We might earn a fee from hyperlinks on this web page.
There are lots of issues a operating app can do, however Runna is an overachiever: it tracks your runs, talks you thru interval exercises, and offers you a plan to comply with to satisfy your race purpose. It even coaxes you to do your mobility and energy coaching alongside the best way, and the whole lot comes with a satisfying checkbox that you would be able to fill in while you full every exercise. Let’s dig in, and see what’s inside this app—and whether or not it’s definitely worth the $17.99/month subscription price.
What’s Runna?
The Runna app is accessible for iOS and Android, and its major perform is to present you a customized coaching plan in your operating. Runna can sync along with your Garmin, Coros, Suunto, or Apple Watch, or you should utilize it and not using a watch and easily “report” the run by carrying your cellphone in your pocket or belt.
The app is free to obtain, however Runna’s major options all require a subscription. It runs $17.99/month, with a one-week free trial. (Do your self a favor anytime you utilize a free trial and cancel the free trial instantly after signing up; it’ll nonetheless work for the entire week, after which you may resolve whether or not you wish to renew.)
Runna will provide you with a coaching plan for the purpose of your selection, from 5K distances all the best way as much as marathon coaching. There are additionally plans for non-race-related objectives, like a Get Match Plan and a Publish-Harm Plan for many who are easing again in after day without work. The plans all include elective energy, mobility, and Pilates exercises, they usually’re all custom-made to your health degree, time dedication, and preferences.
What Runna is nice at
-
Structured programming that updates as you get sooner.
-
Plans are customized.
-
The app syncs seamlessly with different apps and gadgets, like Strava and health watches.
-
Plans embody warmups, cooldowns, energy classes, and mobility classes—all elective.
-
It’s satisfying to test off runs you’ve carried out, and straightforward to rearrange or make up missed classes.
The place it falls brief
-
You must know a latest race time to set your beginning paces.
-
Have to be familiar with minute-per-mile (or km) paces to comply with the exercises.
-
Some newbie runners say the exercises might be too arduous.
-
You possibly can’t select plans by them, solely by adjusting the personalization choices.
Setup
Credit score: Beth Skwarecki/Runna
The very first thing you’ll be requested to do, as soon as you put in the Runna app, is to arrange a coaching plan. I don’t have a race on my calendar, so I appreciated that there have been choices for constructing health with out concentrating on a race. The app beneficial the Get Match Plan for me, however I ended up going with the Purposeful Health plan (which I assume is for Crossfit-style athletes seeking to construct their cardio endurance).
Runna wants a race time to set your paces
I instructed it how typically I’d wish to run (5 days), which days I had out there (Monday by Friday), and which day I’d wish to designate for lengthy runs (Wednesday). All good, till it requested me for a latest race time. I’ve been jogging repeatedly for perhaps two months, and I’ve run races prior to now, however I do not know what my present 5K time may be. (I haven’t even been operating with a watch recently.)
I erred on the facet of warning by giving it a 35-minute 5K time. I knew that was in all probability slower than what I’m able to, and certain sufficient a number of days later the app identified that I’d run 5 kilometers (about three miles) in 32 minutes on considered one of my coaching runs. Would I wish to replace my Private Greatest in order that my plan might use this new information? I certain would.
The programmed runs use minutes-per-mile paces to inform you how briskly to run. These are primarily based on the Private Greatest you give the app, so somebody who runs a 32-minute 5K gained’t be given the identical goal paces as an individual who runs a 25-minute 5K. That is correct and helpful if you happen to’re used to working with minute-per-mile paces, and possibly somewhat bewildering if you happen to aren’t.
My one tip, if you happen to aren’t certain find out how to fill out this part within the setup: do what I did and provides it a time that’s slower than you may in all probability do. It’s simple sufficient to replace when the app figures out that you would be able to run sooner.
Utilizing the app
Credit score: Beth Skwarecki/Runna
Once you end organising your plan, you’ll get to see the app’s major screens. The primary one, Practice, exhibits your plan for this week. That is the place you’ll see the checkboxes. There’s a little card for every exercise, color-coded in line with sort. I had an interval exercise (yellow) on Monday, supposed to be 2.4 miles. Then a 2.5-mile simple run (blue) on Tuesday, and so forth. If you happen to allow energy and mobility exercises, you’ll see these in your schedule right here as properly. When you do a exercise, it’s checked off, and also you’ll additionally see your precise stats for that run on the cardboard—for instance, my 2.5-mile simple run ended up being 3.2 miles, and I can see each the programmed and precise distances on the identical card.
On the backside of the display there’s additionally a button to report a run. Usually you’d begin a run by tapping on the cardboard for the exercise you wish to do and beginning it there. However it’s also possible to begin runs from that button on the backside if you wish to do an additional run that’s not a part of this system, or in case your subscription has ended and you continue to wish to use Runna to trace runs. (The “report run” characteristic doesn’t require the subscription.)
The Actions display exhibits your previous exercises, together with ones that you just did with one other machine or app. The Group tab is a Fb-like feed the place folks share their runs, and mine was already populated with strangers. (I didn’t share something to the feed.) The one factor I acquired out of this characteristic was seeing the information tiles folks have been sharing. This instructed me there was a spot elsewhere within the app (below “share run”) that would generate this nifty readout.
Lastly, there’s a Assist tab, which not solely consists of troubleshooting recommendation for the app, but in addition a library of data and articles. You possibly can examine how a lot protein to eat, find out how to handle Achilles tendinitis, or find out how to enhance your operating kind.
The coaching display is peppered with “feedback” from “coaches,” which don’t appear to be customized in any respect, except I missed one thing. They simply clarify the exercises you’ll be doing, or give recommendations on operating. Usually somewhat video will seem on the prime of a web page, and a speaking head with a British accent will begin telling you a similar info that’s within the display beneath. I discovered this pointless and would shortly mute and scroll previous, however perhaps you’ll discover it provides the app a pleasant really feel.
My expertise operating with the app
I used the app for every week and did all of the exercises—minus a energy exercise that didn’t match into my schedule, however I appeared it over and it appeared fairly strong.
I did one of many runs on an Apple Watch, and located the show useful for following the day’s considerably sophisticated plan. I used to be presupposed to do a collection of distance-based intervals at completely different distances and completely different paces, and take two minutes of strolling relaxation in between them. Monitoring the whole lot manually would have been a ache, however the app made it simple.
Runna would inform me in the beginning of every interval how briskly I used to be presupposed to go, after which if I wasn’t staying on tempo it could inform me to hurry up or decelerate, after which give my present tempo so I knew how far off I used to be. As soon as I adjusted, it could pipe up briefly to say “on tempo” after which I might ignore it till the subsequent change.
The app additionally gave me verbal break up occasions at each accomplished mile, whether or not I used to be doing an interval run or a easy “simple run.”
I discovered the prompts for all of the runs simple to comply with, and I loved the number of exercises. My week had one set of intervals, one exercise marked as tempo (alternating sections at barely completely different paces, not historically what you’d name a tempo run, however shut sufficient), one “lengthy” run that started off gradual and nudged you to choose up the tempo somewhat bit as you went alongside, and two plain outdated simple runs.
Mobility and energy
Credit score: Beth Skwarecki/Runna
Most operating apps don’t program mobility or energy work, or they deal with it as an afterthought in the event that they do. Runna’s mobility and energy work are elective, however when you flip them on in settings, they’ll seem in your weekly plan with yet one more checkbox to test off.
The mobility exercise I did was a 30-minute yoga video. I didn’t adore it, however it was effective. It began with some seated respiration, stretches for the again, good outdated cat/cow, and labored towards a sequence of ahead folds and downward canine that felt like an abbreviated solar salutation. There was a stretch for the soles of the ft that felt nice, however I actually would have preferred extra stretches for the quads, hamstrings, and hips. I added a number of of my very own whereas the teacher was doing corpse pose on the finish.
I didn’t get an opportunity to do the energy exercise, however it appeared fairly affordable. It was estimated to take 25 to 35 minutes, however I used to be disillusioned to see I couldn’t preview the exercise earlier than I began it. After a warmup with pushups and tiptoe strolling (amongst different strikes), the principle work included unweighted lunges, single arm dumbbell bench press, and a core transfer superset with dumbbell snatches. As a coach I’d moderately see runners doing heavier work than this, and extra of it—however for runners who don’t in any other case do a lot energy coaching, this is a superb begin.
Pilates exercises are additionally out there, they usually appear to be structured equally to the yoga exercise I attempted: a 30-minute (for me) follow-along video with strikes that you just’ll acknowledge if you happen to’ve carried out a Pilates class earlier than.
Social options and privateness
Credit score: Beth Skwarecki/Runna
The principle social perform of the Runna app is the Group feed. You possibly can discover completely different feeds (“areas”), however there aren’t many to select from. There are areas for a number of in style marathons, which feels like a cool concept, however many of the ones I tapped on had few or no posts. There additionally doesn’t appear to be a characteristic the place you may comply with your folks (except I missed it?), and when folks ask questions of the group, they appear to go unanswered.
There aren’t any fine-grained privateness controls, both: you may share your run or not. The information tile features a map of your route, which regularly consists of labeled road names. If you happen to’d wish to preserve your location personal, there’s no simple means to take action when sharing that information tile.
What you are able to do with and and not using a subscription
You want a subscription to entry your programmed exercises from Week 2 and past. The one-week free trial unlocks the whole lot from Week 1, and you may proceed to do these exercises even after the trial expires, for instance if you happen to didn’t match the whole lot in throughout Week 1. You may as well switch the Week 1 exercises to your Garmin machine, however when you’re a paying buyer you’ll be capable of sync two weeks of exercises at a time.
After the trial expires, you may see the runs and exercises you’ve already carried out, you may full any runs or exercises that you just unlocked however didn’t but full, and you may even add exercises to your plan—I added a Pilates exercise after the trial expired, and the app dutifully added it to Friday of Week 1 and let me entry it.
You may as well browse the opposite out there plans, and even have it program you a contemporary Week 1, however you may’t transfer on to Week 2 with out subscribing to Premium. (So I suppose if you’re broke and bored, you would pattern Week 1 of all of the out there plans.)
After all, you may at all times report an unprogrammed run at any time. The truth is, once I did a run with a Garmin watch, no app concerned, it robotically synced to my Actions tab.
What this app does properly
The structured, customized plans are the flagship providing right here, and Runna delivers on its guarantees. I discovered my plan to be an awesome match for my health degree and my schedule, and I loved the number of exercise varieties.
The inclusion of energy and mobility exercises is a pleasant contact, too. There are additionally prompt warmup and cooldown workouts for every run, making Runna plans actually well-rounded.
The app can also be versatile on scheduling: I did the exercises out of order, and nothing broke. You possibly can rearrange the times if you happen to like, too.
Downsides and disadvantages
I don’t have any severe reservations concerning the app itself, so the query of whether or not it’s value the price will come all the way down to your opinions on the operating plans it delivers.
Some runners have famous on boards like r/Runna that they have been hoping for easier runs and fewer interval and tempo runs. Runna’s lengthy runs should not essentially lengthy gradual distance runs, however typically embody a development the place you get a bit sooner because the run progresses. This will all add as much as this system feeling arduous or intimidating for rookies or for individuals who want a extra chill coaching program.
Critical runners even have their quibbles with it. The scheduling perform solely enables you to put one run on every day, so there’s no approach to schedule two runs on the identical day. Doubles are a reasonably regular factor for prime mileage runners—heck, even I’ll do a morning and night run on the identical day generally, and I’m nowhere close to elite.
You additionally don’t have a selection of various plans on the identical degree. Whereas there are completely different varieties of plans, when you select one—say, a marathon coaching plan—the app will design you one single plan that they’ve calculated is one of the best one for you. You possibly can tweak the personalization settings, however you don’t get the choice of deciding between plans which are designed in line with completely different coaching philosophies. For instance, some marathon plans unfold their mileage extra evenly all through the week than others. You simply should take what Runna provides you.
The underside line
In the end, if you happen to just like the applications, the app will work properly for you. And whereas Runna is without doubt one of the extra well-rounded apps on the market to plan your coaching, it’s on no account the one one that may schedule a plan for you. In the end, if you happen to prefer it, $17.99/month is an inexpensive worth to pay for a program that holds your hand and retains you on monitor.
