Many fit and active women find themselves reassesing their exercising routines when they are pregnant. If you’re a runner and aren’t sure what’s safe and what’s not, during those nine months, dont fear - we have the answers!

Fitness4Mum answers some of the basic questions about exercising whilst pregnant and invites you to send in your questions to them.

Sportsister has teamed up with Fitness4Mum to answer your questions. Simply email us at [email protected] ^[1]with anything you would like to ask.

Q. I’ve just discovered I’m pregnant, and am over the moon!! I’ve been a regular runner for many years, usually running 2 or 3 times a week for anything up to an hour. I’d love to keep going during the pregnancy but am not sure what’s safe. Can you let me know if I can run and if so up to what point in the pregnancy?

A. Congratulations on your pregnancy! You will be pleased to know that it is still safe for you to continue running during your pregnancy, and will continue to be until your bump reaches a size and weight whereby it makes it uncomfortable.

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Sportsister’s pre and postnatal fitness advice section ^[2]

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Certain types of exercise, such as a bench presses or sit ups, have cut off points at which you should stop performing them (20 weeks). Running, however, does not. You may find that after 15 weeks your bump has grown enough to make running uncomfortable or you may find that you can still run right up to 32 weeks! Our advice is to listen to your body; you will know when it doesn’t feel right and when you need to change it to either a recumbent cycle, walking or swimming.

One thing that you do need to consider when aiming to maintain your running is the intensity you work at. Although you used to run for an hour prior to getting pregnant, we wouldn’t advise that you do so now. Use a scale of 1-10 to establish how hard you are exercising - during your pregnancy you want to exercising between 5-7, with the fitter you are allowing you to exercise closer to a 7.

With all the changes that your body will go through it also becomes important for you to perform a lot of strength exercises, for example lunges, squats and side laying leg lifts. These will all help you avoid hip pain and manage any instability you may experience. Strength work becomes increasingly important if you are wanting to get back into running after your pregnancy, a common mistake women make is to not to perform any strength work then go straight back into running. This can result in hip pain as their steps don’t feel solid from the hormones that have affected the position and stability of their pelvis. Hopefully this will help you, if you need anything else don’t hesitate to contact us.

For those of you who aren’t regular runners the same message would apply - stop running when it feels uncomfortable. If you have only just decided to take up running during your pregnancy, then it is important that you build it up very slowly, running for no longer than a maximum of 25 minutes in any one go.

Make sure that you achieve this by performing intervals, working for 1 minute at a higher pace then 2 minutes at a lower pace and build it up accordingly. If you have performed exercise prior to becoming pregnant then you may prefer to stick with the cardio that you already do, or if you’re not completely sure how to start running I woudl advise that you do not take it up for first time during your pregnancy. Instead, do something like cycling, swimming, walking or even the cross trainer. But remember that whatever you decide to do please include strength work!

For more information visit www.fitness4mum.com ^[3] or contact us at [email protected] ^[4]