Monday, March 08, 2010

A New Training Plan and Week 1 in Reverse

I guess that one of the benefits of early marathon registration is that it has given me motivation to start training.  Yes, it's early to start training for October, but I'm not doing marathon training right now.  I've started following Hal Higdon's Intermediate Spring Training Plan.  Last year, Hal Higdon said that if I followed his plan, I would finish a marathon.  He was right, so I have no problem going back to him for all my training needs.

The focus of this plan is building strength and speed.  No looong runs, but a lot of hill workouts, intervals, tempo runs, and other such things.  I'm using this build speed so that the sub-4 hour marathon becomes a reality.

As for what I did in week 1, here it is, in reverse.

Sunday, March 7: 6 miles, ~56 min.  This was fantastic.  The weather was spectacular (shorts and shortsleeves weather).  There were gaggles of people out.  I did a Summit/River Rd. route, and managed to nail a puddle as I turned around.  I worried about my feet, but my Nike socks did a great job.

Saturday, March 6: 30 min Tempo Run.  A Tempo Run is a very specific workout with a 10 minute easy warm-up, 10-15 minutes of building speed gradually, and a 10 min cooldown.  The building part is tough, and I pushed myself pretty hard.  The hardest part, though, was choosing a route that avoids red lights.  When I hit a light, I turned so that I could keep going, but it didn't always work out.  In the future, I may drive and park at the river, or maybe the lakes.

Friday, March 5: Rest

Thursday, March 4: 3ish miles, 40ish min.  This is the one spot where I deviated from the plan.  It called for 3 miles and strength training.  I wanted to take advantage of the Dome while it was still open, so I ran there.

Wednesday, March 3: 3 Hill Repeats.  These were tough.  I picked the Marshall Ave. hill, and it is steep.  Definitely one of the tougher workouts of the week.

Tuesday, March 2: 3 miles.  Nothing special here, just a good, early morning run.

Monday, March 1: 3 miles + Strength Training.  I suffered for 30 minutes on the deathmill, did a bit of strength training.  I ran into the problem of needing to do bench presses, but without a spotter.  I'm not lifting much weight, but I know you shouldn't bench without a spotter.  I think I solved that problem this week, though.

That was my week.  Below you'll find my personal training calendar, I haven't filled it out completely, but it will always be up to date.

2 comments:

titus said...

"Yes, it's early to start training for October, but I'm not doing marathon training right now. I've started following Hal Higdon's Intermediate Spring Training Plan."

I can think of at least one other group of people already preparing for October, so it doesn't sound that crazy. Although I think they get paid a lot more...

On a related note, is this new training plan similar to Tony La Russa's Intermediate Spring Training Plan, otherwise known as passing out at stoplights?

Matt said...

Similar, but much cheaper. I don't have to pay for tickets, bond, lawyers, etc. I just pass out for free.

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