week 1 summary

Most marathon training programs start 18 weeks out from the date of the marathon. I started mine last Sunday, which gives me 21 weeks to prepare. Why start now? Well, I need more time to build a good base. Since the Lakefront Marathon in October, I've only been running an average of 15 miles per week. Plus, my half marathon was last Saturday, so last Sunday seemed like a good starting point.

My general plan for training for Grandma's Marathon is to base build with ALL slow miles until I reach ~75 miles per week. Then, the first week of April, I will start to incorporate some marathon-pace and tempo runs. Depending on how I'm feeling, in May I'll do a couple weeks of long intervals. And then it's tapering time!

I got Daniels' Running Formula from Amazon, as I heard it had some good info about marathon training. It has some tables with various race times and corresponds that to training paces. Based on my half marathon time of 2:09:41 (I know, didn't even get close to my goal...), all of my runs until April will be at an 11:09 pace. 11:09! I only run that slow when doing crazy long runs! Even my 19.5 mile training run was a little faster than that!

But I decided to trust in the guy with the exercise PhD. And guess what. 11:09 (or 11:06, as that's what 5.4 mph is on the dreadmill) makes runs enjoyable! It's easy in the sense that I probably COULD actually hold a conversation, and I'm not dying a half mile into the run. But it's still exercise, and I can tell it's going to work. I'm still dripping with sweat by mile 2. I still feel amazing afterward.

All that being said, I only got in 25 miles this week. The goal was 38. But I suppose 25 is okay for having raced the past Saturday. I did 4 on Sunday, 6 Tuesday, 8 Thursday, and 7 yesterday. All slow, all on the treadmill. I cannot motivate myself to get outside in this weather. :-/ But I've been using the hill interval program, which should make transitioning to outdoor running less awful once I grow the courage to do it.

Goal for week 2: 41 miles, with a long run of 13 on Saturday. And I WILL make it outside for that one.