Hitting the pavement: A guide for new runners

2025 UTHealth Houston Half Marathon and 10K (Photo by Seth Gibson/ UTHealth Houston)

Welcome to “Ask the Expert,” a UTHealth Houston news series where our leading experts examine pressing health challenges. In this edition, we address the best ways for those inspired by marathon runners to lace up and hit the ground running.  

Are you feeling inspired by the runners who participated in the UTHealth Houston Half Marathon and 10K? With the right tools, you’ll be a pro in no time.  

Whether you’re training for a race, building endurance, or simply trying to run more consistently, these are a few tips to keep in mind. 

How can new runners build a consistent running schedule? 

Start with a schedule you can realistically repeat. Three consistent days of running every week is more useful than running six days in one week, getting exhausted or injured, and barely running the next two. 

I like to think about training in terms of easy, hard, and long rather than simply counting workouts. A developing runner might have two comfortable runs and one gradually increasing longer run each week. As experience and fitness improve, another running day or a structured faster workout can be added. 

Try to avoid stacking your hardest sessions together. A long run, speed workout, and demanding lower-body strength session all create training stress, even though they are different activities. Give your body an opportunity to recover between sessions. 

Most importantly, pay attention to trends rather than a single workout. Some soreness and fatigue are normal during training. Pain that progressively worsens, changes your running mechanics, or doesn't improve with recovery deserves more attention. Adjusting one workout or taking an extra recovery day is much better than losing several weeks because you tried to run through an evolving injury. 

How can runners improve endurance? 

One of the most important lessons in endurance training is that not every run should be hard. In fact, much of your running should be a comfortable effort. 

Those easier miles allow you to accumulate training volume and develop your aerobic system without creating excessive fatigue. As your fitness improves, you can layer in a smaller amount of purposeful higher-intensity work, such as tempo running, intervals, or hills, and gradually extend your weekly long run.  

Rehal Bhojani, MD, associate professor in the Department of Orthopedic Surgery at UTHealth Houston (Photo by Bradley Driver/UTHealth Houston)

I also encourage runners not to think of running as their only form of training. Strength training is an important complement to endurance work. Developing strength in the hips, legs, calves, and trunk can improve running performance and prepare your body to repeatedly absorb and produce force over thousands of strides. During the non-training part, this strength training should be used to build power and get gains. During the training part, this should be done one to two days a week without much change in your strength loads to maintain existing strength.  

Sleep, adequate nutrition, and appropriate rest between demanding workouts are also part of training. Fitness develops from the combination of training plus recovery, not simply from accumulating as many miles as possible. 

What are the best ways to prepare for a half or full marathon? 

Start by assessing where you are today. If you haven’t been running consistently, your first goal shouldn’t be pace—it should be gradually building the ability to run or using a run-walk strategy, consistently and comfortably. You do not have to be a pro to start running, but your training plan should match your current fitness rather than where you hope to be. 

For a half marathon, I generally like runners to give themselves at least 10 to 12 weeks of structured training, and longer if they are new to running. A full marathon typically requires 16 to 20 weeks or more, depending on your running experience. 

The biggest mistake I see is trying to make up for lost time by increasing mileage too quickly. Your cardiovascular fitness can improve relatively quickly, but your muscles, tendons, and bones also need time to adapt to the repeated load of running. Consistency is much more valuable than one heroic training week. 

Rehal Bhojani, MD, is an associate professor in the Department of Orthopedic Surgery and in the Department of Family and Community Medicine at McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston, Zlotnik Family Professor in Sports Medicine, and the director of the Sports Medicine Fellowship.  

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