Monthly results are in
I'm not sure what this means, but it looks as if I've just had my most successful January of running.
I easily exceeded my very modest goal for monthly miles. I view the months of October, following my marathon, through February as my offseason. Accordingly, I plan only to train minimally. I call it a maintenance plan. It consists almost entirely of short runs -- four miles -- at paces much slower than I would consider acceptable for any other time of the year.
For January, I merely want to log 31 miles -- a single mile per day. For February, I want to ramp up my mileage to 56 miles, or two miles per day. Then, come March, I shoot for an average of three miles per day. These incremental increases in mileage have kept me injury-free and helped establish the base mileage I need when my marathon training begins in earnest in April.
I logged a whopping 74 miles this January. That's more miles than I've ever run in January -- props to Mother Nature for the unseasonably mild weather that allowed me twice to run in shorts in Minnesota in January -- and puts me ahead of my schedule by a month. Now I can either increase my mileage to keep me ahead of schedule or I can maintain my mileage as I prepare for March.
The key thing for me to remember is that I gain nothing by logging extra miles at this time of year. If I run 100 miles in each of the year's first two months and then become ill, get injured or take a prolonged break before March, it's all meaningless.
I have to stay within myself. Run when it feels right. Get in the occasional run of more than four miles. Ignore when my watch tells me how slow I am right now.
I easily exceeded my very modest goal for monthly miles. I view the months of October, following my marathon, through February as my offseason. Accordingly, I plan only to train minimally. I call it a maintenance plan. It consists almost entirely of short runs -- four miles -- at paces much slower than I would consider acceptable for any other time of the year.
For January, I merely want to log 31 miles -- a single mile per day. For February, I want to ramp up my mileage to 56 miles, or two miles per day. Then, come March, I shoot for an average of three miles per day. These incremental increases in mileage have kept me injury-free and helped establish the base mileage I need when my marathon training begins in earnest in April.
I logged a whopping 74 miles this January. That's more miles than I've ever run in January -- props to Mother Nature for the unseasonably mild weather that allowed me twice to run in shorts in Minnesota in January -- and puts me ahead of my schedule by a month. Now I can either increase my mileage to keep me ahead of schedule or I can maintain my mileage as I prepare for March.
The key thing for me to remember is that I gain nothing by logging extra miles at this time of year. If I run 100 miles in each of the year's first two months and then become ill, get injured or take a prolonged break before March, it's all meaningless.
I have to stay within myself. Run when it feels right. Get in the occasional run of more than four miles. Ignore when my watch tells me how slow I am right now.
posted by RTG at 8:40 PM
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