Okay, so I've got 5 half marathons under my belt with on awesome PR of a sub 2 hour finish, I've got a lot of 5ks, 10ks, and a few 15ks with PRs too. I know I started a topic a while back about my interest in going straight to 50ks, just passing a 26.2 miler but......... I don't know - it just doesn't quite feel right to me or something like that. Flipping through the January's RW mag I saw the list of FMs and saw the Indy Monumental Marathon on there slated for November 1, 2014 - and that is when it struck me. I want that to be my next step towards my long term goal, heck I don't have a 50k planned or desired until 2015 and I am pretty pleased with the PRs I've earned this year so I won't be racing any half marathons (though you will see the ones I've already registered for in my new training plan) so I won't really have to take so many days to recover. I do still want to run the Evansville Half Marathon in early October, I don't think that will hurt as I believe you have to start tapering 3 weeks before a full marathon. And of course this plan is flexible for changes, flexibility is the best thing you can have with training plans. And my main half marathon goal is in June, not for speed but elevation (around 3,500 - 4,000 feet) which is what I have begun training for from December (now) to June 15 (the race) and then after the much needed days of recovery I will begin my more focused training for the IMFM which will focus more runs back on the road in preparation for the pounding.

Only thing is, when to start my taper for the IMFM - the weekend before the Evansville Half which I am guessing is on either October 4 or 5.......... they probably won't post the date until next summer.... or that weekend of the Evansville Half? Everything is subject to change of course, I mean you never know what the day brings (especially with a child) and I don't know how the increased mileage will affect me and if I am really built for races and distances like that, this plan is definitely flexible and subject to change accordingly.

Anyways take a look at the "plan" I quickly put together and tell me what you think.

http://www.runningahead.com/logs/6d1d5cb5e27e4230a9d79029229a9ba6/plans/1fb03f1da2764bffb75f162b2108c

That's a really long time to make a plan for.

The time that I like to be most flexible in my schedule is the week after a race longer than 5k.

Are all of your goal races trail races?  If not, I recommend doing some pavement pounding.

Andrea I love that you have set up a 40+ week plan, where others like myself have a 16 week plan which starts around Christmas for the Boston Marathon. My concern with your plan is mostly the last month. 3 weeks out from the race I prefer to have my long runs look similar to 22-16-10-26.2. I'm not getting into a debate with anyone whether that longest run should be 20 or 23. That is just what I prefer. Prior to that my long runs go like 16-16-17-18-20.

As far as weekly mileage when you run your longest run, I like my weekly mileage to also be peeking that week whether you choose 50 or some other #. My mid-week runs for March (Boston is 4/21) will be around 10. They will increase in February where I may also do 10.

Andrea, you have had a great year running, and your halfs keep improving. As you shape your plan decide whether your goal is to finish in 1 piece or around certain times. Good luck.

True Mike, the final 3-4 weeks is what gets me so I just threw some numbers on there. I'll look at some training plan examples and stuff to get an idea what would be best. I want to finish my first full in 1 piece and feeling that my training served me well, but I do expect soreness and a degree of pain.

Dave - I have been thinking of putting a run in on Saturday, at least adding that 6th day around the summer or after the June half marathon. Except for last week, which I am considering a cut back week - this month will consist of 30 mile weeks with hopefully the last one at 35, I've already done 2 weeks of 30 miles just before last week and so far so good. My plan for 2013 was to play it safe and take it slow when increasing mileage, giving me time to adapt to a number of miles and it paid off greatly. This plan I am showing you is a bit more aggressive though, and I am still keeping my original 2014 plan which was focused on increasing mileage but at a much more conservative "pace".

I am definitely open to suggestions, and the plan isn't set into stone so I am always willing to change it, or go with how I am feeling if the day calls for it.

At this very moment, I want to finish well - not real worried about where I place but I just want to enjoy it, not beat my body up too badly  but feel like I really had a challenging experience. I guess that is my goal, at least right now it is. Registration for the race begins on January 1, for the first 2 days it's $60 for the full (and I think it says the first 3,000 registrants?) and then it goes up to $110 afterwards. I'd like to only pay $60 so I am giving myself until then to think REALLY hard on it and see how this weekly mileage of 30 for December works on me. Of course even if I haven't made up my mind by then....... the $110 won't stop me either if I do decide to after 

I'd start with this.  What are your goals with the marathon?  Do you want to race it or do you just want to finish it?

Um... I don't think it, week 4? I'll take a look, see if maybe while re-editing I might have put in a higher number.

Edit: I looked on there, it says 35.1 on week 4. I don't have a 50 mile week on that training plan, I think the highest is 48 miles but I can always adjust things as needed.

That seems like a big jump to 50 miles in week 4.  Have you done anything like that before?

I must either being blind, or my computer is screwing with my head. Hold on

Aha, I see what you are doing there..... you were adding/going from January 19 (Sunday) to January 25 (Saturday). Both weeks if going from Sunday to Saturday instead of the RA week of Monday to Sunday have a half marathon race in there. Hmm... I definitely have a lot of tweaking to do with the plan, I don't think I've jumped like that yet...... at least not by a week, I have had good jumps from one month to the next - I think it was like a 20-25 mile increase from one month this past summer to the next....

The link in the OP takes me to January with week 4, Jan 19-25, having a total of 50.1 miles. Week 9 is also 50.1 and week 20 is 55 miles.

Definitely will do, strangely enough I just found the widget thingy lol. I've had the weekly and monthly stats on my log forever, but always wondered how others had the weather and stuff on there. Why does it only show the last... 6 months or so?

A couple of the figures you might want to pay attention to as you execute the schedule are the last 7 days and the last 30 days in the Rolling Totals widget on the RA Training Log summary page. I think they give a better indication of mileage and mileage increases that looking strictly at weekly totals.