How to start

Question
Hi, My name is Shawn. I live in the desert. I've only run when i needed to. It kills me lol. How do you start a running program. i have heard to walk then when you've built up then start jogging. I'm mainly a weight lifter. It would be great if you could give me a good start point. Thank you.

Answer
Shawn,
You can start with walking & jogging intervals, such as walking for 4 minutes, then jogging for 1 minute, doing that 5-6 times for a workout.  Over the course of a few workouts, you can add more jogging time (1.5 to 2 minutes) and decrease the walking times (3-3.5 minutes).  You can also just go by 'feel', and walk as long as you feel you need to, then jog for what you can handle.  Over time, you will feel the need to jog for longer times and walk for less times.  Don't try to get caught up in the 'miles trap', which is what I call it, when people aim for a set number of miles to run each day and they do that for such a long duration of time, they end up falling into a trap of staleness and boredom, and most likely, no progress, either.  (example: a person who says "I"m going to run 2 miles a day, 4 days a week", and do that for 4-5 months straight, and they don't go anywhere in their fitness improvements)

I hope this helps you well,
Rick Karboviak