Lessons Learned from Marathon Training Cycle Seven

I've had quite a bit of time to reflect on my training cycle since I'm not spending a lot of time running. Harumph. I wanted to put my reflections in writing for my future marathon training planning.

• Marathon training cycle length:

I've had failures with the Pfitz 18/55 plan, but I thought it had to do more with the number of tough workouts during a week and not enough time to recover in between them. I decided to keep the length and do a plan from runners world with a speed workout/week and a long run/week. Attention: 17-18 weeks is way.too.long. to train for a marathon. In the future I'll stick to 10-14 and plan to be in solid shape before starting. I think I was in great half marathon shape starting the training cycle, and I feel like I was at my peak at the beginning of August. Oops.

I also struggled with motivation in mid to late August, and I think that's why my body broke down.

• Injury prevention instead of maintenance:

I totally remember this every time an injury comes around and then when running is all fine and dandy I forget. I need to make regular massage appointments, and I need to be better about cross training with cycling and yoga.

• Less frequent racing:

Because my training cycle was so long, I threw in quite a few races throughout to keep myself motivated. I think 10k should be my max distance. I raced my half PR during a marathon cycle so I keep thinking I need to do it again, but I need to remember that I sacrificed my first legit shot at sub-4 for that half PR. Tune up races--good. Goal races within a goal race training cycle--not so good.