As I write this, the New York City Marathon is just 74 days away!!
I restarted my training last week and so far I am pretty excited about it. To keep myself going, I invested in the New York Road Runners Virtual Training program. For just $49.99, I entered a bunch of info about my running history and current habits and it not only spit out a custom 12-week training program for me, it adjusts as I go along depending on the info I enter about each run.
While I should probably have chosen the conservative plan, I thought it was too conservative for me (giving me a target finish time well over five hours when I definitely want to finish closer to 4:40 or so). I went with the moderate plan instead, which has me running five days a week (something I have not done consistently in years), with one “flex” day and one rest day.
My first week on the program looked like this:
Monday: Rest (I did some yoga in the morning).
Tuesday: “Regular” run of four miles at an 11:11 per mile pace. I also did resistance training afterwards.
Wednesday: Five mile interval run, with four 1000 meter bursts of speed.
Thursday: I used my flex day to cross-train on the elliptical for 25 minutes. I also did yoga in the morning and resistance training after the elliptical.
Friday: I made the mistake of waiting until after work to run and it was crazy hot! Nonetheless, I got in a four mile run at an 11:00 per mile pace, with several 15-second bursts at the end.
Saturday: An “as you feel” run of four miles – basically this means I ran without a watch and just ran at whatever pace I felt comfortable at on a route I knew well.
Sunday: My first long run on the plan! While the plan called for eight miles, I upped it to 10 because my last long run was nine miles. I also have a half marathon in just a few weeks so I want to get ready for that. It was 90% humidity when I got up at 5 a.m. to get the run in, but I managed to get through it at an 11:14 per mile pace. Not bad! And I had the added bonus of enjoying a beautiful sunrise over Lake Michigan like the one above.
The heat did get to me and I was exhausted the rest of Sunday, but I’m used to that with marathon training during Chicago summers. Overall, I felt good about getting in five runs and hitting my mileage and paces each time (and really doing better than the plan had prescribed!). Added bonus? I’m down two pounds since I returned from hiking in the Balkans, meaning I’ve lost a total of 18 pounds since January. Sweet! On to next week!
p.s. only 74 days until the marathon also means I have just 74 days to meet my fundraising goal of $3,500 for buildOn! I hope you’ll help support the great work they do to promote education and alleviate poverty around the world and make a donation today!
