I've got a goal HM at the end of October planned and am going to try and actually train for it. I was thinking about using Pfitz's 12/55 plan for the HM. Any thoughts from the pros about doing such a thing?

What other plans should I give a try? I'm looking for planning help.

What are you hoping to do in the half?  Any particular goal other than the sub-1:40 you have listed.  You ran your current PR of 1:44 last October.  Thoughts on how you felt during that and what you did for your training leading up to it?  Took a peek at your log and it looks like your set-up for a summer of tris. 

My wife and sister-in-law have a full July schedule of tris.  We're all signed up for the Milwaukee marathon in early Oct and their approach for training is to train for and have fun with the tris and do a long build-up on alternating weekends in prep for the marathon.  Their first goal is to have fun and get better with the tris and secondarily improve fitness for the marathon.

Back to running and your training plan question...Pfitz's plan is about as good as anything else and to Spaniel's point, build that base.  Long runs and varying weeks of tempo/long intervals should be priority.  That assumes you've built your conditioning and you're recoverying in between hard efforts.  In your case with the biking and swimming, you should be able to get a good balance with that.  One thing that has helped me more than anything is building in hills on your regular runs.  I haven't done a good hill workout since my hammy acted up a couple of weeks ago (I'm due for one) but those are good for building strength.

What are you hoping to do in the half?  Any particular goal other than the sub-1:40 you have listed.  You ran your current PR of 1:44 last October.  Thoughts on how you felt during that and what you did for your training leading up to it?  Took a peek at your log and it looks like your set-up for a summer of tris. 

 

My wife and sister-in-law have a full July schedule of tris.  We're all signed up for the Milwaukee marathon in early Oct and their approach for training is to train for and have fun with the tris and do a long build-up on alternating weekends in prep for the marathon.  Their first goal is to have fun and get better with the tris and secondarily improve fitness for the marathon.

 

Back to running and your training plan question...Pfitz's plan is about as good as anything else and to Spaniel's point, build that base.  Long runs and varying weeks of tempo/long intervals should be priority.  That assumes you've built your conditioning and you're recoverying in between hard efforts.  In your case with the biking and swimming, you should be able to get a good balance with that.  One thing that has helped me more than anything is building in hills on your regular runs.  I haven't done a good hill workout since my hammy acted up a couple of weeks ago (I'm due for one) but those are good for building strength.

My ultimate goal for that race is to run a 1:38 and I think its achievable if I can get my weight down to about 185 without hurting my training.

I did not follow any specific or structured training plan leading into my HM PR last Oct. I just did alot of Easy, LHR MAF (140 HR) runs and a Med-long run each week. I would try and throw some type of interval or tempo or steady state run in once a week. I continued to swim avour three times a week and ride my bike a couple times a week. I felt pretty good during my lead into the HM and got the time I was shooting for. I ran with the 1:45 pacer and tried to kick it in the last three miles to go sub 1:44, but I ended up just 20 seconds or so ahead of the pacer and slowed in mile 12 quite a bit.

I have about three tri's that I want to do yet this summer and fall and am doing them for fun and to get my feet wet (pun intended) to see how I do. I did one last year but was not real comfortable with the swim. I had learned to swim about 5 months earlier and kind of started sreaking about half way through the 1/3 mile swim. I have hopes of completing an Ironman distance by my 45th birthday, but well see how the swim is comming along as I really do not enjoy that sport. I am a fairly decent and above average cyclist and average runner. I will also be competing in some 5k to 10k races over the coming months.

I am planning on Pfitz's 12-55 plan with swimming and cycling as cross training, supllementing activities with no real emphasis on either one, the run training will be primary. I tried to looselt follow Pfitz's 18-70 plan this spring with the race week ending in a May 28th Duathlon that I wanted to compete hard in and see if I could nab one of their coveted granite apples for the top three. I ended up becoming very fatigued in the middle of April and do not enter into the Duathlon at the end of May. I think I was not ready for the 18/70 plan and am still struggling to get my fitness and energy back. I think my easy/recovery running was still too hard and I didn't get a full recovery from the distances I was running them at?

I also had a 7k that I really wanted to run good at on Mar 19th. I was dieting heavily up until that race but with the increased trainig load, I was having a tough time fueling my workouts and trying to keep my appetite in check while still maintaning a caloric deficiet. My diet went to shit ater the sub par 7k race and I started adding the pounds back on. I'm sure that didn't help the fatigue factor any either.

I have been trying to stay with a base phase of easy and recovery running (HR below 145) to get my mileage back up to 40+ and will continue that until I start the 12/55 on Aug 8th. I am planning on following the 12/55 like I was actually trining for a marathon, but I was just wondering if that was ideal for a HM or if I should be changing some of the pacing for the MP runs, tempo, intervals etc. or if I should run them at the quicker end of his ranges?