Mastering Run-Walk Method: Tips and Techniques for using the method created and popularized by Jeff Galloway

Hello, friend,

We are excited to welcome you to the Quick Bytes bRUNch table to chat about our experience with the popular run-walk-run method of running created by Olympian Jeff Galloway.

We referenced his incredibly resource-heavy website, and you can visit it here:
www.jeffgalloway.com

We want to hear from you! Do you use the run-walk-run method? Are you on the fence?

You can find us on Instagram or email us at info@timeforbrunch.com 

Transcript

Shelby (00:01.378)
Hey friends, Coach Shelby and Coach Christine welcoming you in and letting you know it's time for brunch Quick Bites edition where you can grab your miles with a side of smiles, take them on the run midday, in the afternoon, or a late night snack attack, which we kind of did last night, but that's a story for another day. Speaking of grabbing your miles, we are going to dive deep into a running structure that is near and dear to both of our hearts.

makes the waves all the way from the big races to the small races. That's right. We are talking about run, walk, or run, walk, run. You could tell it maybe is the Galloway method, or I guess in the UK they call it Jeffing, which I would much rather call it Jeffing. I don't know about you, Christine, but that seems a lot more fun.

Christine (00:52.105)
I think I've called it both. Actually, when I was training for London, I had leaned into the community over in the UK, so that's where I first came across that terminology. Um, and they get really into it, making their jerseys or their kits as we kind of chatted a little bit with our London episode, how there's quite a few different variations of running and moving and grooving, but friends, however you're moving and grooving here, we're going to go ahead and have an unstructured opportunity for you to get that. That little bit of energy pep in your step.

But if you're folding laundry or doing things around the house and you've got your, or maybe even grocery shopping, that's all good. We are definitely going to talk about Run, Walk, Run. And I think first we should like take it all the way back coach. So you want to give us a little bit of history and maybe even give us a little bit of information about the man, the myth, the legend himself, who, who's really popularized this and created the certification process. And he's quite a celebrity in the run Disney crew.

Shelby (01:48.374)
Oh yes, I will admit I kind of fangirled a little bit seeing him in person for the first time, just because I feel like even like when we had our meetups with the soulmates as well as our brunchers, being able to actually meet somebody in person and realize they are in fact like a real person and not AI technology, I think it's very cool. But so yeah, so Run, Walk, Run as it's formally, I guess called was founded by Jeff Galloway

Christine (01:51.241)
Hehehehe

Christine (02:06.857)
Mm-hmm.

Shelby (02:18.134)
I didn't realize that it actually happened by accident. He started it because he was running his specialty running shop, and he was asked if he wanted to do a group four beginner runners. So he knew, we know as coaches, the best way to start running is to primarily walk and then put in sprouts of running. It helps from a mental standpoint, a physical standpoint.

And so he did this. And as his graduation at the end of the group, he had them do either 5K or 10K. And he found that most of them still did the same run walk structuring that they had done throughout. And he also realized not one of the runners was injured. And he knew and credited that to the walking. So over the years, it evolved.

applied more science to it and basically that's how Run-Walk was birthed. And it was birthed. I mean, I mean, I could go more graphic, but I'm trying to keep this, you know, light for the stomachs.

Christine (03:21.961)
was birthed.

Christine (03:26.281)
So Jeff Galloway is an Olympian and he has made his entire life and love for really actually titled America's Coach, really making this sport something that people can go the distance with and do it in a way that's safely. And he has, I mean, he's got a huge following, so he's written in quite a few books. He's...

Luckily had the opportunity to actually coach with him. He's just an incredible human being him and Barb, but I remember my first time running with him was actually at a local race and I was not a run Walker at that point, but I was kind of getting to the point of my running where it had hit a slump and I was starting to have diminishing returns after my workouts. And I went into a race unprepared. Ha ha ha. Like that's never happened since then. But he.

Shelby (04:20.801)
Mm hmm. Yeah. The maniacal laugh that accompanied that. We just have to put that on a laugh track from now on.

Christine (04:22.217)
Yeah, I know. Oh my goodness. Uh, so let, I came across him actually on the course. It's a local course here and he was the go-to person. I remember seeing him actually at the convention or the expo leading up to it thinking, I don't know who this person is. So, you know, I've kind of heard the name, but I really don't know much about it. But long story short, going around this

Christine (04:52.297)
absolute emoji poo. And I come across him and his wife, Barb, and I decide, Oh, whatever they're doing, they look amazing. And they're super sprightly. They're super got a pep in their step. I'm just going to hang out with them and chit chat with them. So in chit chatting with them and hanging in with them, I realized that it felt really good. I felt really strong and it really actually turned around, which I think could have been a really, really

unenjoyable experience into quite pleasant. And I felt great afterwards. So that's kind of like, that was my first time actually employing run walk. My first time actually seeing it was also on another course where I kept leapfrogging with an individual who was doing run walk and I was running and I was so annoyed coach because I was like, why is this individual walking and still able to surpass me? And they did actually surpass me towards the end of that race.

Shelby (05:36.119)
Hahaha.

Christine (05:44.937)
And again, another opportunity where when I was done with that race, I felt like absolute poo and they're like hanging out at the finisher's tent, drinking beer, eating pancakes, enjoying their best life. So I think it was those two situations that really helped to turn the key for me to understand that Run, Walk, Run is such an incredible opportunity for you to actually train, train consistently, not have those sideline injuries and really still put in some really great efforts.

I'm going to get into some more, like I can geek out about this as true, like in different ways as to like physiologically. I think it's like also shows if you have any kind of like thyroid issues or you have issues with your body already producing a spiking, a lot of cortisol, run, walk, run can help you in minimizing those issues and kind of balancing your hormones, which can help in terms of if anybody has any of those issues where they run, run, run hard all the time and they like are putting on a lot of weight or they're not feeling good about.

like they're like maybe bloating or holding on to a lot of stress. It's probably because they're spiking too much cortisol and run walk helps to diminish that as well. So I, I'm not going to geek out about all that. I, I couldn't help it. It's just, there's so many great ways not to mention the heart rate benefit that you get from run rock one. So over all, those are my personal experiences. Those are also my experiences of working with people with run, walk, run, but I'm curious some of your favorite run walk benefits.

Shelby (06:51.934)
You just, yo, you're not gonna geek out? What was that? You just scienced all over us.

Shelby (07:12.110)
So we had talked about this a little bit in our Run Disney recap to where I love Run Walk. I haven't utilized it as much. But getting back into my running, building that consistency, I was craving going further. But I could feel that it was having adverse effects on my body, my running. I was pushing too hard. But I.

I have always say I choose distance over speed, all day, every day. For me, that fills my cup. And in preparation for springtime surprise, I was like, all right, run walks my way to go. And I've always known the benefits, but it's one of those to where you can talk about the benefits, but then when you have it click, it truly is magical. And how you described feeling so fresh after the race.

There is no way, and I will say, there was no way I would have finished springtime surprise and the three day challenge if I had not done run walk. Because not only did it keep my legs fresh and turning over, my heart rate was not getting so elevated. And I'm really excited to use it during summer, especially, because it gets hot here. Even the other night, I had went out to do three miles.

I was gonna get a nice quicker run in and I started out and my legs felt heavy. It was humid as all get out. It was hot. I just was done. And without run walk, I probably would have turned home. In all honesty, I probably would have just gone back and be like, all right, not my day, not feeling it, whatever. And instead I pulled out the run walk. I did the 60 seconds running 30 second walk and it was still

a really tough run. It was a grind. I even think I posted on social media about it and said it was a grind, but it felt so good to run. And again, I know we talked about it, but breaking down the stigma on RunWalk, because I feel like most people hear RunWalk and just zone out because it has that negative connotation of, oh, you're not running the whole thing. Well, I'm here to say who the F cares.

Like I'd rather get my miles in and feel good.

Christine (09:39.113)
So I do want to talk about that because I think that let's be frank. There's no doubt that we ourselves there, you have to admit that at some point you had stigma against run walk. I know I did. That's why I fought it. Like that specific race where I was getting leapfrogged with this run Walker and I was super irritated because somewhere along the way conditioning had come into my brain that for you to consider yourself a runner, you should run the entire thing.

Shelby (09:53.294)
Oh yeah, I admit it.

Christine (10:07.849)
And it wasn't really until they surpassed me and at that finish line that it started to seep in like, maybe there's something to it. And I still didn't start using it at that point. I still had a certain amount of just concern that I would be looking back at terms of like kind of turning back my progress by going into Runwalk. So that was a big concern of mine. And I think it's because from a lot of us that came to running, a lot of us came to running from a traditional couch to 5k program.

Shelby (10:15.895)
Yeah.

Shelby (10:28.822)
Yes.

Christine (10:36.681)
I love the catch the 5k program. I credit it for being right here right now, talking to you coach. If it wasn't for the catch to 5k, it really helped me to break up really small segments of running and walking to get to that point where I could run. So in run consistently, which is really what it's all about. But I think there are a lot of us that come to it, start to see like every week you diminish the amount of walking, you diminish the amount of walking. So once you finally get to that point where you're running nonstop.

And you first start thinking of going back to Renwalk. There's a little bit of that hesitation of am I actually turning back my progress instead of moving forward? So how did you really work on getting past that yourself? For me, it was actually putting it into place. And like you said, for me here in Florida summers, and I know a lot of you guys are rolling your eyes and you.

Shelby (11:13.931)
Right.

Christine (11:29.769)
are thinking one, you guys don't know how easy you have it down there in Florida, or two, you're saying it gets really hot and humid in your side of the world. I am respectfully going to tell you, come join us for a run in July or August, my friends.

Shelby (11:42.210)
It's like us saying it's cold during the winter. We honestly know that are cold, but we get the bill for all of our beautiful weather. We get the bill in summer and it is danger. I am not even exaggerating. It is dangerously hot and extreme conditions to where if you do not take care of yourself, you will have adverse reactions and you could very well wind up in a very bad situation.

Christine (11:45.609)
We have no clue. Yes.

Christine (12:07.145)
Yeah, I've called summer training my triathlon training because your body is actually working at filtering out all of that, like humidity that's actually your lungs are processing water at the same time and trying to process oxygen. So again, we're not going to turn this all about us necessarily, but I am curious as to what turns the key for you as to like, okay, this is actually valid and it's not valid in the terms of I'm only going to use this.

Shelby (12:13.294)
I'm sorry.

Christine (12:33.001)
temporarily, this is something that can actually really go the distance, can help me with consistency, help me with the long run of doing it. And that's mentioned as Jeff Galloway so often says his plan is to run until his last breath and he feels like this is exactly how you do it. So

Shelby (12:49.954)
which I don't disagree with. I, again, I think for me, the single, if I had to pick one single, which you know, guys, that's totally our strong suit is picking something. When I realized that I was actually a hair faster doing the run walk than when I was trying to straight through run. Cause it was one of those things I had that moment of, why am I drilling myself into a hole?

Christine (12:59.913)
Hahaha

Christine (13:07.017)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Christine (13:12.681)
Yeah.

Shelby (13:19.530)
and feeling like a mojapoo after the fact, when I'm getting at least the same, if not slightly better results doing run walk. And that's when it's like, I had to break down and we talk a lot about ego, that's where the ego had to let go. And it's like, who cares? Who cares? And I realized how much I was holding on to the reception of what others would think, like you said, kind of that imposter syndrome of what would other people think.

Christine (13:27.785)
Yeah.

Christine (13:39.561)
Absolutely, absolutely.

Shelby (13:49.694)
And it's like, well, they're not the ones doing it.

Christine (13:51.529)
So I also think we are very lucky. And I was talking about this with an athlete who's having issues with switching over to the run walk. Here in Florida, because of the weather in the summer, a majority of run groups do employ run walk run. They may not do it year round, but very often you will find at least a portion of the group who includes it. I know I can't think of any of my local run groups who do not have a portion of the group who follows the Galloway method.

I think that there's other locations throughout the US where they're more hesitant. And so because they're the only ones using an interval timer, they're the only ones pausing for walks, they may have a little bit more of that stigma attached to it. So I think we're here to say, if you can't at all look at like the fact that this person's not going to whoever's driving past you or whoever's possibly passing judgment right then and there, they're not the ones that have to live the rest of your life.

If you have more energy to go through the rest of your day, if you feel a little extra pep in your step, you're actually able to see your numbers start coming back in terms of your performance consistency or your performance actually improving. Because there's no doubt that this does help with performance improvement once you're getting to that point. If you're over training or you're having diminishing returns. So there's just so much value that I would love to challenge people to give it at least, I would say at least 30 days, just to see how they feel.

Shelby (14:49.323)
Right?

Shelby (15:06.983)
Oh yeah.

Christine (15:17.801)
And to actually keep a log of how am I feeling? Am I feeling a little extra pep in my step? Am I feeling my, I'm getting a little stronger, a little, maybe not necessarily faster at that point yet, but maybe like you said, even seeing like a run or two feeling really good and actually coming back with a stronger pace.

Shelby (15:36.674)
And seriously, the mental, let's strip away the physical benefits for just a split second. The mental training you actually have to employ in RunWalk, I think

Shelby (15:52.130)
Dare I say, I think it almost even edges out, like full distance running, because you are literally having to keep picking yourself back up. Because it's one of those things you can bargain with yourself to stay in motion, but it's a lot harder to bargain with yourself to go from that power walk back into a run. It's conscious decisions every 30 seconds to keep going.

Christine (16:18.665)
So I do, I do agree that mental training is no doubt about it. And that is something that I would definitely say to you strongly, let's start talking about a few best practices because that's what's going to be so hard for us. There's, we are going to wax poetic about how much we both love this specific style of running, but there are some best practices to use where I'm just going to straight up say friends go to the Jeff Galloway.com website. If you haven't already, talk about a resource rich website. I mean, he is,

Shelby (16:32.907)
Hehehe

Christine (16:46.377)
Definitely the type of individual who does not believe in holding the secret sauce ingredients of what he does. So if you were to just go to his website and look under learn his blog, his categories, there's just so much information. I mean, that spans the, he is also, I think I could call him a fellow nerd. So he loves the different aspects of the science behind it and the physiological.

Shelby (17:09.142)
hahahaha

Christine (17:13.192)
adaptations that we get. So there's so much great stuff about it there. But also if you're already on the fence, he's going to likely suggest that you look at a magic mile, which you could find also in his website. And it has a really fancy little calculator where you plug in your current mile time. And it'll suggest at that point what your run walk run ratio should be. And you kind of already touched on that. You did a 60 30, which means you ran for 60 seconds. You walked for 30 seconds.

not everyone's going to have a 60-30. It could range all the way from 15-30s, where you'll run for 15 seconds, maybe even 10 seconds, and then walk for 30 seconds. There's also the opportunities when you start looking at maybe running for five minutes, instead of having a five minute run and a 30 second break, that he'll kind of start to give you options of doing shorter segments of walking.

Um, so 15, 20 seconds, 30 seconds. I think for a lot of us, the 30 second recovery seems to be a bit of a sweet point. He has come to the conclusion that that's the longest that you should do is the 30 seconds because of all of the, the. Hesitancy for your body to actually move back into a run segment for after you wait longer than 30 seconds, which I have totally found for myself. If I give myself a minute, it's virtually impossible for me to get moving again.

Shelby (18:40.854)
Well, and I'm gonna jump in here because I have had athletes before that we have done a one minute walk. So there are always exceptions and this might not fall in line exactly with the Galloway method to the T. But if I have somebody, I had an athlete coming back from surgery and injury to where that one minute was more needed to kind of fully assess and everything. So it's not hard and fast. So.

Christine (19:04.105)
Mm-hmm.

Shelby (19:09.066)
Like we always say, it depends, but we're gonna say for the general masses, the general guideline, that 30 seconds is gonna be the sweet spot because remembering with this run walk, we're saying walk, but this isn't just a stroll walk. This is a power walk. And I would honestly say it's the one time I actually wanted to fight you during a race because listen guys, her power walk, again, she has about what, five inches on me.

Her power walk, I'm like basically I should have just ran because my little legs could not keep up with her power walk. She walks it like it's hot.

Christine (19:47.561)
That is another reason though. Well, I will say that I love, love, love the pacing groups. But if you're not used to training your walks at a higher clip, the pacing groups can be a little intimidating because they do keep those pacing groups. I always, I literally liken it to my first time going to New York City, being a Florida girl my entire life. It was the first time that I was literally scared to stop moving or I would get runt over. And I, as you use the word runt over.

Shelby (20:14.850)
Runt.

Christine (20:16.297)
because people are hustling, they're moving, they're on the go. So what I would suggest is to employ a little bit of that New Yorker, you're trying to get to the subway in time, you're trying to get to the bagel shop in time, whatever the case may be, you're hustling in those, whatever the walk breaks are. Coach, I am gonna bring it back a little bit back to what you just said. You're right, there is no hard and fast rule with anything. And wholeheartedly agree, maybe you're still at the point in your, maybe coming back from injury, or you're still a bit newer, and you want to have

a longer walk and then start popping in those times of running. Absolutely. But I'm going to suggest friends that if you're doing four minute runs and then doing a minute or a minute 30 walks that you consider shortening your run time. So you can also shorten your walking time and seeing that it's going to likely even out. There's also a couple other best practices that he's going to have you suggest and you could see it on his website, which is

utilizing cadence drills and acceleration gliders, which we're big fans of, of using with our private athletes. But again, friends checking those out to help you with smoothing that process through transitioning from your run walk and back up from your walk to your run.

Shelby (21:24.306)
And that's a good point about shortening the running segments, just because you can run for four minutes or five minutes or what have you. Using the run walk isn't to run until a point of pure exhaustion to take that walk break. Think of it like filling up a glass. You're going to fill it up, you're going to drain it a little bit. You're going to fill it up, you're going to drain a little bit. You're not going to fill it all the way to the brim and then try to drain it out in 30 seconds. It's just not going to happen.

So this is something to build upon, not get to that max heart rate and then be like, oh, I'm gonna take a 30 second walk and recover. It's not gonna happen. The 30 seconds is not gonna be enough for that. And it's gonna be the equivalent of digging yourself into the hole. So really paying attention to shortening that run interval. So you're feeling good. Like you could go more, but you're taking that walk break and then.

Shelby (22:23.594)
Basically reduce, reuse, recycle.

Christine (22:25.929)
I love that. So a couple more things about that as well, friends with it is give yourself at least 30 days. See how you feel over all over the course of those 30 days. Be really honest with yourself. If you can check your ego at the door, leave it behind with any of that self-doubt and see how you feel about it. But I'm also going to suggest that in coach, you use your Garmin. So you connect your Garmin to it. I love the, okay. I love the old school.

Shelby (22:49.910)
I do, I set intervals.

Christine (22:53.161)
pager beeper that's, um, it's a gym boss interval timer that you can actually pick one up from his store as well. Or you can pick it up from Amazon. I like it if you're going to be training for longer distances and races where you don't want to drain your watch capabilities or your phone capabilities. But again, it could just be cause I'm, I like the old school pager. I remember those days actually paging people. So really it feels it. Okay.

Shelby (23:16.638)
I remember Pagers, I'm not that young.

Shelby (23:20.886)
Pagers, my mom had a pager, we had the big old block phone. I still remember pay phones, okay? It's not a novelty for me, that was my childhood. Thank you very much.

Christine (23:30.281)
Well, friends, I'm also going to suggest, and I'm glad that you segued that perfectly, if you've been running for some time and you are starting to notice that your body's not reacting as well to your running because it's a little harder for it to warm up, this is where the run walk really comes into play that I feel has made a big game changer for me to get out the door and stay consistent as I've gotten older, but also being more conservative with my run walks.

I very rarely will start my run walks with a two minute 30 or three 30 or whatever the case may be. I usually start with a 30 30. It really is a sweet spot to help me warm up both mentally and physically. I can do the drills within that first mile and a half and then I can smooth into some of the other interval paces. I will say I'm going to be honest friends. If you're using a treadmill, this can be a bit more challenging.

Shelby (24:28.553)
Mm-hmm.

Christine (24:28.585)
And there's a couple of suggestions that I've heard Jeff suggest with how to do those best and kind of control that treadmill. There's some treadmills that react a bit easier to those pace changes. But overall, I would definitely give this a try if you can outdoors a couple times just to see how you feel if you're an outdoor runner versus trying it on the treadmill for the first time out.

Shelby (24:51.998)
Yeah, and if you need extra help or have other questions, again, always feel free. Even if you aren't in our training group or one of our women athletes, we're definitely not not holding back our knowledge. So make sure if you have questions, you can DM us on Instagram or Facebook or email us info at time for brunch dot com. Our doors and our table are always open. Again, above all else, we want to make sure everybody's running safely, running fun. And.

I'm going to piggyback on it again. If you are, even if you physically feel fine, but your love for running is taking a little bit of a hit, give Run Walk a try. Again, 30 days, it's made such a difference. I'm happy to say Running and I have worked through our couples therapy and we're on a good path. I think we're going to make it, folks. I think we're going to make it.

Christine (25:42.537)
I'm sure you guys will make it. Well, friends, thank you so much for joining us. You're going to want to tune into our long run episode that drops on Friday. Time for brunch. We've got quite a bit of fun in store and I know it's, it's, but I feel like this one actually put a big smile on my face when we first started talking about it. So I'm super excited about it.

Shelby (25:56.782)
When do we not?

Shelby (26:02.466)
Hehehehe

Christine (26:05.225)
And friends, let us know what you think about this new day switch, because of course, it's just been a few weeks where you've been dropping it on Fridays. We've heard some good reception so far about it, but if you have some thoughts, we'd love to hear as well. So you're always welcome to reach out to us at info at timeforbrunch.com. Come join our community group or follow us on Instagram. And then until then, we're going to see you again, because regardless of when or where, we're going to be serving up more miles with...

Shelby (26:32.989)
aside of run, walk, smile.