Modifying a Training Run That Isn’t Going Well

About a month ago, I had a really bad run.

Maybe it was the lack of coffee.  The fact that I’d gone to bed at eleven, and woken up at 5:15.  Eating gel for breakfast when I usually have toast.  Maybe going from 10 – 15 miles of jogging a week to 20 miles of intensity focused training was catching up with me.  Could be the heat.  It was hot.  Humid.  Hadn’t slept great because of it.  But my shins kind of hurt.  I woke up with my legs feeling tired, not refreshed and ready to go.

Whatever it was, this tempo run was NOT going well.  I knew I was in trouble when my warm up mile was a solid minute per mile slower than it normally is.  (I can tell a lot by how quick my warm up mile is – if I’m holding back, it’s a good sign.  If I can barely muster up a jog, it’s going to be a tough morning.)

1 mile in to my 5 scheduled miles of Mid-Tempo paced running, I stopped the watch, took a drink of water, and tried to figure out what on earth I was going to do.

I knew I wouldn’t make it those 5 miles.  It wasn’t lack of motivation, it was physical, my legs were too tired, my feet and shins and thighs complaining far too soon.

My Options:

A) Turn it into mile repeats stopping every mile to recover and hope I could meet my target pace and mileage, albeit with breaks

B) Add 10 – 20 seconds per mile to my target pace or run as fast as I could manage with the target base as my ceiling for how fast I would go

C) Cut my run short

D) Some combination of the above

 

What I Decided:

I decided to try B) by slowing down but making it a more challenging pace than a long run would be.  I figured that turning it into mile repeats was redundant since I had done intervals two days before – this was supposed to be a moderately difficult, sustained effort.  To keep with the purpose of the tempo run, it made the most logical sense to focus on my effort instead of time and try to complete the run without recovery periods by modifying the pace.  Since you’re supposed to modify your pace to accommodate heat and humidity anyway, this was actually a logical step.

What Happened:

I slowed it down, I made it one more mile, I stopped three miles away from home and admitted defeat to myself and walk jogged all the way back home for a total of six miles which was not a good feeling.

While I was walking home, I realized that I was lucky to have made it through four workouts without feeling this way yet.  I’d had four good training runs, run a very successful 19.5 mile week last week, and been hitting my targets and recovering well.

Maybe this was a fluke, or maybe I just need a little more rest because I’m ramping up so quickly.  I still got some miles in, I didn’t  feel injured, just fatigued, and I still had 14 weeks between now and my next half marathon.  I have time, I’m not demoralized, I made a good effort to modify my training plan intelligently when it became clear the run wasn’t going well, and I’m going to keep training.

Where I go from here:

I was concerned after that run that maybe I’ve ramped up into this half marathon training plan too quickly.  I’d been running fewer miles than this per week, and they’d all been easy miles rather than half intervals and tempo runs plus a long run with a pace goal.

I think the fact that I hit my targets four workouts in a row shows that it’s not too far a stretch, but I don’t want to risk injury, so I’m going to reduce my long run this week from 9 miles down to 4 so that I still get out there and run, but it’s not such a high mileage week.

It makes sense for me to cut out some of the long run miles, because long runs are the one aspect of this half marathon training plan that I’ve been doing on and off for a year.  I have much less experience doing intervals and tempo runs, so I’d like to make sure I’m rested and ready for those two workouts.  I won’t skimp on my long runs over the course of training, but that’s an area I’m more confident and prepared in.

Moral of the Story:

Some runs stink.  Ask ANY runner – sometimes runs don’t go well.  Often it’s just a fluke and you don’t need to do anything, but if you’ve recently ramped up your training or changed some part of your routine, take it into consideration as you plan your next few runs.

Remember while you’re on a run that isn’t going well that you don’t have to choose between all or nothing, you can modify your plan to still get a few miles in, or you can head back to give your legs some rest so you’ll have a fresh start for your next run.

Realizing that run doesn’t define you or your training is smart – but so is paying attention to what more than one bad run in a row might be telling you.

Hoping my next run goes great!  If not… I’ll figure it out from there.