You have now realized the truism “You can’t out-train a bad diet.” So many people think they just need to jump on the treadmill and weight will fall off while they continue to eat 3,000 calories/day.
I have re-learned this lesson multiple times in my life. Exercise because it’s healthy and feels good. Control your diet to lose weight.
Exercise is extremely healthy. It’s good for mental health, energy levels, and activities of daily living. If the addiction and benefits of running itself aren’t enough to keep you going, you can try entering and training for events.
If you find yourself hating running, maybe you just don’t like running and need to find another form of exercise you enjoy more. Of course, including some running will be good CV training for other forms of exercise too, like hiking. But there’s no law that says you have to enjoy running or run to stay in shape.
I ran a long time ago and loved it but stopped after knee injury and never got back into it. Recently, I started again. I signed my husband and myself up for a 6k in a few weeks and then a 10k in a few months. The desire to finish easily is my current motivation.
At 80 minutes, you are well above a 10k but what about a 1/2 marathon or marathon to keep your motivation levels on track? It may help having a running goal to work towards.