The Great Half Marathon Training Plan

I'll be the first to admit that last year, Hannah and I jumped headfirst into training for a half marathon without really knowing what we were doing. We laced up our running shoes and hit the Mallard Creek Greenway after work twice a week and tried to up our distance each time that we went out for a run.

{our first 4.5 mile run last fall}

It was nothing but long runs.

It ended up working out just fine considering we both finished the race last December, but it seemed like there might have been a better way to go about it.

Last January, after my first half, I started running with a group called Run Far sponsored by Run For Your Life in Charlotte. The group was training for various half marathons and marathons... me, I was just going out so that I could learn how to properly train for one and so that I could keep up the whole running thing.

The biggest thing that I took away from the group was that you're not supposed to do a long run every single run. You don't just sit there and add distance. You have to train other ways, too! I learned how to train for speed and how effective hill running is. I learned that by cutting down my training to one long run a week and mixing it up with speed work / hill runs / cross training, I was getting better {and faster!!} at running.

So with that in mind, I set up a 19 {yes, 19!} week training plan for myself. I have no idea how much more effective this will be. I have no idea if I'm going to even hit all of the scheduled workouts. I know there will be some days where I just do not want to run. At all. There will be days where I'm not going out in the cold or the rain to tackle hills. Some days, a beer at Craft & Draft will have my name all over it. But hopefully, this will help me figure out what I need to be doing each day to tackle the Kiawah Half in December and it'll hopefully help me knock some time off of my PR.

Here's the grand plan:

Ugh.

It's a lot of running.

Is it bad that I'm already looking forward to about 10:30am on December 12th?

After a little bit of research, I've found four races to run during my training:

Stomp the Swamp 5K

Already regretting this one. It's going to be a hot, muggy mess of a race that will proably make me dislike running again. But it was a hot, muggy mess of a race last year that kickstarted our training so maybe it's good to get that kind of race in?

Ray Tanner Home Run 12K

ONLY because it's in Columbia, it's a good distance at that point in my training, and Clemson has an away game that day.

Boys & Girls Club of the Midlands Turkey Day 5K

I wish I was going to be running the South Park Turkey Trot again in Charlotte, but whatever. Running a race Thanksgiving morning is the best way to start the day.

ACC Championship 5K

1. It's a good reason to go up & visit friends in Charlotte!

2. It fits perfectly into the "tapering down" part of the schedule.

3. Maybe I'll have another reason to be in Charlotte later that day? Fingers crossed for my Tigers!

Alright, enough chatting. I need to go drink a billion glasses of water today so I'm hydrated for these muggy August runs after work this week!

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Check out my other running adventures here.