Sunday, July 12, 2009

Time to Refocus

So today took an extraordinary  amount of willpower not to strap on my running shoes and go for run. I woke up around 7 and enjoyed a leisurely morning at home with my daughter. We went mini-golfing later in the morning and she went swimming with a friend in the afternoon. I'm feeling a lot better. My throat isn't sore and I'm not feeling as fatigued. I'm going to take the rest of the week to rest some more and re-energize.

Which is where you come in....up until now, the focus of my training was distance. This is the first summer where I'm not running a fall marathon. Instead, my goal race is the Asbury Park Marathon Relay on October 18. Allen and I will each be running 13.1.

Training for a half marathon is much different that full marathon training. I'm usually not one to toot my own horn but I could probably run a half marathon right now if I had to. It wouldn't be my fastest, but I would finish. Needless to say, my goal for Oct. 18 is to set a half marathon PR. I think a 1:45 (8:01 pace) half marathon is well with my reach. I'm not so sure about a 1:40 (7:38 pace). What I need help with is a plan. I'd like to stick with my existing schedule: Long run on Sundays, tempo runs on Tuesdays, speed work on Wednesdays, and a recovery run on Fridays. I also know that I should aim to run my long and tempo runs at a certain pace. What pace and for how long? Does someone out there want to put together a half marathon training plan for me?

2 comments:

Jake said...

have you ever looked at the FIRST training plan in "Run Less, Run Faster"? rw.com has plenty of info on it, and i know that jason over at nycin310.com has written about it a bit.

i like their plans because they incorporate a tempo, interval, and long run each week, and i tweak it a bit to work in extra miles via recovery runs and/or crosstraining. they also give very specific paces for each workout.

Michelle said...

I am trying to work on a schedule too.

At least I know what I am doing on Wednesday evenings SPEEDWORK and I am really looking forward to it.

Thank you!!!