Training

Years ago, a co-worker gave me a copy of a training plan that he obtained from Runners World magazine.  He was going to train to run a marathon and do it in a time to qualify for Boston.  He was in his early sixties, so he liked his chances since he could still run very effectively.  Unfortunately, an injury kept him from being able to go the distance, but at least he was still able to go to Boston to watch his daughter race.

The training plan was a rookie plan of sorts to train for a marathon.  Since I have no desire to run a marathon but was interested in maybe doing a half-marathon someday, I figured I would just take the plan, divide the distances by two.  Bam, there's a half-marathon training plan.  

I mentioned that I received this plan years ago.  Every time I would try to get into running and get into shape, I would use this plan...and I'd make it about three weeks before I stopped or couldn't find the time or had achy legs and took extended rest days/weeks/months.  

Lo' and behold, I'm using the same plan now to train for my half-marathon.  Only problem is that the plan is a 16 week plan.  When I decided to train for my first half-marathon, I found I had 13 weeks to do it.  Instead of scrambling to find a plan that worked for my time period, I just kept with the same plan, cut out three weeks of it, and kept chugging along.  It makes things a little harder, but so far I'm pleased with the results.  

For example, the last time I ran a 10k was in college.  I was probably thirty pounds lighter and certainly a lot more fit.  I actually took a college course in running and the 'final' was to train and run a 10k race.  I did it in 54-56 minutes.  I'm running a lot slower, but in my last distance run, I ran 60 minutes without stopping.  It might have been slow going and I certainly did not get the distance I got some ten years ago, but I still get a feeling of accomplishment that I'm able to run that long and still feel like I have gas in the tank.

Anyway, I thought I'd post a quick summary of my plan:

Monday: Crosstrain (15-45 minutes)

Tuesday: Interval Training (1.5-4 miles)

Wednesday: Easy Jog (1-2.5 miles)

Thursdsay: Tempo Training (1.5-4 miles)

Friday: Rest

Saturday: Distance Training (3-10 miles)

Sunday: Easy Jog (1-2.5 miles)

The distance varies depending on what week I am on the plan.  The most I'll run is 10 miles, but I feel pretty good that I can find it in me to get the last 3 miles if I'm not struggling to get to 10 miles.  During peak training, I don't run more than 20 miles a week, which I appreciate since I don't feel like that will overtax my body too much.

I'll get into more details about my week to week plan through various other posts.