Sustained training plans at 1/2 marathon distance?

[Robbi]

Hi folks,

My long run is now at 16km, so it's a matter of time before I hit 21 (yay!). I'm re-evaluating training plans, but everything around 21km is event based with a ramp. It's almost as if no-one is doing any sustained training around that distance.

Am I missing a trick here? Should I be periodizing training on an event basis even at this distance? I think of some of you guys going for a 'casual' 16 mile run and it seems to fly in the face of this event-based thinking.

Currently my training is simple, I take my long run distance and divide by three. That gives me a short, medium and long distance. My schedule goes as follows:

Monday: Medium Distance, fast pace
Tuesday: Cross Training
Wednesday: Medium Distance, fast pace
Thursday: Short distance, easy pace or rest day (usually rest, as I travel often on Thursdays)
Friday: Cross Training
Saturday: Long Distance, easy pace

I'm not trying to be majorly competitive, but I do want to get faster and stronger to have a sense of progression. Any reason not to just keep this up? Am I missing a trick?

 

[Barefoot Gentile]

I like to train for a specific race with specific distances, but after the race is done and over with I run freely without a schedule. If I constantly maintain a "training plan" it's causes me to lose interest in running and burn out, this from personal experience. I run one or two marathons a year, and a few half marathons thrown in there, I will set up a training plan for those races I like some kind of structure for a race goal. If a half marathon doesn't fall to short from a previous race, I don't have to go crazy with long runs or "officially" be in training mode. I will already be pre-conditioned.

Personally I am not the one to go out and run 15 or 20 miles just for the heck of it, no interest at all in doing that. When not in training for something I like to run 10 miles on the weekend as my long run, it's a happy medium distance for me.

 

[BFwillie_g]

I ran 15 miles on Tuesday, for the heck of it. And 16 miles today, lol. Through snow and ice and mud, uphill, downhill, without a plan or goal... But I'm working on general endurance for an ultra run in May. This was a backed-down week. Next week will have more runs and more mileage, but nothing strict, no 'plan'.

When I ran shorter distances competitively, I found two things really useful: Tempo runs well above my race pace, and about half the race the distance; long runs well below race pace but a hell of a lot longer.

If I were to srsly train to run a good time in a half-marathon, I'd stick to a plan, similar to what you describe. But it would be a twelve-week cycle based around two six-week cycles of increasing intensity. Something like, start with eight levels of intensity with 1 being quite an easy week and 8 being as badass as you can manage, up there in high-risk territory. And then the twelve weeks would look like this, listed according to the intensity levels:

1,2,3,4,5,6, 3,4,5,6,7,8 - followed by a week at level 1-3 that finishes on race day. BAM.

But I don't do that stuff anymore. And there are a million variations on the theme. Macro and microcycles are where it's at, though, so familiarize yourself with the concept.

Whatever you do, make sure that whatever approach you take makes sense to you and that you enjoy it

More specific to your questions: "Am I missing a trick here? Should I be periodizing training on an event basis even at this distance?"

Periodization is the way to go if your goal is to hit your fastest time at a specific race. Just goofing around week in and week out is ok, too, but it's not going to give you the results you seem to be looking for. You're not missing anything. This is why the plans you're seeing are all similar. Those of us who go off and run 16 (or 10 or 30) miles for kicks aren't doing it because we want to win races.

 

[Barefoot Gentile]

BF_Willie, you are a stronger man than me, that's incredible.

 

[BFwillie_g]

BF_Willie, you are a stronger man than me, that's incredible.

you missed the 'if' up there, Adam, lol. It was a big 'if', the kind that means 'I don't do that stuff anymore!'

 

[Barefoot Gentile]

haha, I did! Cheers man!

 

[Robbi]

Thanks, BFwillie_g, that sounds like great advice, and you answered my general question as well. I'm going to keep my rhythm until I'm doing 21+ comfortably, then look at turning up the wick a bit for a specific event.

Cheers, have a great weekend!

 

[BFwillie_g]

Thanks, BFwillie_g, that sounds like great advice,

Well, not really advice per se, just my thoughts and the way I used to do things. You might want to get Phil Hart involved in the conversation. Maybe post in the Coaches Corner?

 

[JosephTree]

Sounds like a younger fellows game to me. I follow the "what do I feel like running today" school of training. My decisions are somewhat framed by my race schedule, but I don't really want to push myself anywhere near an injury (again), nor do I want to push beyond the kind of running I enjoy. My bow to speed training is to put more long hills into my routes.

All that said, I am a little concerned that my times will not equal last year's. We'll see.