Couch to 5k!

I'm not very clued up on fitness so I'm not sure exactly what strength training is. I go to the gym a few times a week as well, where I use the rowing machine, bike, and some of the machines (focusing on arms and abs). Is this okay? Or should I be doing something else? And what do you mean when you say cardio only isn't a good final look? Sorry for the questions

Strength training is anything with weights, or to build muscle and cardio is to get your heart racing and burn fat. Now burning fat is good, but only doing cardio will burn fat and muscle which can lead to a kind of saggy thin look i.e. pancake bum and so on.

Good luck with this! I did the couch to 5k program about two years ago, and I think it's really great. All the other "beginner" running programs I looked at assumed you had a moderate level of fitness already, which is unrealistic for someone like me who couldn't even run for a minute straight before hand!

Like leedswest said, the best way to lose weight is doing cardio, but if you want to maintain muscle in order to get the toned look, you need to use weights as well. You could try out some of the machines at your gym, though freeweights (dumbbells) are the best as the exercises done with these engage the most muscles.

I completed it not to lose weight but rather to improve my fitness level, it helped a lot. Stick with it OP, even when it seems incredibly difficult on some runs (I struggled with week 5), but still managed to complete it.. And I am a regular runner now

Been doing this for a Week.. Hope I stick to it! Going good soo far

That's awesome! I did something similar a few years ago to prepare for a 10k race here in Vancouver, and went from 0 to 10k in about 4 months.

The first 5/10k is the hardest! After that distance builds up very quickly since at some point you'll hit a plateau where you'll feel like you can just run forever without feeling any more tired. It's a weird feeling that can only be experienced! For me that starts at about 3k (of non-stop running), but it obviously depends on the person!

I have been running 8-10k for the past few years, and just decided to try 14k for the first time a few weeks ago, and it felt more or less the same, just taking longer.

You'll love it (even more) once you get to 5k non-stop!