Question:I'm considering a new training program to run a marathon in 17 weeks
(flying pig). I've used hal higdon's novice plan, modified slightly, to
run a marathon in each of the past 7 years. I'd like to hear what
you all have to say about the various plans that you use.
Answer:
I can't help much because I'm a one trick pony addicted to high
mileage. I figure if you like to run, running long runs is a treat, not
a chore. Otherwise, a marathon would have zero appeal. Assuming you are
already running regularly, ramping up in 17 weeks should be no problem.
You have considerable experience with Higdon's plan by now, and
presumably some idea what you like and don't like about it, what you
respond to and need and what you don't so much. If you liked Higdon
well enough to keep using it seven consecutive years, and kept
improving, sounds like it must be at least a reasonable match for you.
You're not interested in just tweaking it a bit more, knowing what you
now know? Or altering it so much that you can say you're training
using the Dred (inspired by Higdon) plan?
It seems there's a lot of universal and nearly universal principles,
but that among the dozens of halfway reasonable approaches, different
ones best suit different folks depending on their needs and abilities
and preferences in several realms: physical, psychological, time
management... For that matter there's a spectrum encompassing folks
who don't feel comfortable without The Plan dictating the exact details
of every run to those who aren't about to take marching orders from
some fool plan, dammit.
Anyhow. Despite running a not great marathon - for which I blame my
own lack of restraint in the last three weeks, not the plan - I enjoyed
and greatly benefited from summer & fall training based on the Hansons'
plan: http://www.runningtimes.com/rt/articles/print.asp?id=4447
or at least what I saw as the main principles: the weekly MP run of
increasing length, the second workout each week, and the not-so-long
long runs. I didn't feel compelled to follow everything to the letter,
and especially on the easy days I did whatever the hell I wanted. But
those weekly fairly long MP runs, combined with my highest mileage to
date (generally in the low to mid 80's), did me a world of good, as
reflected by a huge 1/2 marathon PR.
This is a fairly unconventional approach, which is why I mention it.
You'll have no problem finding a handful of other plans online many of
which are closer to Higdon. I've enjoyed reading some of this guy's
pages FWIW: http://mysite.verizon.net/jim2wr/index.html
Higdon has the small, medium and large program aka, novice, intermediate
and experienced, have you tried moving up to one of the others? After 7
years at the novice plus a tweak you are staying in the novice ranks and
need up the ante as you got all the mileage, so to speak out of that
plan. Your shorter races times says you have lots of room for
improvement but you need to pay some more dues be it distance and/or
speed to get there.
