A Half Marathon Training Plan For The Only Slightly In Shape

Last week I posted about my upcoming breast reduction and some of the implications that come along with that. One piece of good news is that with surgery timing, I’m able to do the Chicago Spring Half Marathon with one of my favorite coworkers!

Slight hitch to that plan – I had a few too many Girl Scout cookies last month and haven’t been working out as much as I should. I’ve got a good fitness base, but am certainly not running at my usual stamina.

Not a Perfect Fit …

It’s pretty tough because the half marathon training plans out there are either couch to 5K followed by 5K to half marathon (which would take more time than I have), or a more advanced plan starting at higher mileage. I’m solidly in between the two – running more than 2 minutes at a time, but not running 30 without stopping.

I decided to piece together my own 16-week training plan with Fridays and Sundays as my rest days. Since I’m obviously not a professional trainer, this is coming from research and my previous half-marathon training experience. Hopefully it will get me to run a full half marathon without stopping to rest – which is a long-term goal of mine.

Another shorter-term goal for this year is to run a 5K 31 minutes or less – that’s a 10-minute / mile pace. Hopefully this will help me toward that as well. That will mean shaving 3 minutes off my current time.

The Half Marathon Training Plan …

Download The Half Marathon Training Plan By Bumble and Bustle.

So far, so good! Right now I’m focusing on just getting back to the gym – running in intervals as I’m able. On cross-train days, I’m doing spin classes which I love and swimming. Maybe some weights too in the future …

If you’re going to be training soon too, make sure you check out my running playlist as well!