Marathon Training Begins (Kind Of)

I’m training to run a marathon.

I’ve run two half marathons, a 15K, and a handful of 5K and 10K races.  I’ve been running for just over 2 years.  But a funny thing happens every year (all 2 of them!) when I finish my half marathon.  I quit running.  It gets hot and humid outside, I’m sore, I deserve a break…you name the excuse and I’ve probably used it.  Then when I finally do resume running I try to pick back up where I left off and end up hurt.  So, this year when I resumed running I vowed to do it slowly so I wouldn’t get hurt (hopefully).  I’ve been doing a combination of running and walking 3-4 times a week for about 2 months now. 

I’m approaching this very carefully.  First, I’ll run for several months to establish a solid base.  Then, I’ll begin a four month half marathon training plan.  After successfully completing my half marathon in May I will continue to strengthen my base until mid-June when I will begin officially training for a fall marathon.

I’ve decided to do a training plan that identifies training by time, rather than distance.  I get hurt every year at some point during training, and I think a lot of my problem is speed.  Not that I have speed mind you.  I’m actually quite slow.  But I try to do speed workouts, or keep up with a faster paced runner.  Or more often, my training plan says I’m going to do 4 miles, so I’m going to do 4 miles darnit, but I’m tired of being out here on my feet so I’m now going to sprint the last half mile so I can just be done already.  Then I end up hurting myself during those little sprints.  No more!  This year I’m going to run for time.  If I’m supposed to run 45 minutes, then that’s what I’ll do whether I make it 3 miles or 8 miles (yeah right!) in that time.  I’m hoping this will discourage me from doing crazy things to try to make up distance, and maybe my knees and hips will make it to race day in working order.