmill can be great for workouts but I find pace just feels different than on the road - it always feels harder on the treadmill, even if the HR might say otherwise. I'm sure the difference is all in my head.

Signing up for a service like Zwift is a complete game changer, though. I would not even consider using a treadmill without any more. Before Zwift, my longest ever treadmill run was 45 minutes and that felt like forever. Since Zwift, I have run anything up to a full marathon on the treadmill (still prefer the road, though). If she wants to run a marathon, she still needs to run a decent amount of miles on the road but the treadmill can be a good additional training tool.

6run28

I really push myself to run in daylight in winter no matter the weather just to get that fresh air. Usually lunch time. But sure the treadmill is better than not running, especially if you would be sitting watching tv anyway.

echancrure

I find the treadmill most useful when you start playing with the incline. You can really have a great workout in 30' with incline intervals. It is also much softer than the road.

BeepBeep67

I do about 1/3 of my running on a treadmill.

It's a useful tool for;

1) Recovery miles, easy to set the desired effort, my hrm connects to the display.

2) Paced runs when the conditions outside could compromise the quality of the session (wind, ice, etc).

3) Easy runs when I'm busy or potentially need to respond to something for work.

4) Carrying a niggle, easier to step off the treadmill than shuffle home from 2-3 miles up the road.

Kander

Same as BeepBeep in how I use my treadmill. More leaning towards recovery & easy sessions

You'll know this from using a bike training but the set up will help the motivation to use it more. A good set of fans along with a laptop to put netflix makes the work of difference for me. Gone through so many series & films at this point it's great.

robinph

Our treadmill has had intermittent periods of good usage over the years. I'd much rather be running outside, and find that far easier and more productive, but my current treadmill usage is actually a couple of times a week at the gym whilst the kid is doing some other activity and I just can't be bothered to leave the building so use their equipment instead.

Over the years the treadmill at home has been used during isolation, when I was wanting to watch some telly instead of listen to podcasts or watch some live sport at the same time, or the other half hopping on for a few minutes whilst I fetch the kid from school or something but without needing to go through the extra faff to head outside.

Unfortunately the treadmill is currently out of action because the dog has chewed through the cables for a second time and I've not yet got round to seeing if there is enough left for me to attempt to patch it together again. :(

Zwift if certainly worth setting up. It's nowhere near as good as the cycling version, even though it's the same app and functions. It just isn't the same "game" for running as for cycling because you just can't interact with it in the same way...but it's still worth having a play with, and it's free for running.