Revised plan!

[gazelle2B]

Hi all,

23 days ago I posted my post-grad plan in the C25K community. I said this:

"My cunning plan is to increase my runs by 2 minutes every week until I'm running 5K (I'm currently running 4K)..."

So I thought I'd post an update about how I'm doing. Well... I've discovered that, at this stage in my running (I only graduated C25K on 13 June) increasing 2 minutes every week was a bit too ambitious. So, I've altered my plan so that I'm adding 2 minutes every 5-6 runs. That's a much more sustainable increase, and I'm currently doing 34 minutes/4.5 K. With luck and determination, I'll be Parkrun ready by late summer/early autumn, although I'm not really fussed if it takes longer. I'm just enjoying challenging myself.

[Tomas Graduate10]

Sounds like you're doing great, and taking ownership of your own progression (as opposed to sticking blindly to a plan someone else designed) is really good.

I don't know if you have each of your runs being the same length. But you might consider that now you have graduated you could make one of them "the long one" and only increase "the long one" on a regular basis while keeping the other runs the same duration/distance. Many people do "the long run" on the weekend where they have a bit more time than during the week.

[gazelle2B in reply to Tomas]

Hi Tomas , Thanks for your advice! But just so I'm clear, do you mean something like the following progression (assuming 3 runs / week):

1st run = 34 min

2nd run = 34 min

3rd run = 36 min

4th run = 34 min

5th run = 34 min

6th run = 38 min

Is that the kind of thing you mean? And is that a safer way of getting to 5k, rather than working up to making every run a 5k run (which is what I was doing)?

Thanks for any help you wish to give me. I'm still very much a newbie...

[Tomas Graduate10 in reply to gazelle2B]

Hi gazelle2B , yes that is exactly what I mean.

Is it safer? Only insofar that it keeps the weekly total distance lower and therefore less strenuous. And it may help keep your mojo intact because two out of your three runs each week is a known distance that you know you can do. So you're consolidating your existing fitness while once a week pushing harder and further.

All the best

[Anniemurph Graduate10]

Great that you have a plan The other thing to consider is to mix it up a bit as well. Are you already doing intervals? Whisper it... *hills* ? Not in any huge way, but just shaking up your runs every so often keeps things interesting and will also add to your running fitness and increase what you can do. Have you tried the C25K+ podcasts? Sorry, you might already be doing all these things, in which case, just ignore me, but if not, perhaps it's something to consider? Just a little bit here and there, not to go mad!

[gazelle2B in reply to Anniemurph]

Thanks Anniemurph ! All great suggestions, and things that I haven't tried yet, although I downloaded the C25K+ podcasts yesterday, so I'm definitely going to start shaking up my routine. It's great to have lots of new challenges to look forward to, but I'll try not to take them all on at once! ;P