Marathon Training Plan Changes

If you like my blog's Facebook page you already know that Mike and I are going to be changing our marathon training plan a little bit.  This post isn't meant to be an excuse, but I wanted to share WHY we are cutting back our running a little bit.

I LOVE sharing our training plans, our workouts, our races, etc. with everyone but sometimes I feel a lot of pressure. I am the perfect example of someone who constantly tells people to just run his or her own race (literally and figuratively), but even I get stuck on what other people are doing.

I also get really, really, really annoyed when people give way too much unsolicited advice or constantly say what works for them (in a way that makes it seem like that's what we should be doing). Well that's nice and all but you aren't me or Mike (and Mike and I are even different in what works for us and what doesn't, as hard as that is to accept sometimes), and that's a good thing.

This world would be really boring if we were all the same, even when it comes to running.  I love talking with our friends, Amber and Greg, about running but there is no way in hell I am ever going to be able to run 50 days in a row or run a 1:29 half marathon like Greg just did last weekend. Ali hits PRs by only running 3 days a week, which is AMAZING, but I love running too much to just run 3 days a week.  And I would go bat-shit crazy all the time if I didn't run more than that, just being honest.

I love running!

I love talking with other people about what they do, but don't be offended if I don't do what you do.

When I made our marathon training plan this time, I wanted to do more than one 20 miler and Hal Higdon's Intermediate Marathon training plan did just that.  It also has you run 5 days a week.  I was a little bit hesitant because I knew that once 70.3 training started in March that the 5th day of running would have to go and also because Mike and I are injury-prone.

 This is what February was supposed to look like

I thought that we could handle it for a few weeks, but today I just felt like it was too much.  This is our third week of marathon training and Mike only ran 4 times the first two weeks and I ran 4 times and then 5 times.

When I run, I don't really take many "easy" runs.  Even our long run is at a pace that is a little bit faster than I should be going (which is another topic entirely), add the one day of speed work and one day of hill training and my legs were waving the white flag.  

I successfully completed our first marathon with only 4 days of running, and quite a bit of cross training until the last month, and Mike got to mile 18.5.

That should have been an indication to me that maybe 4 days was good enough, but I have to admit sometimes seeing what other people do makes me want to do it too.

I might still run 5 days a week if I feel good but just to put into perspective all of the OTHER things that we are doing this is what my month of January looked like in terms of miles:

Swimming - 4.2

Biking - 112

Running - 84.75

We also did strength training once a week.  The last two Tuesdays I have done a full triathlon (in the wrong order and with more "transition" time than normal) after work.

My "triathlon" stuff

In the end, I want to finish two marathons and our half Ironman this year without any injuries.  Cutting out a few miles here and there isn't going to hurt our chances of doing that, and actually it will probably INCREASE our chances of finishing all three of those races.

In order to get ready for half Ironman training, we are going to ditch our mid week longer run and keep running on Saturdays and Sundays.  Once 70.3 training starts in March, we will run on Saturdays and bike on Sundays and our midweek longer run will be back.

I think I am becoming a better runner/triathlete because I am realizing that I need to be more flexible and do what is best for me, rather than what other people tell me is best for me.  And that's a good feeling.

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