As the Chicago Marathon gets closer, I thought I’d write a post about run schedules.  Full disclaimer, I am terrible about making or following any kind of schedule.  I hate writing things down, and I have general trouble tracking my own progress on all things workout related.  That being said, if you are training for a marathon, having a running schedule makes a HUGE difference.

Up until recently, my training usually consisted of a grab bag of short distances throughout the week, and a long run on the weekend.  Sometimes I’d sprinkle in a little gym activity here and there where I could manage. This got me through 2 marathons, though I felt pretty miserable afterwards.  So last year for the first time, I actually put together a real comprehensive running schedule. (Actually, my girlfriend put it together for me, she’s run more marathons than I have.)  And it made a huge difference in how I felt during training, and I cut several minutes of my marathon time, and perhaps most important, I didn’t feel like I was going to die afterwards.

Now there are a lot of different marathon plans out there, and different plans work for different people. For me, the most important thing was to have a written calendar that had every week till the marathon broken down. The only runs that I wrote out specific mileages for were the long weekend runs.  There are different philosophies on just how long your longest training run should be, but most programs have you hitting 20 miles just a few weeks before the Marathon, and then cutting your mileage. For the short and mid-range runs during the week, I kept the distance fluid, some days I would do a 3 mile run, some days a 6 miler.  When I did shorter miles, I focused on pace, and for the midrange, I focused more on breathing and consistency.  I also designated one day a week to speed workouts at the track (Though I was not as consistent with those as I should have been.)

Finally, after I had this schedule written up, I hung it up on a wall in my home, a wall that I would have to pass by whenever I left the apartment.  As I mentioned, I’m terrible about writing schedules and tracking progress. Having this schedule pinned to my wall let me just glance at it on my way out the door, note which run I was doing that day, and get to it.  I know some people really thrive on metrics and if that’s the case, I encourage you to keep a notebook, or a dry erase board, so you can write down all of your progress as you train.  The important thing is to have a plan when you start training, it will help you run your best race.