A part of become a good runner is letting go of expectations. There is a lot of quasi meditative written on the topic, but even if that’s not your thing: even if you walk/jog/walk to retain a constant, middle to low heart rate you could easily have the same effort as a trained runner doing some great mileage. The humbling part is part of the experience. Stay away from anything with speed for the first thousand miles. It will only lead to injuries. The good thing is, both condition and speed will improve very fast and the happy run feeling isn’t based on speed or distance. It’s being outside, alone, in silence with sounds and weather while doing something actively (but not overly). Did I mention I miss running? (Alas I am now missing some necessary cartilage.)
I never understood why people are chasing some stupid numbers, constantly comparing to each other, and then are unhappy or push themselves into injury. Such an unhealthy mindset for life overall.
That's really the opposite of what sports are supposed to be for 99.9% of the people. Who cares how life and training of some fastest guy in XYZ category looks like? Go at your pace, progress slowly also at your pace, also good strategy for life overall. You also don't take tips for driving in traffic from top formula 1 driver, do you, sorta worse than useless.
I do naturally push myself a bit when I run alone, to the point when even say 5-6km run makes me tired and drenched in sweat, but certainly not first 10-20 runs after some lull (like now broken foot, starting gently next week). And running is really just training for other more adrenaline sports for me, not chasing kms and preparing for races. But never pushing beyond whats OK for my body, and with experience one knows oneself very well in this regard.
I first trained to run long distances using a run-walk method for equal distances, which I then shortened – it took some convincing from an experienced runner that I wasn't "cheating", but when I realized that I was able to run at enough overload to train no matter what, it then clicked: it's about staying in motion; it's running, not sprinting, which are two different things indeed.
I now cycle for the same reasons as you do, although it's not as consistently intense as I would like.
