1 month to my 1st half- HELP!

Wonkagirl

So, I'm doing the half in Connemara on April 10.. am trying to decide what kind of training to do for the next 4 weeks. I'm coming from a reasonable level of fitness (ie can do 10km in 50 mins and am very strong).

This yr, I've done very little really- 2 x 10km races, and 2 x LSRs- 1x 12km and 1x 14km.

Gonna push out 16km this Saturday, and that'll be my longest run. I'm doing another 10km race on march 27th, and i plan to do a few fast 4 milers and a bit of interval runnning (at bootcamp) once a week as well.

Any other suggestions? I'm willing to go all out and train 5 days a week- open to all suggestions.., need to start doing a few hills as well. Have i left it too late??

BrokenMan

Ideally you would have been following a half marathon specific programme for the last couple of months.

You are currently 7k approx short of the Half distance on your long runs and you will probably need to taper for 2 weeks, that gives you 3 weekends to get your long runs up. Try 16K, 14K, 18K over the next 3 weekends then drop back to 10K the weekend before the race.If you can get one of these done with some good hills all the better but if not dont worry too much about it.

You dont say how many days a week you are training now so be careful about ramping it up too much, general rule of thumb - no more that a 10% increase in weekly miles each week.

Dont worry too much about intervals and fast miles at this stage just try to get miles in your legs.

Best of luck with it.

brownian

BrokenMan wrote: »

Ideally you would have been following a half marathon specific programme for the last couple of months.

You are currently 7k approx short of the Half distance on your long runs and you will probably need to taper for 2 weeks, that gives you 3 weekends to get your long runs up. Try 16K, 14K, 18K over the next 3 weekends then drop back to 10K the weekend before the race.If you can get one of these done with some good hills all the better but if not dont worry too much about it.

You dont say how many days a week you are training now so be careful about ramping it up too much, general rule of thumb - no more that a 10% increase in weekly miles each week.

Dont worry too much about intervals and fast miles at this stage just try to get miles in your legs.

Best of luck with it.

+1 on that advice. The distance is key here; I'd be hoping in your shoes to get at least one run close to the race distance before the big day. It's not a very easy half, with those two big hills, so some comfort over long distances is IMHO more important than short-distance speed.

Wonkagirl

thanks guys- much appreciated.. am going to forget about speed so at this stage, get 3 more long runs in- 16, 18 and 14, and then 10k the weekend before.

Do either of you know any decent hills in the city- i live in ballsbridge. I was thinking fosters avenue, but then someone said find a short, steep hill and run up and down it 20 times, instead of one long hill? surely a long hill would be closer to race conditions?

i'm told also that short steps are the key to going uphill- any other nuggest to help with hilll running?

i'd be better advised to get off TINTERNET and hit the roads:D

RayCun

Going up Fosters Avenue sounds like good preparation. If you really want short and steep, go up to the top of the avenue and turn right (going towards Clonskeagh) - there's a bit of a short, steep hill there.

brownian

RayCun wrote: »

Going up Fosters Avenue sounds like good preparation. If you really want short and steep, go up to the top of the avenue and turn right (going towards Clonskeagh) - there's a bit of a short, steep hill there.

+1 - that's always a "highlight" of the DCM, that sharp little rise. Though up onto Mount Anville is also ugly enough - reps from the N11 to the Goat Grill and back (or all the way from the N11 to Dundrum and back) would have a fair bit of up and down.

But...if you've a car and you're going to run for enough time that a bit of driving is worth the investment, go out to Ticknock and run up and down the road to the aerials on top of 3 rock - that's pretty stiff, and has no cars, and is a nicer place to run.

Wonkagirl

tks guys- fosters ave to goats grill it is for me tonite..

brownian just discovered your 'i thought it was..' thread- will be following that now for futher inspiration.. mind you, with your times, i'll be a smidgen behind! I'm really hoping for a half sub 2hrs, and i'll be delira with that! Did my first ever 10km a month ago in 55, and another one 2 weeks later in 52- so hopefully i'm on track. If not, i've already signed up for bayrun and achill halfs in may/june where i can right the wrongs!

brownian

@wg: you're most welcome to follow my training log, but much of the actually useful content therein will come from people who actually know about running like Krusty or D-pop. I'm making it up as I go along:)

I've done the half the last few years and always found it to be a real challenge - you're right to take it seriously. But the sense of achievement on finishing is always great...and the location is truly special, especially if we get nice weather, as we have done for the last few years (and I hope we do this year, since I'm going to be out in it for 26 miles:eek:).