I wrote a column last month discussing whether runners should train with a coach — and not a single reader wrote in to ask how to find a coach. But many asked about something else.

I mentioned that my colleague Henry Fountain had started running with the help of a podcast. Readers wanted to know what podcast it was. “I really need it,” one wrote. (For the record, that podcast, on podrunner.com, is called “First Day to 5K.”)

That response is an indication, exercise researchers say, of two things: how hard it is for someone who is not used to running to suddenly take up the sport; and how unnecessarily complicated advice about running has become as “experts” battle over shoes and running form and training programs.

Researchers who have no financial ties to running programs or shoe manufacturers say that most of those complications are unnecessary and some of the advice is even risky, because it can make running harder and can increase the chance of injury.