Base miles are finally over and I’m finally back on a training plan! I’m excited to have structure back in my running and my workouts will be focused on the goal of running Columbus half in October. I’ve made a few changes for this plan, mostly because I’m still a bit worried I could fall back into the injured category. Here’s what’s different this time around.

-Back to 16 weeks. I’m spreading out my mileage more than my sweet spot of 14 weeks. Hopefully I won’t get burnt out with the longer training schedule.

-Running 4 days a week. I’d prefer to run up to five days, but I’m keeping mileage a bit lower this time, and adding more days to recover in between workouts.

-Lower mileage. I’ve always done well on the lower end of mileage, but I’m keeping it a bit lower than normal. Lower mileage plus fewer days running will hopefully keep me injury free.

-Yoga, lifting, and ab work. The more cross training I do, the stronger I hope to be.

Here’s what I have planned for the next 16 weeks.

And now to week one recap.

Monday: 4 Miles + Abs & Hips

Tuesday: 0

Wednesday: 3.25 Miles (1 mile w/u, 2×800 w/200 recovery, 1 miles c/d) + Abs & Hips

Thursday: 6 Miles

Friday: 0

Saturday: 3.5 Miles

Sunday: 0

Total Miles: 16.75 Miles

Monday was the first day of the training cycle, and typically I use Monday as a rest day. Because of some travel later on in the week, I had to get my run in then. Lucky for me, it was incredibly hot and still 90 degrees when I got home from work. But even though it was toasty, I still managed to stay just above 9:00 and my legs still wanted to go faster. Thankfully I had sprinklers to keep me cool along the way.

Wednesday was the first track workout of the cycle. I ended up at a new track near my parent’s house and ended up having the whole thing to myself. It was nice to focus in and not have any distractions. Starting from scratch, I did just two 800’s, and ran 3:51 and 3:47. It’s been a long time since I did 800’s, but they felt a lot better than the 400’s from a few weeks ago.

I ended up running my long run on Thursday. Typically my long run would start at 8 miles, but I decided to start at 6. I met up with Mo and we ran a loop through her neighborhood. It was pretty hilly, and my legs were a bit tight. But I still managed to get it done in a decent pace. It wasn’t my best run, but they can’t always go as planned.

We traveled to Houston over the weekend so I moved things around to do my recovery run on Saturday. And I’m so glad I did. I went out with Cori and her pup and we headed to Hermann Park. I was definitely not prepared for the heat and humidity. As early as 7am it was already 85 and felt like 90+.  I felt like I was wearing heavy fleece and had a harder time than usual breathing. I had to take a few walk breaks, but we managed to get 3.5 miles in.

 

It was a good first week of training. I got all my workouts in and even though my mileage was lower than I typically run, I hit all my miles. I’m hoping to stick to the plan as much as I can, but also know that things may happen and if I feel any ounce of lingering injury then it’s time to back down.

I’m excited to get back into training and see what the next 16 weeks hold!