Tips for running with asthma?

My first advice would be to see your doctor, get that inhaler. It's important that you have it all the time, no matter what kind of asthma you have. Severe attacks can cause permanent damage to your lungs, it's important that you take the proper precautions to stop and attack if you get one. Also talk to your doctor about how to manage your exercise induced asthma, things that would help it before and or after exercise, and what to do if you feel an attack starting. Get a notebook and write down every question you can think of. Talk to your doctor about this.

Being prepared to manage your asthma is the #1 thing that needs to be done. Because once you can do that, you will be much better off when beginning running.

If you want to get into running then go out and get a good book on running for beginners. Running isn't like a lot of other sports, it's very high impact and your joints take a decent amount of stress. So it's improtant that you ease into running right so that your joints have time to build up resistance to that impact and prevent injury. I would start off with 1 mile every other day and increase that distance by a half a mile per week until you reach 3 miles. Then I would hold steady at 3 miles for about a month.

Now you should vary your paces and distances when you run. So once you hit that 3 miles, maybe some days do 1 really fast, or 2 slightly faster, and a couple easy 3 mile weeks. You can throw a 4 mile very easy run in there once a week if you feel really good. After a couple months of that you will be pretty conditioned to running and be ready to start some serious 5K plans or some beginner long distance plans (like a 10K). But a book will really help you understand how to get started.

You also want to spend some money on good running shoes. Now running shoes are only for running, they are not for wearing throughout the day or going to the gym to do other activities with. They are for running only. The reason is #1 they are exensive and you don't want to wear them out really fast and #2 when you cross train in running shoes you put pressure on the sides of the shoe and you can ruin that structural integrity that supports you when you run.

But go out to a really good running store (not just some sporting goods store) and have them put you on a treadmill and fit you for a pair of shoes based on your stride and pronation type. That is the key first step is getting a good pair of shoes.

-Connor

2

I have a special inhaler to use before I work out. Ask your doctor about those. Gradually easing into running should help too.

Step one is to follow your doctor's advice when you ask him/her this specific question.

There is no step two.