Thursday, December 11, 2008

I need help with training plans

Rich and I are using Hal Higdon's novice half-marathon training plan to train for MB half and it is going great so far. We are on week 7/12. We are running Napa-to-Sonoma Half in July, so we have about 5 and a half months between them. All you fabulous runners out there, please give me some advice on how to train for the 2nd one, what your favorite half-marathon plans are, etc. I know it is quite a while in the future, but I want to go ahead and get my calendars marked and ready and start penciling in some 5 and 10ks as well. Maybe it's too early to start looking at training plans for July, I guess I should see how MB goes first, but I love to plan so I can't resist!

3 comments:

Aron said...

i am doing the napa to sonoma half too!!!

i havent trained for a half marathon specifically, they have all been during marathon training so i dont have much help... sorry!

Anonymous said...

I really didn't have a set plan for my 2 half marathons this year. They were both in spring and I was just figuring things out. I take bits and pieces from various programs and make them fit my schedule. With each race I run I learn something that I incorporate into my next training.

Sorry this doesn't help much.

Lindsay said...

i completely understand the need to have a training plan! you can definitely go ahead and put something together, just keep in mind that things may change and stay open to tweaking it as the actual training period gets closer.

if mb goes well and you like hal's novice plan, maybe you could consider moving up to an intermediate level. i usually start with a program like one of hal's and edit it to fit me a little better (extending it out a few weeks, increasing mileage, adding in workouts i like, etc). it's easy to modify a 'base plan' like hal's because you know you will be getting at least the minimum mileage in, and you can tweak to it to make it more enjoyable, which will in turn make it easier to do!

if you want to build your own from scratch there are some books out there by arthur lydiard or pete pfitzinger. i know many marathoners use their plans and i'm sure you could apply it to half training too. the website "runbayou.com" has a "vdot" calculator. you type in a recent race time for just about any distance and it gives you times you could expect to run in other distances, as well goal paces for each type of training run. under each goal workout pace it suggests the percentage of your weekly mileage that should be done at that speed.

after mb, give your legs a week or so to rest - no running! definitely do some "active recovery" if you are up for it but give yourself a break and time to recover. then you could take 2 months at your regular/average mileage to maintain fitness/build a base, before starting an 'official' training period.

hope i at least gave you a few ideas. i built a plan for all of 2009 back in september but have been continually working on it since then, and probably will through most of next year too! good luck and have fun!