Treadmill running: ways to make it more enjoyable? Easier? Technique?

headphones and music. It is almost impossible to run on the treadmill without having background sounds canceled out .

The constant sound of hearing each foot hit the belt is bothersome, as well as conversations and noise in the background.

There must be music and headphones, and I can endure 1 hour of treadmill running, which is what I do 2 times out of the week for my mileage , just to run on a softer leveled surface.

Got those northeast winter blues wrote:

As much as I hate it

Winter is coming...here in New England...

That means ice snow and treadmills.

How to make it easier?

More enjoyable?

Technique?

Looking for ideas

Ty

I live in WI and have your same problem. I need to do a lot of my winter training on the treadmill due to snow and ice making it virtually impossible to do any quality workouts outside. I usually run Boston in the spring, so quality training over the winter is an absolute must. I mounted a 42" TV in front of my treadmill. My wife likes to watch Netflix, but I prefer to watch videos of trails or race courses because it makes you feel like you're running outside and I forget that I'm running in my sun room and not moving. I've bought a GoPro and filmed a bunch of the roads and trails that I normally run and watch them on MP4 on my TV (throw them on a USB stick).

The best thing I've come across though are these videos:

Outside Interactive makes software that will automatically adjust the pace of the course video based on a foot pod that you wear, BUT... they sell all of their race course videos very cheap and you don't need the software. I buy their videos and convert them to MP4 using a tool like Handbrake, and adjust the speed of them when I convert them. They film all of their race courses at 10 MPM so it can be a bit brutal to watch them at regular speed, but if you adjust them to say 7 MPM when converting to MP4, they are great. Of particular note are the 4 part Boston Marathon course videos. I've converted them and strung them together into a single MP4 and the video plays at 2:30 marathon pace. I really like to do 2-2.5 hour long runs on the treadmill and watch the Boston course the entire time. If you don't know the Boston course and will be running, it is a great way to learn the in's and out's of the course. There are a bunch of other videos for high profile races, like Peachtree, Beach to Beacon, Cherry Blossom 10mi, etc.

Hacking up phlegm for months wrote:

My BETTER advice would be to run where you can enjoy it the most and get the best workout. If that's in 2 foot of snow or inside on a treadmill or track makes no difference.

This 100%.

I always run to high tempo music on a treadmill. My usual workout is to run 200s with 100m walk recoveries. Sometimes, I run 100s with 50m walks. I also like to run Viren Sprints, i.e. sprint the straights and walk the turns. Here are 4 good books on treadmill running: 1. Treadmill Training for Runners, 2. Treadmill Training and Workout Guide, Alberto Salazar, 3. Treadmill Workouts, Amy Beatty, and 4. The Ultimate Treadmill Workout,Siik.

Gym butts.

Got those northeast winter blues wrote:

As much as I hate it

Winter is coming...here in New England...

That means ice snow and treadmills.

How to make it easier?

More enjoyable?

Technique?

Looking for ideas

Ty

* Use it for harder workouts, not easy runs

* Negative split everything.. for mile repeats, I start slower than normal and increase 0.1 mph every 1/4 mile and increase a little each rep too. For tempos, start out slower and increase every 1/4, 1/2, or 1 mile

* If you're new to treadmill workouts, forget about equating treadmill pace to real outdoor pace. My treadmill workouts were embarrassingly bad at first but started to look more like my real workouts after some time, now I prefer it during the winter

I know it’s probably considered junk training but I find that only doing 2 mile tempo runs every other day on a treadmill can break the monotony. Try to set a 2 mile or mile treadmill PR, can be quite fun. Everyone in the gym will either think your hard core or psycho

If you can watch sport on TV it can help alleviate some of the boredom on an easy treadmill run, but I find it hard to concentrate on anything once I pick up the pace.

One benefit of treadmill running is you can often position yourself near a mirror so you can analyse your form at different speeds - not all of us has a coach filming us from a car driving alongside us!

That's both fascinating and kind of sad.

I like to watch Japanese Anime on my phone using netflix.

They are each about 20mn, sometimes I even make the workout longer to watch the next episode.

In any case, anyone can get used to indoor threadmill.

I also think it is easier to recover from a threadmill workout during summer.

I like to listen to music and every time the song changes increase the speed .1. Makes for a nice progression run.

My personal treadmill is in my basement, so I set up a mirror across from me and then run shirtless. The sweat coming off me motivates me to keep going.

When I am using a treadmill that isn't my own, I put my phone on Flotrack/ Milesplit videos and keep it right in front of me.

I also progress in my runs at different intervals, sometimes the mileage, others the time, and just to mix it up sometimes, even the calories burned counter.

Youtube has a lot of virtual treadmill runs that are really nice you can find runs from all over the world. In 4k or 1080p

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_K_EHDaSew&t=2641s