Lessons Learned

This week marks the first full week of actual Half Marathon training.  The first three weeks of training were borrowed from a 5k training plan since my Half training plan only went 20 weeks.  Things I have learned so far this week...


1)  Intervals equal pain.
After reading some websites and getting suggestions from my guru, I decided to embark on my 2-mile training yesterday by doing interval training.  So, I took my 9 laps = 1 mile indoor track and alternated laps between walking and interval training.  On the interval training laps, I sprinted the straightaways and walked the curves.  And what did I get for my exhaustive efforts?  PAIN!  I woke up this morning with calf pain and arm pain.  I guess I expected the calf and shin soreness, but arms?  Who knew that you used your arm muscles to run??  I do now............and those 18 laps around the track taught me lesson #2..

2)  I can't count that high.
As most of you know, I have been doing a mix of training at the indoor track and outside.  This week, I learned that when there are more than four laps to a mile, counting laps while running is difficult.  Even with the aid of my split time counter on my heart rate monitor, I still found myself missing clicks of the split timer and lap counts.  As a result, I decided to try something different on day three for my first 3-mile training session.  What I learned from that.....

3)  Treadmills are NOT for running.
After a few weeks of training on the indoor track and outside, I decided to head back to the treadmill today for my first 3-mile.  Yeah........not such the greatest of ideas.  I couldn't find my own personal rhythm on the treadmill and I'm sure my walk time was way too slow when I was walking.  Add that to the pain from earlier in the week and it was the slowest training session I've had to date.  Good news though...I did finish my first 3-mile training session.  I think that finishing today was the bulk of the battle.  Sunday's 3-mile will be completed with actual jogging though.

After part one of week one of full training, I am sore and frustrated that I am not doing better.  I'm trying to figure out how to make my training more fun each session.  Intervals were fun AND they were hard...that's the best!  There also has to be a way to figure out the training sessions so that I am mixing hard shorter workouts with my long endurance runs with the midlevel runs.  I'm not sure what the best course of action is on those...I had worked out an initial idea of doing the following:

Monday: rest days
Tuesday: always a midlevel day from 3-5 miles: probably doing increasing time training (more time jogging each with with diminishing recovery time)
Wednesday: always 2 miles: these will be intervals...
Thursday: always a midlevel day from 3-5 miles: light days for recovery after intervals or time training...or strength training...
Friday: listed as rest/cross-training so I'm thinking yoga or something to keep me injury free!
Saturday: midlevel days...same as Tuesday
Sunday: long runs...just finish them using varying techniques as the runs get longer...

Not sure how that will work out but it's what I'm thinking anyway...here's to my yoga day tomorrow!