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1 week ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
I’ve been coaching beginner runners for 12 years and I still find it really rewarding. This month I’ve started coaching a new group of beginner at my running club and the nicer weather has had lots of them turning up each week. It’s a great time to start running. Whether it’s someone close to you or someone you’ve just met, helping someone go from non-runner to doing their first 5k is an amazing thing to do.
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1 week ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
I ran my first marathon back in 2010, aged 28. The following year, I ran another - and throughout my 30s, I completed a flurry of 26.2-mile races. Now in my 40s, with three more marathons under my belt since turning the big 4-0, it seems I’m far from done with the distance.
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2 weeks ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
I’ve lost count of the amount of times I thought about calling Trading Standards because something arrived through my letter box proclaiming to be a bra when it clearly wasn’t. There are different types of sports bras - some have cups, others don’t, some have adjustable straps, others don’t, some use compression to keep everything from jiggling and others support in a different way. What works for me might not be what you prefer to run in.
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2 weeks ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
Last year I wrote a post on embracing failure which dealt more with the emotional side of not succeeding at something. But what do you actually do in practical terms when a race doesn’t go to plan or happen at all? Let’s discuss. In a world that often asks us to put on a brave face, I implore you to sit with your feelings for a bit. Have a big old cry if you want to.
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3 weeks ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
This piece was requested by a couple of readers. I’m not a dietitian, so this is based on my own experience and the research I did before taking creatine. I started taking creatine last year in the run up to my Hyrox and reading an article in the Guardian on the possible benefits. I’ve seen enough things heralded as miracle supplements over the years that my attitude wasn’t totally optimistic, but I went in with a ‘well, it’s worth a go’ approach.
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1 month ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
More years ago than I care to count, I trained for my Personal Training certificate. On the course were two brothers who I sat near in the classroom parts of the course. Every 90 minutes an alarm would sound on their watches and they’d take out a lunchbox containing precisely measured out portions of chicken breast or boiled eggs. They explained to me that they were on an intense training (and eating) schedule and had to make sure they got enough protein in throughout the day.
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1 month ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
Marathon kit selection is important. You want to wear clothes that work for you technically and emotionally, as well as items that look good and give you confidence. For some runners, wearing leggings is a non-negotiable, whatever the weather because they feel most confident in them. Some runners will be wearing a charity top or a their running club vest and this will give them an emotional boost.
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1 month ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
In the week before the London Marathon we had several weather warnings from the race organisers telling us it was going to be hot and that we should adjust our race plans. “It will be fine” I told myself “I run well in the heat”. I had run my marathon PB at a particularly warm Edinburgh, and I had an early start wave for London, so I wasn’t too worried. I did, however, adjust my expectations of the day.
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1 month ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen that I recently spent a weekend turning my garage into a ‘gym’. I painted the walls to make it a bit brighter, put in some gym flooring I was given and cleared out a load of old tat that had been taking up space. That third point was key and the one that cost zero money: clearing out things that we no longer needed that were taking up space and making it difficult or less appealing to workout in the garage.
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1 month ago | 
lazygirlrunning.substack.com | Laura Fountain
For the past year I have been the Reviews Editor for Women’s Running magazine, which means that I pick and choose the kit that we review each issue, get it to the reviewers and compile all the reviews. Before this I reviewed kit for the magazine and website and was part of The Run Testers doing shoe reviews on YouTube.