Structure

For the last few weeks, since I finished Couch to 5k, I've been floundering a bit. I really liked having the structure of the training program, and without it I had a long series of crappy workouts where I felt like I regressed in my training a bit, or at least stopped making progress.

Although I really want/need to start looking to October now, I'm not advanced enough at this point to start most of the popular half marathon training programs. Many of them require that you're regularly running 3-5 miles several times a week before beginning. Which totally makes sense.

But there is one expert, Jeff Galloway, who has helped about a bazillion people run successful races from scratch with his quirky-ish method. I tried it out last night, and I haven't felt better in a long, long time. I was skeptical, but now, even after 1 workout, I am a complete believer.



Galloway's "thing" is his run-walk-run method. Interval training. When I first was reading his claims that so much walking throughout a run, even for seasoned runners, results in faster times and stronger finishes, I was reminded of Professor Harold Hill's "Think Method." He's the main character in the musical The Music Man, who scams an entire town by selling them on his idea that kids can learn to play instruments just by thinking the notes.

So, like I said, I tried it out last night. For my pace, the recommended interval is run 2 minutes, walk 1, repeat. The results were incredible. I worked out for 30 minutes and walked for 10 of those (intermittently), and finished exactly 2 miles in the same amount of time (30 minutes) that it would have taken me had I been running the whole way. I felt myself able to push so much harder, knowing that I was only running for 2 minutes before I got a break. My increase in pace happened naturally, it wasn't a conscious effort, and it felt good. Really good.

I'm looking forward to seeing where this takes me. I have a feeling it's going to be my key to success in training for this giant race that's approaching more quickly than I care to think about.