Week #5 of Half Marathon Training

Week #5 of Sev's Half-Marathon Training Plan:

	Tempo Run / Intervals	Long Run	Easy Recovery Run	total	target
Week #1	3.07 mi	5.4 mi	3.2 mi	11.67 mi	11 mi
Week #2	3.5 mi	4.85 mi	3.64 mi	12 mi	12 mi
Week #3	4 mi	6.6 mi	3.3 mi	13.9 mi	13.3 mi
Week #4	3.87 mi	7.5 mi	3.3 mi	14.67 mi	14.6 mi
Week #5	4.2 mi	8.9 mi	3.4 mi	16.5 mi	16 mi

• For Week #5, I started adding interval training, to replace a tempo run. Interval training is alternating a very high intensity near-sprint with a low-intensity jog or even walk, on a much shorter time scale, like 100m fast / 200m slow, or 1min fast / 2min slow, or 1:1, or 2:3, depending on what your body can handle. The point is to get up to a near sprint on the fast parts but then let your heart rate recover on the slow parts. Tempo running involves holding a medium-high-intensity pace for longer periods, like 1-3 miles at a time, with jogging rests between only if necessary. So this run was an interval run.


• The 8.9-mile long run I ended up doing at a 10:00 mile pace. To keep things interesting (and because I was curious!) I did 1 mile on 7 different treadmills, 2mi on the last one - so I got a short break between miles as I moved treadmills. In each case, 1 mile on the treadmill was 1.03-1.1 miles on my Garmin. That is really only 10% error which doesn't seem unreasonable for a public gym treadmill used by all different kinds of bodies which can't be calibrated every day. It's just that the 10% adds up over, say, 8 miles! My 8 miles became 8.9 miles! It's treadmill magic! *BARFS*


• I did my easy recovery run outside. It was pretty nice, even though it was cooolllllllld. If you look at the run, the long break in the middle of it was me walking around the high school track, trying to find a place I could hope the fence and run a mile. The presence of police in the area convinced me to not break into a high school track, and I ran home instead.
  And this run also confirms that my Garmin really is calibrated. I ran a stretch of road that I can track on GMaps Pedometer online, and that I've driven in my car, so I know the distance. GMaps-Pedometer says the stretch of road is 1.285 miles. My Garmin recorded 1.3 miles on the way down and 1.26 on the way back. That's only 3% error in the Garmin and I can probably attribute that to me not necessarily being able to hit the lap button at THE EXACT SAME PLACE while crossing traffic. Also the average of the two numbers is pretty much exactly what GMaps tells me.
  So I believe the Garmin a lot more now. Still not sure what's up with the treadmills - I keep meaning to ask the owner if they've been calibrated, but I can't ever seem to find him on days I'm there. NEVER GIVE A NERD A WAY TO COLLECT DATA ON REPETITIVE ACTIONS, it doesn't end well for anyone except the nerd.
  

Week #6 is finally a rest week, oh my god thank fuckness. My only goal for Week 6 is 3 x 4mi runs. That's it. Giving my poor legs (and lungs!) a much-needed break.