Some Magic Would Be Nice – Surrey Half Saturday

Today marks the first day of training for my upcoming half marathon, being run as part of the Surrey International World Music Marathon weekend.  I haven’t run a half since June 2010 as I focused on 3 fulls, one ultra, and, now, adapting to heart-rate training.  I guess the only thing I can really say about how I’m feeling is, “This should be interesting.”

I have only ever trained using one program’s methods – that of the Running Room.  If you’re Canadian you know that RR is a bit of a Canadian institution.  You might not be a fan, nor do you have to be, but when I was starting out in 2009 they were the closest running store offering a learn to run program.  I liked their promotion of walk/run training (all long runs are done as 10+1s) and have found some great friends because of them.  However, I dropped out of the half clinic last summer due to never being able to make the runs and, to be honest, not really clicking with the instructor.  You might remember that I also dropped the full clinic this past spring once I had the lactate test because I simply couldn’t keep up.  So where do I go this year?

Well, I’m not “going” anywhere.  This is a purely self-directed training cycle as it didn’t make any sense to drop out of a 3rd clinic!  I am really excited to be following the training program found in Train Like A Mother by Dimity McDowell and Sarah Bowen Shea, who also penned Run Like A Mother.  It’s titled HALF-MARATHON: Own It and I have high hopes for it!  It follows the standard training regimen of long runs, easy and recovery runs, hills, tempo runs, and speed work.  I think the reason I want to do it is that it’s just different enough from what I’ve been doing to seem new.  I get the principles already so I’m not intimidated, but they are much more specific than what I have been doing so it will be challenging.  What I also like is that they include what zones I should be running in and, since I’ve already got my numbers (you could do it by perceived effort if you haven’t tested), I should be able to achieve those runs with (hopefully) few problems.

Another thing that is different for me is that my long runs are moving to Saturdays!  I have been a firm Sunday LSD runner since I began running.  However, with work commitments and Colin also wanting to do long runs, Saturdays just seemed like a better fit.  I’ll be getting out really early or going out in the evening depending on my shifts, but at least it will keep it interesting!

As you can see from the post title this will be a regular blog feature.  Surrey Half Saturday will cover how my training is going, what I was up to during the week (training log style), and any other stuff going on with the event.  Please check back each week to follow along, give me encouragement or a kick in the butt, and let me know how your running is doing as well.  If you are running any of the Surrey races tell me so we can catch up on race day!