Marathon Training Plan

All spic and span before I head out on my marathon training plan

It's Sunday morning and as usual I wake up before my alarm clock.

To be precise, I open my eyes about two hours before the most annoying sound in the world kicks off. That little device and its shrill ringtone was downgraded in importance in my life some years ago to 'stand-by' status thanks to my ever increasing insomniac/hyper tendencies.

I do enjoy my down time at weekends but I also have lots of commitments -- a good thing as I don't have too much time to faff and I love getting to the end of a day and doing a check list of how I didn't waste my free time.

Being occupied keeps me out of trouble and my recent obsession with getting fit enough to run the Flora Womens Mini Marathon, co-sponsored by this newspaper, in under an hour this June 6 has kept me plenty busy.

So my intentions were good. I was up and about before 8am yet instead of slinging on the running gear I meandered around the house cleaning, polishing, ironing, cooking and doing anything else I could think of in order to NOT do my biggest run of the week.

The very run that will help me check my form is up to speed for the big day! Spot the procrastinator!

Denial

Every time I checked the kitchen clock I thought 'sure I'll just mess around getting other stuff done for a half an hour, the run can wait and then I'll give it socks'. This self-imposed mind game went on for two hours until I slung my ass out of chez-Dee.

What helped force me out the door was the that in the back of my addled and in-denial brain I have computed the fact that the race is only three weeks away! I've been sticking to my schedule -- it's just that any time I plan a morning run I will find ANY excuse to delay it. In the evenings, after work, it's all about being starving when you get home and acknowledging the fact that you are not going to leg it around Marlay after a big dinner. For me it's a quick snack, 20-minute sit down in my running clobber and then out the door -- simple. And then there is dinner to look forward to after the shower. And yes, I do plan what I am going to cook as I run!

Next Sunday is the big test as in order to get my time up I need to increase the distance I run -- so it's four rounds of Marlay at 10.30am. That's eight miles folks. And there will be no faffing as my running guru is picking me up at 10.30am. The cleaning will have to wait, because the Mini Marathon waits for no one!

Michelle Goes Running: Creating a Marathon Training Plan

Have a goal. If your goal is to simply finish and enjoy the race, I wouldn't recommend some advanced program with speed work, hill training, tempo runs, etc. I think that your plan should have at least one 20 mile long run three weeks prior to the big day Know your schedule. If weekend long runs don't work for you, play around with a training plan you find to make it fit your needs. There is no rule saying that long runs must happen on a Saturday or Sunday. I think that an effective training plan should be at least 12 weeks long. If you are already in marathon shape, that's another story (and blog post). Don't be afraid to change up the training plan if you find that it isn't working for you. If your plan calls for specific distances at specific paces and you find yourself falling short, don't beat yourself up. Just make some adjustments. I've only done 2 marathons so obviously I'm no expert. But I have done a lot of reading and know what I should be doing. Actually doing it is another story entirely. As we all know, anything can happen on race day. I learned that the hard way during the Seattle Marathon when I bombed at the half way point and realized I still had 13 more miles of hell to go. However, prior to the Eugene Marathon I spent a good 2 weeks practicing visualization and during the race I constantly gave myself pep talks and played mind games to pass the time and not give up. And it worked.

You might already know this (I mention in my blog from time to time) but I used the RLRF plan after my marathon fail in Chicago back in October. RLRF calls for 3 runs as you said and 2 x-training. To be honest, I barely did any cross-training. And I definitely did not do a long run every week. More like every third week. Nonetheless, I knocked my time down by 30 minutes in 6 months. Your running paces are much faster than mine- I am 100% confident that you will get a sub-4:15 very soon!

My marathon training plan was through Team In Training but had us running up to 4x per week with speed work and hill training included. Though my goal during my first marathon was to simply finish and that I did. If I did another one, I would definitely be on the hunt for a more in depth plan. I know you are going to do great things, I can't wait to follow you on your next marathon journey. :)

For some reason when I think summer, I think of Rascal Flatts and country music. I made a playlist for my car and it definitely has some of that on it. It's just good music that you want to roll your windows down to and blare! So I can see how it would be exciting to run to it! I am jealous you ran Eugene. I want to go there so bad and just feel the atmosphere because I'm sure it is runner central.

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