Hi Folks

I have a v ery specific question about Higdon's Intermediate 1 Marathon training plan.

I am currently following this plan pretty closely for a 04 December Marathon, which will be my first.

I skipped the first few weeks because of a HM that I was running and now am on week 6.

Things seem to be going OK.

In a few weeks time I'll be up on "the Half Marathon" that is scheduled in week 9.

I have actually switched weeks 9 & 10 around due to race availability locally.

Here's the question: Am I supposed to race this HM as an all out, shoot for a PR type of race, probably around 1:50 for me, or at marathon pace ,somewhere around 2:05? or something else?

I may be over thinking this a little (it has been known to happen) but I know that if I run this as I would a goal HM it will affect my next week's marathon training.

Log is, of course, open for stalking if that's of any value.

Thanks in advance for the advice.

Cheers

MattJ

If you go all out on your half, you definitely will be sore during the next week of training (or at least for 2-3 days).

Then again, running a half hard will give you a much better idea on how well you can run a marathon.   It's always fun to go after a PR or a good time.  You could take your time and plug this number into the running calculators for a goal marathon time based on your current fitness.

Great question- I had the same concerns about running a 1/2 before my full in october and have to admit, I bagged the half.  I know it sounds dumb, but I had a fear that I'd run balls to the wall like i did my last half, as it's a race environment and land up setting myself back some (it took me about 4 days to recover & even then my body wasn't the same for about 1 1/2 months afterward.  I didn't know what kind of effort I should put into the half were I to run it (long aerobic run pace? half MP, half aerobic?)

I Look forward to reading suggestions & answers.

I'd race it all out.  It wouldn't be the end of the world if you backed off training a little if you feel the need the week following the half since it's a couple of months before your goal race.  It doesn't make sense to me to enter a race and not race.  If that's the case save your time and money and go run a 13 mile MP run anywhere.

I don't like the 2 rest days before the half, either.  I'd rest 2 days prior and at least get a short run in the day before the half so I was loose for the race.

Good luck.

Matt -- look at the next week in the plan, following the 1/2 marathon.  You want to be able run that week's workouts with quality, so if running all out on Sunday will take more recovery than the Monday easy run Hal has your running after the 1/2, you'll want to ease off.

 

I disagree with this - I'd sacrifice the next quality workout for this one really good workout (race) for a lot of reasons (confidence, race pace, race prepration, etc.)  You are so far out from the marathon goal that it shouldn't have any material effect on your training. 

Without looking at the actual plan...

I looked at the plan.  He's switching weeks 9 and 10 so his next big run would be an 18 miler a week after the half.  The plan calls for 5 running days a week, one cross training day, and one rest day.  So I think that there is time to recover before the next workout if he races the half.

You are supposed to race it.  But you are supposed to race it without tapering so it isnt likely to be your best possible race.  But it is supposed to be a race effort from what I recall of Higdon's plan. 

Thanks for the replies everyone. If I read the overall sentiment of the replies it looks like most are saying it should be raced but to expect that it will both suck and not be as PR-able as if it were a goal race.

I guess I should have posted this earlier. Here's what the week before and after the HM look like in the current plan:

To this rookie it's funny that the experienced ones amongst you consider the "easy" runs as recovery after the HM.

I can tell you now that my Monday 10/10 recovery after the HM won't include any running and, comparing to past experience, it's going to need me to HTFU to get out there on Tuesday but that is obviously going to have to happen.

So here's the new plan for those two weeks:

I will race the HM but will do so on "tired legs". I did not like the rest day before the race and the mini-taper that's built into that week so I changed it up a little. I will give myself the Monday off after the race but I will get out there on Tuesday. My overall mileage for the 2 weeks is unchanged.  It looks like this:

Will let you know how it goes. Thanks again folks.