Happy first day of half marathon training to me!  Today starts the official training for the Yuengling Shamrock 8k and Half Marathon for me.  It seems like yesterday I was crossing the finish line at the Philadelphia Half Marathon (thank God!).  

I'm sticking with Jeff Galloway and his run/walk program.  This time though I am aiming for a program that focuses on time rather than just finishing.  Since I finished Philly in 3:16:20, I'm following the plan that trains you to finish between 2:30 and 3:00 hours.  This plan involves lots of speed training and crazily starts my first long run at 8 miles!  Crazy!

The positive is the program starts before Christmas which hopefully keeps me on track throughout the holiday.  I've got all sorts of workouts planned this month, all piggy backing on half marathon training.  So, here we go!  Yuengling Shamrock 8k and Half Marathon training ho!

One week til Half Marathon training begins!

One week from today, I will begin training for my second half marathon.  I ran my very first half marathon on Sunday, February 27th at the Disney Princess Half Marathon and when I crossed the finish line, I wasn't sure I would ever run another one.  I decided to give it some time before making a final decision on the matter.

Then hubby decided to run the full marathon at Philadelphia on November 20th, so I decided to run the Philly Half Marathon - Best Time of your Life!  Why not?  I've done it once, I'm sure I can do it again...and maybe do it faster?  My time at Princess was 3:21:11.  Maybe I can speed things up a little.  :-)

Last time, I had a full plan with mileage per week and all sorts of stuff.  I made it to a 10 mile run at the most, even though I had a 12 mile scheduled.  Training went fairly well, as far as I could tell and I ran every last mile of that 13.1 miles.  But, I know I should have done things better.  I should have gotten that 12 mile training run in.  I should have eaten my sports beans like I did in training.  I should have brought a better camera...oh wait, that has nothing to do with training!

So, this time around, I'm trying a Jeff Galloway plan.  It's really simple, which is seriously perfect for me.  Tuesday and Thursday do a 30 minute run, then do your long runs on Saturday.  This makes life sooooo much simpler!  My last program had specific mileage per day.  I was constantly worried about not getting those weekday miles in, especially when we had snow (training for a half marathon between December and February can involve the white stuff and it did!).  This plan is a simple to follow 30 minutes twice a week.  I can handle this.

So, next Tuesday - July 27th - 5 months from finishing my very first half marathon, I'll start training for my second.  I'll share how it's going, tell you how the training program itself is working, and possibly ask for advice.  Stay on your toes!  It's going to be a crazy ride!