Longest training plan

[JSmitty]

What is the longest length in weeks for a training plan for a half. In other words, how many months before embarking on a plan?
Is 12 weeks enough after a base building phase of 4 months?

[Jwolf]

What is the longest length in weeks for a training plan for a half. In other words, how many months before embarking on a plan?
Is 12 weeks enough after a base building phase of 4 months?

12 weeks should be enough as long as you're comfortable with distances of at least 10k.

[jgore]

Here is a simple 26-week marathon plan based strictly on time. I know you're not a novice and are planning on a half-marathon, but you could always follow this and make your longest runs 150 minutes (2.5 hours). If you had started last week, this would end on March 2nd. (I know because my SIL is hoping to do a half on March 2nd, provided she has solved her foot problems that prevented her from doing the ATB 30K last spring. I'm running with her 3x/week. We will be doing a lot of hilly routes.)

26-week Marathon Training (for novices)

[JSmitty]

Jim, interesting plan.
Do you vary the type of runs, or just go on the basic, tempo, long run. How do you gage your time for the race day?
I assume it would be run by perceived exertion?

Thanks

[Jwolf]

OK, now I'm confused-- are you looking for a long plan or a short plan?

[jgore]

Jim, interesting plan.
Do you vary the type of runs, or just go on the basic, tempo, long run. How do you gage your time for the race day?
I assume it would be run by perceived exertion?

Thanks

I convinced my SIL that the important thing for her is to build up the distance first. As I said, there will be a lot of hills, though only as part of the routes we run, not as hill repeats; we won't be sprinting up them. The most we'll work into a route will be about 6 or 7, but some every week.

We just run however we feel on the day, occasionally throwing in some pickups, at least until the distance is getting up there. Later in the schedule we may do tempo runs, but we'll wait and see how things are going. I believe in building up distance/stamina before throwing in other stuff.

[JSmitty]

OK, now I'm confused-- are you looking for a long plan or a short plan?

I don't understand the confusion... being that I generally go by distance, i asked how to gage the type of runs, and how this relates on race day if done based on timed runs.

[Jwolf]

I was actually going back to your original question. When I saw jgore's answer I realized we were answering different questions and I got confused- I'm easily confused.

From your original question- are you looking for a longer plan or are you asking whether 12 weeks is long enough?

[JSmitty]

I want to SLOWLY increase mileage by running 4 times a week. Currently I am doing 1.5 miles and the long run was 4 miles. Eventually I want one of the mid-week runs to be longer than the other two, probably Friday's run.
I should be at 19 miles going very conservatively with 3 runs of 3, 3 and 5 miles with the long ride topping at 8 miles.
This will be done over 25 weeks which will bring me to March to start training for the Ottawa Half.

It seems the base building is so long, but given that I haven't trained for a couple of years, it is probably the safest, and wisest decision. By the time training is upon me, perhaps I can get a 10k in to figure out pace.
Any thoughts and suggestions would be appreciated.

[Jwolf]

Building slowly is a good idea, and worrying about pace later. Your time frame seems fine.

One caveat though-- sooner rather than later, I would try to get your short runs up to about 30 minutes. Shorter than 20 minutes and you really aren't building all that much fitness. Even at a fairly slow rate of increase, you should be able to add 5 minutes each week to get those up over less than a month.

[jgore]

Are you going to try that schedule I posted? I'm running 5x/week, my SIL only 3x/week. The only change we made is that any run over 150 minutes is limited to 150 minutes. Due to past and on-going foot problems, she doesn't want to run any longer than that, which is what limits her to the half-marathon distance.

Anything under 50 minutes we will be running straight through, but she wants to do 10 & 1s for runs that are longer than that.

[JSmitty]

Building slowly is a good idea, and worrying about pace later. Your time frame seems fine.

One caveat though-- sooner rather than later, I would try to get your short runs up to about 30 minutes. Shorter than 20 minutes and you really aren't building all that much fitness. Even at a fairly slow rate of increase, you should be able to add 5 minutes each week to get those up over less than a month.

Yes, I was wondering about that. My issue is jumping right in...so the three runs would basically increase from 48 minutes to 96 minutes by Thanksgiving.
Would that be too much? Would I keep my long runs at 4 miles or can I increase that as well?

Jim, I am considering the plan as a base building for the moment. It would be good at the gym where most of my runs will be on the treadmill and the time is somewhat limited. I still am not sure how I can measure my fitness and my runs beyond the obvious fact that I would be running longer in the given time frame.

[Dstew]

Building slowly is a good idea, and worrying about pace later. Your time frame seems fine.

One caveat though-- sooner rather than later, I would try to get your short runs up to about 30 minutes. Shorter than 20 minutes and you really aren't building all that much fitness. Even at a fairly slow rate of increase, you should be able to add 5 minutes each week to get those up over less than a month.

Yes, I was wondering about that. My issue is jumping right in...so the three runs would basically increase from 48 minutes to 96 minutes by Thanksgiving.
Would that be too much? Would I keep my long runs at 4 miles or can I increase that as well?

Jim, I am considering the plan as a base building for the moment. It would be good at the gym where most of my runs will be on the treadmill and the time is somewhat limited. I still am not sure how I can measure my fitness and my runs beyond the obvious fact that I would be running longer in the given time frame.

My 2 cents"

After an extended time off from running and slowly regaining my form, I was talked into a half marathon by a coworker as they needed one more member of the team. It was "only" a half marathon so I agreed. Because it was a race and I was feeling so good, accelerated my running faster than I should have and was only saved by a nasty flu in part caught and knocked me out for several weeks because I was running too much. It is not a cliche or meaningless platitude to "listen to your body" and progress at a rate comfortable to you and not because of what some plan says. From a psychological point of view, you may even have that half in "pencil" and see how things are going when registration opens.

To put this a different way, the question is not can you follow a half marathon program of 12 weeks after 4 months of base building and run a half marathon as the answer is yes. The question I would pose given your history is should you as you can do it but there is the possibility of setting yourself up for chronic problems and having to stop running again. You may make excellent progress and have absolutely no problems or you might be able to get away with it and only have some minor aches and pains that just last a little longer. Do not be afraid to have cut back weeks or extra rest days or not add those miles when the program tells you to do so. I would treat any program not as the bible but as a guide.

When I was first returning, I was using the time method for the "long" run and that really seemed to help me. The game I would play is 30 minutes out and see how close to 30 minutes back I could be. That tended to really help make sure I was not too fast. When I switched over the miles, I made sure I jogged for 10 minutes as a "warm up " and "cool down" on either end of the runs and that also made a huge difference.

[JSmitty]

thanks for the input.

My 2 cents"

Do not be afraid to have cut back weeks or extra rest days or not add those miles when the program tells you to do so. I would treat any program not as the bible but as a guide. FOR SUREWhen I was first returning, I was using the time method for the "long" run and that really seemed to help me. The game I would play is 30 minutes out and see how close to 30 minutes back I could be. That tended to really help make sure I was not too fast. IN MY CASE I WOULD HOPE THAT I WOULD HAVE MORE DISTANCE ON THE BACK PORTION. I HAVE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO ACHIEVE A NEGATIVE SPLIT OR EVEN PACING. .

[Dstew]

thanks for the input.

My 2 cents"

Do not be afraid to have cut back weeks or extra rest days or not add those miles when the program tells you to do so. I would treat any program not as the bible but as a guide. FOR SUREWhen I was first returning, I was using the time method for the "long" run and that really seemed to help me. The game I would play is 30 minutes out and see how close to 30 minutes back I could be. That tended to really help make sure I was not too fast. IN MY CASE I WOULD HOPE THAT I WOULD HAVE MORE DISTANCE ON THE BACK PORTION. I HAVE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO ACHIEVE A NEGATIVE SPLIT OR EVEN PACING. .

The bonus is that such running is a good way to learn about even pacing or even a negative split. Just to confirm, I am not saying run 60 minutes but it is a nice round number. You go out in 30 minutes and back in 35 minutes shows that you went out too fast. Go out in 30 minutes, back in 25 minutes, maybe a little too slow. Or even try this with a 30 minute run. The theory is at the half way mark, one's body/mind/central governor starts to calculate how much energy and resources are going to be required to do that distance again. Without training to do that, the central governor may say, I have used up 50% but just case it gets hotter or more hills or whatever, I better slow the body down. And hence the positive split. But if you teach your body to run even splits at 20 minutes or whatever time, then it sees you know what you are doing and will not slow you down out of an abundance of caution. And there is also the possibility that you are going out too fast and at the half way mark, you have used up more than 50% of your resources so the central governor [for lack of a better term] may have no choice but to slow you down in order for you to complete the distance. Funny thing is I had completely forgotten I had done this training early on in my running career after a 19:30 first 5 K and then a 24 minute second 5 K. And thinking about it, not everyone is born with the ability to pace evenly and so it makes sense as we do speed work, etc that we also need to train how to evenly pace a race.