Forums >General Running>training plan
Just had to share that I finally got it on here! And I am 3 days post wisdom teeth and so far so good. Wanting to run, but may wait until tomorrow. And any thoughts anyone can share on my plan is appreciated
2/3rds training
First off, good luck with the wisdom teeth recovery.
One thing I noticed about your plan is that in weeks 5,6,9, and 11 (just one week before the goal half) you have races listed for saturdays followed by your scheduled long run on sunday. You should really take into account the necessary recovery time from those saturday races because, no offense intended, your body is probably not going to deal with that amount of stress well. Some people can get away with racing often, but they are usually pretty seasoned runners who's bodies can recover from hard efforts fairly rapidly. Starting a HM training plan is already ambitious if your running log history is accurate, but to add four more races into the next 12 weeks PLUS finish off with the half is just asking for injury in my opinion.
If you really want to do those extra races for some reason, I would suggest running them easy and then just running the rest of that weeks long run mileage right after (or before) the race, for example saturday of week 5 run three miles as a warm-up for the 10k you have scheduled and then take sunday off or just run a short 2-3 mile recovery run.
My not-entirely-running-related 'Gram
Consistently Slow
Run until the trail runs out.
SCHEDULE 2016--
The pain that hurts the worse is the imagined pain. One of the most difficult arts of racing is learning to ignore the imagined pain and just live with the present pain (which is always bearable.) - Jeff
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Thank you both for your feedback. The 5k's are just for fun. Not worrying about setting any PR's until after half training is finished. I didn't think about tapering, newb here! will adjust that! I have been running since last summer just not as consistently as I would have liked. Ran lots of 5k's but the longer distance is new for me and so far loving it!
My take is a little different...
First, you have the same distances in your plan during the week for the entire cycle. Some of those runs should also increase as your fitness improves. It's not all about the long run. Bump some of those 2 milers to 3... then to 4. Bump some of those 3 milers to 4... then 5. Bump some of those 5 milers to 6... then 7. It's a progression that should reflect your fitness improvement over time.
Second, racing the 5ks before your long run day can be a good thing. You want to keep your long run pace easy, and running them after a good 5k effort will keep them nice and easy... also, those 5k races can help you determine a realistic goal pace for the half-marathon.
Third, I don't believe anyone needs more than a 1 week taper before a half-marathon. I'd suggest keeping the weekly mileage up until 1 week out.
Just more opinion... ;-)
be curious; not judgmental
My take is a little different... First, you have the same distances in your plan during the week for the entire cycle. Some of those runs should also increase as your fitness improves. It's not all about the long run. Bump some of those 2 milers to 3... then to 4. Bump some of those 3 milers to 4... then 5. Bump some of those 5 milers to 6... then 7. It's a progression that should reflect your fitness improvement over time. Second, racing the 5ks before your long run day can be a good thing. You want to keep your long run pace easy, and running them after a good 5k effort will keep them nice and easy... also, those 5k races can help you determine a realistic goal pace for the half-marathon. Third, I don't believe anyone needs more than a 1 week taper before a half-marathon. I'd suggest keeping the weekly mileage up until 1 week out. Just more opinion... ;-)
Thank you! I was hoping that I wouldn't need a huge taper or anything because towards the end I was trying to keep up some decent mileage. I'm not looking to set records. Just enjoy my first half and go from there! I will look at bumping up the shorter distance as fitness improves. I can't remember what I was supposed to run today but I did 5 (I think it was supposed to be 3) I'm a little sore/tired but nothing unbearable.
As Mr MattM suggested you'd probably be better off capping that long run at 2 hours whatever the mileage that comes out to, I am thinking that will be about 10.5 miles for you, and bumping one other run in the week to about 80-90 min. Run the longest run no later than two weeks prior to your race (I think it takes that long to get any benefit from the workout), and decrease the long run duration by 20-30 min a week out from the race.
I'm just here to agree with what MattM and HappyFeet have said.
As long as you're willing to deal with running slowly the day after, the 5K the day before a long run can be a great training practice to have you start fatigued and better prepare you for the end of the half marathon, too.
I'm a huge proponent, too, of running for time. This means your distance will increase on its own as your fitness improves, and the body knows time and effort, not distance, anyway.
Just make sure, above all else, that the plan is a guide, and the way your body feels is the real deciding factor.
Oh, and I'm jealous of how quickly you bounced back from wisdom teeth surgery. Mine pretty much wrecked my whole September.
"When a person trains once, nothing happens. When a person forces himself to do a thing a hundred or a thousand times, then he certainly has developed in more ways than physical. Is it raining? That doesn't matter. Am I tired? That doesn't matter, either. Then willpower will be no problem." Emil Zatopek
I think the above quote summarizes it nicely.
2 Hrs is better than X miles (least that's what I think) -- you probably want 2 hrs of effort from your long run a few weeks before the race (but NOT the week before - the week before go something like 60 minutes)...............Also, one of your mid week runs should be increased to about 80/90 minutes. Since you have Thursday up to around 5 miles, probably you could get more bang from your training by gradually increasing that run to 80 or 90 minutes...
On one of you shorter days you 'might' want to stretch your legs a little by adding some 30 sec to 1 minute quicker pace intervals.....I'm not talking about speed work here, just run a little faster than normal (but very controlled) one day a a week for something like 4 x 30 sec. or 4 x 1 min.....you'll feel it..
Champions are made when no one is watching
Thanks for all the great suggestions!! And I was terrified to run again after I had my wisdom teeth out. I had pretty much convinced myself I was going to end up with a dry socket Like it did back in high school. But this time around I only took strong pain meds 3 times and only a half because I'm a wimp and the stuff makes me feel horrible. I would almost rather hurt! But really no pain at all this time. So thankful!