10k or half marathon?

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nicolo333
nicolo333 Posts: 44
in Fitness and Exercise
Heyyy. In may I will be doing a race. I can do a 10k or half marathon. I have run 5k before but never a 10k. I am really motivated but obviously being a mom and working full time gets in the way. I can probably get in 3-4 30 min runs a week. Which is my better option doing the 10k or the half marathon? I really want to do the half marathon but idk if that's unreachable right now.

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  • scottb81
    scottb81 Posts: 2,538 Member
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    3 to 4 30 min runs a week isn't really enough to train for a half marathon and not have to feel like the race is a death march. At a minimum, one of those weekly runs has to be up in the 2 hour range at least a couple of times a month. Also, training for and running a 10K would be a good step in the direction of moving up to a half marathon later.
  • 416runner
    416runner Posts: 159
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    If you have 30 minutes at a time to run, training for a half is out of reach, for now. To train for a half, you really need to get your long runs into the high-teen/twenty km range (10 miles+). Personally, with that amount of time available, I would go for the 10k at most, or maybe even stick with the 5k and spend a lot of time working on speed and power, and make my goal a strong 5k time.

    Happy trails!
  • kdkyzer
    kdkyzer Posts: 137 Member
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    Hi...Most novice half marathon plans gradually work up to a final long run of 10 miles or so prior to race day. I don't know what your average pace per mile is, but that 10 miler will take longer than 30 minutes to complete.

    You can certainly train for a half marathon with 3-4 running days per week, but as the mileage increases, so does the time commitment. My advice to you would be to google some novice half marathon training plans to examine the time commitment needed as the mileage in the training plan ramps up. Then you can decide if you'll be able to devote the time for half marathon training or if you should stick to the 10K.

    Hope this helps!
  • RunDoozer
    RunDoozer Posts: 1,699 Member
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    10k it sounds like you don't really have the training/ experience yet. You could probably end up hurting yourself if you go for the half. The 10k would be a good stepping stone to be doing halfs in the future.
  • Ras_py
    Ras_py Posts: 129 Member
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    the first race i ever did was a half... i trained for it, 6days a week(5M a day during the week), on the weekends was out there at least 2hrs.. i trained for that race heavy for 6 solid months. how far out is this race?
    there is a HUGE difference between the 10M and half. I have since done many races, my first 5K with my tot recently. its not a crazy idea to have one of these races be your first, but i would say you would need to be putting in more mileage to train.

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