The benefits of running with a friend

A lot of people have a training buddy, but what are the benefits?

The extra mile

There’s no doubt about it, running with a friend can significantly boost your motivation and willingness to put in that little bit more effort whether that be running a little faster or adding an extra mile or two. These benefits are well known, and unless you’ve never run with anyone before you’ll know this already.

Technique

If you run with a friend one thing you can do is look at each other’s technique. If they know that their left arm tends to swing wide, run behind them for a little while and let them know if it’s happening. Equally if you know you end up leaning too far forward or hunching your shoulders, ask them to check your position and give you a gentle nudge when needed.

This way you both benefit from an outside perspective and a little bit of coaching, as well as the subconscious adjustments you’ll make to your own technique (think how we open our mouth when feeding a baby, or when someone mentions the word posture near you and you instantly stand a bit taller).

Different routes and sessions

As much as I love running, completing the same route time and time again without much change would still be boring. Run with a friend and you get to see new areas or do different session types that you perhaps don’t do very often if at all. A friend of mine is a trail running coach, offering guided runs, and he took me to a large forest he knows well. It was one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever run. This keeps the fun and intrigue in running as well as giving your body a different stimulus to respond to and recover from e.g. someone living in a very flat area suddenly running with a friend living in a hillier area.

Inspiration

Not everyone loves to run with people faster than them, and it can be hard to meet someone local who has the same goals as you, who’s available at the same time as you and is the same speed as you. Personally I love working with people faster than me as it pushes me harder, as well as being truly inspiring to see someone running with relative ease at the same pace as my 90% effort.

Runners have to work for their results, there is no shortcut, so working with someone at a higher level than me is a privilege in my view.

As well as making running a bit less of a lonely activity, there are clearly numerous benefits to running with a partner, so go out and find someone to run with every now and then. You won’t be disappointed.

Written by Kyle Brooks, Running Coach based in Norwich, Norfolk