The Next 12 Weeks

The mind is a weird thing especially when it is starved of blood and oxygen.

At mile 9 during Sunday's race I for sure decided that I was going to quit this whole competetive running thing. This was my last race, ever. I was 100% convinced it was the right decision. I realised that eventually, no matter how hard I train, I am going to be unable to meet my goals. So why keep doing all this and having a really horrible, painful time during the dark, dark 3 miles at the end of all these races if the ultimate result is guarenteed to be failure? Who cares if my final fastest time is 1:34 or 1:10? I am highly unlikely to break the world record, I'm certainly not going to win any money and I don't need any more race T-Shirts. All seemed perfectly clear to me at the time.

Of course, by the time I'd caught my breath at the finish line I was over all of that, and now I've planned out the next 12 weeks training in excruciating detail. This will hopefully get me in shape to run the Los Gatos Jungle Half Marathon in less than 90 minutes - which is my ultimate goal for this distance in 2007. (I have no idea what the Jungle thing has do with Los Gatos, maybe they have released some lions to inspire you to run faster?)

So the plan between now and the big day of July 15th is all set. I need to get from a 7:11 pace to a 6:52 pace. Doesn't seem like much of a difference on paper, but 19 fewer seconds every mile is going to be tough. Also, I seem to have some sort of mental block in moving from 7:xx to 6:xx pace. I rarely get under 7:00 and when I do I am always amazed that I can actually run that fast. Doing it for 13.1 miles is still something my brain is struggling with.

Anyway, here's the keys to the training

Miles, lots and lots of them
Most of them will be at a relatively easy pace of 8:00-8:15. The basic format is 3 hard weeks getting steadily longer, followed by 1 shorter "cutback" week to give the body a chance to recover. Mileage will be 41,49,51,37,47,49,51,37,48,51,47,31 (race week)

Progressively faster speedwork
I begin this based on my current race pace, and I'll gradually go faster until I get to times based on my goal race pace. I do three types of speedwork....

Tempo runs. 1.5m mile warm up, gradually building up the speed, then run 3-6 miles at a pace about 10 seconds faster than race pace. Gradual slow down to finish with 1.5 miles cool down. I started these today with 3.5 miles at 7:00 over gently rolling hills, I end up in 12 weeks with 6 miles at 6:37 or faster. These are tough but I usually enjoy them.

Mile Repeats. 1/2 mile warmup, then run a fast mile on the track, 90 seconds jog to recover, then repeat for a total of 5 fast miles. Then a couple cool down miles to finish. Pace for these is about 30 seconds faster than race pace. I start these Friday at 6:40 pace and will end up at 6:24 or lower. These are just flat out ugly and unpleasant, so I figure they must be good for me.

Fast finish long runs. This is when you run the last 3-4 miles of a Sunday long run (12-16 miles) at half marathon race pace. These are actually fun in a sick kind of way.

10k races to assess progress
The first is in 4 weeks as an intermediate measure of progress. Plan is to run at 6:45, which will get me round in just under 42 minutes. My last 10k race (Jan 1st) was in 46:25 (7:28 pace) so I know I'll beat that since I run half marathons at a faster pace.

The second is in 8 weeks. The plan is to see if I'm really ready for a 1:30 half, which according to various running formulae equates to running a 10k at 6:30 pace (40:26 time). If I can do that, I then have 4 weeks to solidify the training and I will be ready for the lions of Los Gatos.

I must admit, it all looks absolutely perfect in excel, and the analytical/scientist side of me has already declared victory. But obviously the physical/athletic side of me still has it's work cut out.