as many of you know, kevin and I are both training for the Chicago Marathon on October 9. this will be our second full marathon (I did chicago last year, and k did des moines), but our first time working with a coach! after such a positive experience with the red dirt running company lincoln half marathon training program, we decided to hire the coach, sarah madsen, to write us a marathon plan and work with us throughout the training period.

we met to discuss our goals and go over what we wanted in a plan. for our first marathon, we both just wanted to finish (and I was hurt going into mine, so I didn’t even know if that would happen), but this year, we’re both hoping to improve our times significantly. we followed an 18-week training plan fairly closely last year, but i’ll admit, even though I almost always put in the mileage, I didn’t always do the workouts (especially tempo runs, etc.) as prescribed. i’m a pretty dedicated runner and occasionally enjoy nerding out over planning workouts, but generally speaking, i more like the idea of someone else planning them for me (especially knowing they are aware of my goals) and checking in with me along the way to keep me accountable and to make sure it’s not too easy or too hard.

sarah recommended and prepared a 16-week plan, which we were comfortable with since we’d kept up with running a few times a week after our half marathon in may, and continued to do strength training and generally stay active. we also got a 4-week pre-training plan, which was a great way to get back into a routine and reintroduce speedwork and other workouts after a few weeks off. we did quite a few of the workouts during this period, but didn’t stress over it, and attended lots of fun runs, rode our bikes a lot, rested when we felt like it, and got our minds and bodies ready for what’s to come.

i won’t be posting the whole plan here (but I highly recommend considering sarah if you’re interested in a customized plan!), or all the runs i’ve completed, but thought i’d share some overall thoughts, favorite workouts, hard moments, and the like. we’re in week 6 of the program now, so i’ll share on weeks 1-4 for now, then 5-8 in another couple of weeks, etc., etc.

generally speaking, our plan follows this structure:
monday – easy w/strides
tuesday – hill repeats or track workout + strength training
wednesday – recovery run (super easy pace)
thursday – tempo/interval/pace workout + strength training
friday – rest
saturday – long run + core workout
sunday – rest or cross-train

week 1 – june 20-26 / mileage – planned: 32, completed: 30.66

the first week of training went great! i liked getting into the routine of what most of our weeks will look like – 5 days of running (monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday, and saturday) with strength training on workout days (tuesday, thursday). i completed all the weekday runs (6, 5, 5, and 6 miles), and got in two good strength training sessions (I’m using fitness blender videos primarily).

I was particularly worried about the “steady state” run scheduled for this week (2 mi w/u, 2 mi @ steady state – 7:30-7:50, 2 mi c/d) because it had been awhile since i’d run “fast” (even though my half marathon pace was in that range). the run was challenging, but not impossible, and i hit my paces just fine, giving me the confidence to succeed in the harder tempo workouts to come.

our long run this week was scheduled as 10 miles, but we had a 10k race that morning, so i ran the race, then cooled down for another couple miles to bring my mileage up a bit, but since i’d raced hard, didn’t worry about getting to 10.

week 2 – june 27-july 3 / mileage – planned: 35, completed: uh, 6?

week 2 was a bit of a wash, running wise, but we knew that going in. we were on vacation in colorado this week, so we planned to do some running, but didn’t want to miss out on hiking opportunities, biking around fort collins, and generally enjoying time with our family.

we ended up only getting in one 6-mile run, but we also did two fairly strenuous 9-mile hikes, biked almost 25 miles one day around fort collins, strength trained a couple of times, plus took countless short walks, so we hardly felt guilty over it. (ok, I might have felt slightly guilty, but I can get obsessive about training plans). considering how active we were on vacation, and that we did all of that at elevation, i don’t think we lost much, if any, fitness — plus, it was early on in our training.

running at elevation (we were in winter park – 9,500 ft!) is no joke, but i’d take that fresh, dry mountain air any day over our summer humidity here!

week 3 – july 4-10 / mileage – planned: 38, completed: 33.5

we got back from vacation on july 4, and missed a run that morning, but otherwise, i was mostly back on track for this week. I didn’t get in as much strength training as i normally shoot for, but did get in both workouts (strides and a short tempo), and even fit it in the schedule to run at the weekly scriptown run that we’d missed the last couple of weeks.

this week’s long run was scheduled for 14 miles, but we did the 12-mile angry cow heifer hustle trail race on this day, so were a couple of miles short (the course ended up being around 11 miles, so i got in around 12.5 with a cool down). again, since it was fairly early on in our training, and since trail running tends to be harder than road running, i wasn’t too worried about coming in a few miles short this week, but was looking forward to getting totally back on track for week 4. we got in a 8 mile bike ride as cross training the day after our trail race, too!

week 4 – july 11-17 / mileage – planned: 38, completed: 38.17!

week 4 it all fell into place again, and i completed the planned mileage, plus strength training on tuesday and thursday. i was nervous about being able to get in strength training after my runs on these days, but so far, i’ve been able to get in a 25-40 minute video (or two short videos) twice a week. conceivably i could do it in the evenings, but i know i’m less likely to do it then, and it’s nice having it out of the way in the mornings, and it hasn’t affected me getting to work on time. (mostly it just means not hitting snooze when the alarm goes off).

our long run for week 4 was again 14 miles, with miles 5-9 at marathon pace. we normally do long runs on saturdays, but opted to do it friday this week since friday was my birthday and we had a late night planned. although it was challenging after four days of running in a row, especially with thursday being a workout day – i’m so glad i got up early (4am…) and powered through so i could enjoy my birthday stress-free. saturday we were pretty lazy, but we got in a 15 mile bike ride on sunday as cross-training.

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if you’d like to follow along, check back in a few weeks for my weeks 5-8 update. i’ll also talk a bit more about my strength training, nutrition, etc. then as well!