Part of this blog has been sharing my progress towards my first half marathon in September, so I thought I’d offer some thoughts on picking a training plan for a race, and share my training plan for my half marathon.
Thoughts on Choosing a Training Plan for Any Race Distance:
Pick one that matches your goals: The 5k training plan designed to get current runners a PR is a lot different than the 5k training plan for someone who hasn’t run before and whose goal is to complete the race without walking. I remember reading an article about training for a 5k that said the best way to train for a 5k was to train for a 10k. Umm, not helpful advice for a brand new runner just trying to reach 3 miles, thanks.
Pick one you can stick to: Find one that’s practical for you as a runner. How many miles does the plan expect you to be running in your first week? How many days a week is it asking you to run? Does it work in cross training, and if so, do you have time to do it? Are you just squeaking in the plan before race day, or do you have a couple weeks to spare in case you need an extra recovery week, or a repeat week?
Choose an appropriate plan based on your experience: A lot of training plans include a note about what your experience should be prior to using that plan. Some are walk/run plans for new runners, others expect you to have been running 15 miles a week, others just ask that you’re comfortable running 6 miles. A fun goal might be to look into training plans for an event you’d like to do in a year, and find out what you need to do now to get ready to start that training plan. (Did I just say that it’d be fun to train for a training plan? Yeah. I did. Yikes.)
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How I decided to Train for My Half: I created my own training plan, because I couldn’t find one for beginners that worked with how often I thought I was going to be able to run, since I’m balancing being a stay at home mom with my running.
My Original Plan:
My half marathon is in September, and I started training for it back in April. At the time I started, I was over 4 months away and had been running 10 miles regularly for almost two months. Before that, I’d been running anywhere from 0-10 miles a week because of a rough fall (bronchitis) and tough holiday season (sinus infection).
I looked up some half marathon training plans back in April, but many of them were geared towards more experienced runners than I. I wasn’t starting from scratch, but I didn’t have a ton of time for training or a lofty time goal. I just wanted to finish. I had never run more than four miles without stopping at that point, and the thought of just completing a half marathon seemed crazy. Exciting, but crazy.
Since I knew my goal (run 13.1 miles, not worrying about pace) and I knew how much time I had (about 17 weeks) I made my own training plan. I figured it was realistic that I could run three times a week, two shorter runs of 3 miles each (hopefully one an interval run, and maybe one a stroller run with the boys) and then a long run. For my long runs I would add a mile every other week, building in a recovery week with a shorter (or no) long run every six weeks.
Looking at some training plans and talking to Greg, I discovered that it’s recommended to taper down your long runs in the couple weeks leading up to your half marathon so that your legs can recover and you don’t get injured. So I built in a couple weeks of shorter long runs prior to the event.
My Revised Plan:
I added a fourth day of running: I discovered that somewhere along my path towards the half marathon, it no longer became appealing to only run three days a week. I actually want, and would prefer, to run four or five. This was completely unexpected, but I think it’s because my shorter runs became so much easier and more fun the longer my long runs became. Once I started hitting long runs of 9 or 10 miles, I added in a fourth day of running to my week, and my three mile runs occasionally became four. I was getting edgy on the days I didn’t run, and I enjoyed having an extra day of putting a few more miles in. The transition from running 10 to 15 miles a week was harder than the transition from running 15 miles a week to 20. (Note that it’s recommended you don’t increase your mileage more than ten percent per week, building up gradually is a good idea to avoid injury.)
My recovery weeks scheduled themselves: I also noticed that I had to move around a couple recovery weeks in order to accommodate myself. There was a rough week when I had low motivation to run and was considering quitting my half marathon training (not seriously considering, but I was really regretting the whole thing). I called off my long run, and took it easy for a week, logging 8.5 miles when I should have hit 15. It made a huge difference mentally just to feel like it was ok to take a break from training when I needed it, and gave me the mental and physical boost I needed to have an awesome running week the week after, hitting 17.5 miles and having them be good ones.
I upped my weekly mileage for the second half of the program: I see a lot of training plans for half marathons where people are running 20-25 miles a week minimum and doing cross training to boot. I try to remind myself that my goal was just to complete a half marathon for the first time, not to set a PR (though it will be, because it’s my first one!). That said, I am turning some of my three mile runs into five mile runs to better prepare for a fun race. I’m still not doing the strength training or cross training most plans would recommend, but I will finish this!
I’ve found that by being a little flexible, and focusing on upping my mileage rather than improving my pace, I’ve been able to successfully lengthen my long runs and work towards my goal of running those 13.1 miles.
My longest long run to date was 10 miles, and it went great. I have six weeks left, and only one more 10 mile run between me and a recovery week of low pressure short runs.
I plan to run 12 miles as my longest long run before the half marathon. If I can run 12 miles prior to race day, and have five double-digit-mile runs under my belt, I am thinking I can run 13.1 on race day and finish. I’ll let you know how it goes J
Your plan sounds really sensible, and clearly it worked very well for you, because I know you are a couple of weeks past your half! I imagine that having a marathoner for a husband helped you create a balanced program that you could amend as needed to your circumstances. I found a 10 week training plan online, which had a starting requirement of being able to run 10km without stopping, which I could do. It recommended 4 days of running a week then 5 from week 5. I found that to be too much, and from week 3, I only ran 3 days a week. 2 weeks before race day, I ran 100 metres more than the 21.1 half distance in a training run, just to ensure that I could, which helped a huge amount with the mental aspect on race day. I added in a toning class once a week at about week 4, then a boxing class at week 5 which mixed things up a bit (I had stopped that training due to minor shoulder injury at the start of my 10 week program). I skipped a couple of training runs – one night it was really cold and rainy and blustery, and another night it was very windy and would have been unpleasant to run in. On one of my 10km training runs in week 6 I hated every single step of it and was wondering what on earth I was doing, but thankfully that didn’t last long. So much about running is mental. I don’t listen to music when I run so I am alone with my thoughts the whole time, and sometimes it becomes a bartering exercise – you tell yourself you can stop when you get to the next lamp post or drink fountain (I have a couple of public ones on my regular route), and it’s normally enough to keep me going. I count steps in my head as a distraction exercise when I’m getting bored or focus on breathing in for 3 steps and out for 2 to alternate the load on your legs (which I learnt about in the Runner’s World magazine). I love that there are so many plans available on the internet that people have so generously shared (runners are such awesome people, hey?), and that you can use them as a starting point and mix them up a bit to get them to fit your schedule. Thanks for sharing your training plan, Kelly!