Wednesday, January 7, 2009

January 6, 2009 - day off

well it was cold, snowy, and very windy out tonight. i was planning to go for an evening run but never made it out the door.. lol too busy getting caught up on e-mails. oh well, a day off now and then doesn't hurt!

Jennifer

4 comments:

Arthur Drayton said...

Jennifer, I am curious about something...do you just run or do you follow a strucured plan? I know right now you are recovering but when you are training for a race do you do speedwork once a week and a threshold run as well? Just curious.

Jennifer McCreath said...

i sort of have a guideline but i wouldn't call it a formally structured plan..

i usually do speed work once a week (3 one mile sprints with 5-10 minute breaks in between).

and one slow long run a week..

tempo/thresold work is something i probably should take more seriously..

i don't generally train specifically for races, but it is my goal to try to get my overall level of fitness to a point where i feel i am capable of running an official marathon on a monthly basis.

Arthur Drayton said...

go to www.runningplanet.com and get a decent plan...it'll help big time, plus it is cheap($10) or at no cost at all.

But from what I can tell right now you have a few errors in your running schedule...first you do too many short runs. 16K a day is great but it is best done as one run or as a separate 6 miler and 4 miler, one in teh morning and the other in the evening. Breaking up 16K or so into 3 runs is not a good idea for enhancing your endurance capability.

The other thing is Threshold runs...for a marathoner these are more important than the speed intervals. You should do a 4-8 mile (plus 1 mile warm and 1 mile cool) threshold run once a week at a pace that is between 10K and 1/2 marathon pace(about 7 mins/mile for you). Make sure you throw off the headphones too for this one...wear the phones on the easy days if your want.

trust me on this and you will find Boston will be ALOT easier come April 20th.

Jennifer McCreath said...

yah i realize that. most of my runs back and forth to the pond shouldn't really even count as runs.. lol in the peak running seasons, i generally do at least 4 consistent runs of 10K or more per week. plus one or more long runs.

ahh, i see what you mean by threshold runs. i did that on a more frequent occasion in 2008 than 2007. i've found getting myself involved in official 5K and 10K races really improved things overall for me.. got me getting used to running at faster paces for longer times.. got me from running 4 hour marathons in 2007, to 3:20 marathons in 2008.

my strength, speed, and endurance will take a significant hit over the next year as i further transition from male to female.. so i definitely don't plan to worry too much about my finishing times in 2009.
runningplanet.. thanks for the tip, i'll definitely be checking it out.

Jenn