Happy 2011! After a long break from running and fitness in general, I’m ready to get back on track. Last week, I went in search of a running plan that would get me back in shape. Since my level of fitness is so poor right now, I steered myself toward novice plans to ensure that I didn’t take on too much too quickly.
Here’s what I found.
1. Hal Higdon: I used one of Hal Higdon’s running plans many years ago, so I revisited the site to see what I could find. I found a “Novice Supreme” training plan that would be great for runners wanting to run several days per week.
2. Runner’s World: Runner’s World has a program called SmartCoach that allows you to enter information such as a past race time, how many miles you’re currently running per week, and the level of intensity you’d like to train at to create a personalized training program. A link is available on the Runner's World Training page. It requires you to register with Runner's World before you can use it, but registration is quick and easy. This program requires you to pick a distance you are training for in order to create a plan, so I picked a distance of 5 miles. It created a moderate plan complete with a suggested pace for each run. Pace is something I won't be paying attention to, at least for the first few weeks.
3. Competitor.com: Competitor.com has a great Running 101 article that provides a 6-week training schedule. It starts with 3 runs per week complemented by non-running cardio and progresses to 6 days of running per week.
These are all great plans, but there wasn’t one that had exactly what I was looking for - they either called for too many days of running per week, or they progressed in mileage too quickly. So, I decided to use these plans as guides to create my own 10-week training plan. It’s progression is painfully slow, and it starts and ends with only 3 days of running per week. However, this is only the beginning of the year, and I want my plan to ease me gently into longer distances while giving my body plenty of time to recover in between runs. I have included my plan below. It calls for 3 runs per week, and runs can be completed on any day of the week as long as there is at least a day of rest in between runs.
Week 1: 2 2 2
Week 2: 2 2 3
Week 3: 2 3 3
Week 4: 2 3 4
Week 5: 3 3 4
Week 6: 3 4 4
Week 7: 3 4 5
Week 8: 3 4 6
Week 9: 4 4 6
Week 10: 4 4 7
Be sure to check out this article on Runner’s World about getting back into shape.
If you’re coming back from a long break, how will you get in shape for 2011?
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