Oh boy. I guess by giving a synopsis of my plan I threw in some confusion. Sorry about that. What I typed was a normal week routine for me, and yes I generally run that same program week after week. HOWEVER, I do taper for marathons. I'm a firm believer in that. I'm currently doing that now. Usually that means replacing the 20 miler and making that an 11 or 13 a couple of weeks before the marathon. The week before I start having a few of those days not running at all in preparation. I treat the experience like a vacation and focus on enjoying it.
After the marathon race, I'll start running regularly about a week after. The full mileage routine won't be started until usually 3 weeks after. On occasion, I do run local, shorter road races... but for those I don't change my normal routine. They are usually on Saturdays.
Pretty spot on Sportwagon! That pretty much describes what I attempted from 2015 to 2016. At least that was the plan and it took some time to make it routine. I had done marathons before... and a few 20 milers in training. Figured I knew what I was doing. My normal weekend running route is an out-and-back route along the same course for both Saturday and Sundays... I just go farther before turning around on Saturdays. Also, before I got up to the 20 miles, I'd make that long Saturday run about 15 or so instead.Did you get fairly quickly to...
M-F: 5.25 miles
Sat: 11 miles
Sun: 11 miles
and then increase the Saturdays gradually from there?
Because an ordinary person (i.e. readers other than you) needs to increase the distance they can run gradually each week. With your base of running from previous years, perhaps you didn't need to build up so formally.
Galloway is the golden rule for running the marathon!! He has helped so many people make this accomplishment possible. I'm glad that it worked for you, SW. Not only are you a marathoner, but it must of made an impact even all of these years later to have such insight and make such smart inquiries into my running.I think I based my plan on a Galloway plan, and built up Sunday runs by 2km until I reached about 13miles, and then did 13miles every second Sunday, with the other Sunday increasing by 2km until I reached full marathon distance. I didn't run as much during the week as usually recommended, because my feet seemed to have problems if I ran too frequently. At that time I had noon-time runs I could do with other people, which helped make the runs easier to do. It was usually MWF of aoubt 8km, I think.
Weekends were interesting. Oh! This weekend is just a 13mile (half-marathon) distance! An easy weekend! Next weekend I work harder!
I apologize if I came off as a braggart. I've come to a pinnacle in my training and an exciting goal after all that work is now on the horizon. I just wanted to share in the I WORKOUT thread. I was hoping that maybe it could be inspirational to someone... as many of your stories and trials and successes have resonated with me over the years. I never intended to "discourage" anyone. If anyone is trying to train for a first marathon... Look to the Galloway plan that Sportwagon posted... or check out the other stories of the first time runners in here. It will help, and is absolutely a solid, correct path to follow...