Half Marathon Training Week 1

The time has come for me to start my training for my very first half marathon. I will be running in the Covenant Health Knoxville Half Marathon March 29th. I’m terrified and pumped up all at the same time. I’ve never considered myself to be a runner. I don’t even really enjoy running if we are being honest about it.

I started running 3 years ago because I was sick a feeling sluggish and tired all of the time. I wasn’t happy with my body and I wanted to do something about it. The first time I had run in YEARS was a 5K race I ran in at my church. It was a purely spontaneous moment that I decided to run in this race. I literally decided 30 minutes before the race started to go for it. After that first race I was hooked. Since then I have continued to run in several 5K races and run around my neighborhood on a somewhat regular basis.

After getting into strength training in 2014 thanks to my Beachbody programs like T25, PiYo and Les Mills Combat I decided it was time to push myself a little bit further with my running to see what I was capable of doing. One afternoon after I had just finished my second round of T25 I decided to go for a run around my neighborhood, this time I was going for distance. I ran my normal 3 mile route and was still feeling good so I kept going. I reached the 5 mile mark and thought I could either cut down my street and call it a day (after all 5 miles is pretty good) or I could keep going and try to run a full 10K. So I kept going. I finished my 10K and when I was done I was tired. But not so tired that I didn’t feel like I could keep going if I wanted to. This is when I decided if I can run a 10K, I can run a half marathon. So I signed up for my very first half marathon.

Now that we are a few months away it’s time to get serious about this. I haven’t been running much lately because I HATE running in the cold. Can someone tell me why I decided my half marathon was going to be in March? So I went on the advice of my runner friends and went to our local Runner’s Market and got fitted for a good pair of running shoes. In my first week of training I’ve managed to keep up with my schedule fairly well considering we’ve had some weather with the high being in the mid 20’s. Brrr!!

I have already had a minor set back. While I was running one of my 3 mile training runs I got a horrible cramp in my left leg at around the 2.25 mile mark. It hurt so bad that I had to stop running and it severely hurt my time (good thing this is happening now so I can address it). Turns out I’m having issues with my IT band. So foam roller to the rescue. I’m also considering taking my new shoes back and having them take another look at my heel strikes to see if I bought the right shoes.

Now onto week 2….

Are you all training for any races right now? If so, what are you training for and how is your training going?