Now that I’m done with Insanity, I have to focus on building my mileage up for my September half marathons. In all honesty, I kind of wish I hadn’t signed up for them. Even though I did run some with Insanity, it was much harder than anticipated (more on that when I post the full Insanity review later this week).
Through Insanity I’ve basically been doing 1-2 trail runs a week at lunch, and one long-ish run on the weekends. I’ve gotten up to 8 miles, but then last weekend I didn’t do any running. Exploring the mountains > squeezing in a long run. Now that I’m less than 5 weeks away, it’s time to do put together some semblance of a training plan. On the other hand, I have been following a very strict and rigid training plan through Insanity for 63 days and I need some flexibility so I don’t burn out.
Plus, my goal for these races is simply to finish without injury.
Starting next week, I’ll be aiming (at the minimum) for one speed workout, one trail run, and one long run every week. I’d like to do two trail runs per week because I’m much more nervous about the trail half than the road half. If I’m not feeling confident about the trail half in a few weeks, I’ll drop down to the 10K.
My weekend long run mileage from here on out will go 10, 10, 11, 12. To make up for the missed run this weekend, I woke up early this morning to hit 8 miles before work.
It has been months since I ran before work. After spending the last two summers training for marathons in DC heat and humidity, it’s kind of nice that I skipped over all the hot months. Since I haven’t been running much, I expected this run would suck.
To my surprise, it was a really great run. It was 59 degrees when I left the house. I was reunited with my favorite route around Sloan’s Lake, with views of the mountains on one side and views of the sun coming over the Denver skyline on the other. There were ducks and geese and boats. I saw some familiar faces from the winter months. I was happy to be spending time outside and finishing my workout before 7:30 am.
Let’s hope this feeling stays for the next 5 weeks!
Did you finish Insanity? I’m going to have to read back some. Curious how you liked it. I did it for a month and wasn’t a huge fan, and I didn’t end up running much either. I need to rn at Sloan’s Lake sometime!!
I’m kind of in the same boat…although I haven’t signed up for any half marathons and I don’t have a solid 8 mile base. But, I do have my eye on a trail half in November with the sole goal of surviving.
I don’t want a strict training plan but I don’t want to die. Right now my “plan” has a goal distance for my long run and then another goal of running at 100-150% of that long run distance during the week as well. So if my long run is 6 miles, I want to get 6-9 miles in during the week as well. Not lofty, but I’m still betting I’ll have weeks where I struggle to hit that goal…there is biking to do, WODs to attempt and textbooks to be read!
Good luck with the training…and have fun with the races!
very jealous of your temps and views!
59 degrees???? I’m soooo jealous!!!!! I am CRAVING cooler morning runs and ready to be done with August! Plus I’m doing the Parks Half in a week and a half, and I’m getting really excited that fall racing is starting. Apparently, in my mind, that means cooler temps and apple cider are coming.