I've Got a Plan
Ok, so my maintenance miles have ended this week. I have kept my goal of 20-25 miles per week since my Marathon on June 20th. I have surpassed this goal on several occasions and feel very strong to train for the next Marathon in November.
Runner's World has a great training plan guide called the Smart Coach. You type in your weekly mileage, the level (easy, moderate, hard) of training you would like to do, your distance that you are training for, your most recent race time, and how many weeks you would like to train. From that, it calculates a Marathon plan. I put in Moderate because it keeps my during-the-week-runs between 5 and 8 miles, which I can handle before going to work without having to think of the 4 am hour. Ok, when it get to 7 and 8 miles, I'll have to figure that out....oh, dark thirty.
The plan is reasonable and seems easy. What I do not understand in these Marathon training schedules is how I am supposed to run so slow on Easy and Long runs. Am I missing something? I definitely pace differently for each type of run, but I do not know how to run at an 11:34 pace unless I have already worn myself out for 20 miles. I want improve my time by 15 minutes for the next marathon. This is completely possible and will keep me a healthy runner. I want to run for a long time.
It's going to be a good race. Thanks Runner's World!
Hey, Ruthie. Do you run with a heart rate monitor?? That is probably a better way to track easy and long runs rather that pace. Check out these articles...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.source-e.net/public-content/lactate-threshold-what-it-and-why-it-s-important
http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=633
So you figure out what your LT is then you can base your zones on that. An easy run would be Z1-Z2. Good luck!!