Half marathon training in a crunch?

ryblueeyes

A friend of mine is signed up to run two HMs, back-to-back, October 4 and 5. Any tips or training plans to help her get ready? Most of the plans are 12-14 weeks or more, which she obviously doesn't have time for. She ran a half in May 2013, and has been running 3-5 miles several times a week for a while now.

jimmmer

Last time I had to get ready for a half I used the adidas micoach app and just told it the date my race was and it scheduled my training sessions for me upto and including a taper.

I had a similar time frame for getting up to speed and just did the workouts I was told to when I was told to and completed the race just fine.

Perhaps something to look into?

ETA: the problem might be the back-to-back bit. Depends on how well she recovers. She could leave something in the tank for the first one and hopefully "cope" with the second. Might be a push to be prepared in 8 weeks though...

JTick

That sounds miserable....this will be her second and third half, correct?

No advice on training, because honestly it doesn't sound like enough time, but I hope she's not planning on racing both of those.

Edit to try to be more helpful: Does she currently have a training plan? What plan did she follow the first time? Would she be against using Galloway's run/walk method for at least one of the races? I would think that would allow better recovery to be able to complete both of them.

brianpperkins

Running a half in May and keeping a consistent running program up since then could reduce the ramp up time needed to up the mileage. The base is there .... maybe not at the level your friend would like but it isn't as though they are total newbies. Find a plan they can tweak to meet their current needs and see where they can jump into the now abbreviated training schedule.

Where I would focus is on the plan for recovery and fueling to do the second half. An abbreviated schedule leading up to back to back half marathons requires some thought on how to address things.

__Di__

She'll need to ramp up the mileage because 3 to 5 miles per session is not enough if intending to run two HMs in two days. In fact, 3 to 5 miles per session is not enough if running just one HM, let alone two.

Trouble is, she cannot ramp up the mileage too quickly because then there is the risk of injury. Therefore, all she can do is her best. There is still 8 weeks to go, so although it isn't ideal, there is time to up the mileage a bit more than you stated.

viktha

She could try to look at a training plan (i.e. Hal Higdon's for the novice half) at week 5 included a 4, 2, 4, and 6. I am using his as a guide for training for a half, key word guide. I didn't start at the beginning since I was easily completing more than that for mileage as one of my running partners was already training for a half and I was joining her on her long runs. Right now I should be on week 5 which is a 4, 2, 4, and 6 but this week I'm doing a 4, 2 (speed work), 4 and 8.

I don't know anything about back to back halfs.

MeanderingMammal

A friend of mine is signed up to run two HMs, back-to-back, October 4 and 5. Any tips or training plans to help her get ready? Most of the plans are 12-14 weeks or more, which she obviously doesn't have time for. She ran a half in May 2013, and has been running 3-5 miles several times a week for a while now.

Challenging, and it depends on whether the objective is completion, or times. The former is achievable, the latter probably less so.

If she can already run 4-5 miles then it's reasonable to drop into the plan part way through. The bigger issue is recovery, essentially that's a marathon over the weekend and the second run is going to be in a very fuel depleted state. Personally speaking I just did two 10 milers this last weekend, the second I was about 15% slower on, and I could quite easily have spent Monday dozing all day.

TAsunder

It's about 7 weeks out so that might be an appropriate amount of time to go from 5 miles to a half marathon on a conservative plan like Hal Higdon or similar. But running them back to back when she's only ever run one half marathon before? That seems like a recipe for injury. I am pretty sure I'd have a hard time running two half races and I have run a half marathon or more on my long run every week for several weeks now.