Marathon Training in Full Force

Warm up a Ric Flair "wooooo!" because it's time to kick marathon training in gear as the fall racing season approaches. Last year my body broke down with incredibly bad timing; I picked up a major hip injury six weeks out from the marathon, and didn't run for a few weeks before. My marathon time was decent, but well below my expectations.

This year I'm cutting back training in an effort to hit the fall season as healthy as possible. Last year's marathon training consisted of 20 weeks of training, three weeks over 50 miles, and running the Army Ten Miler two weeks out. This year I'm cutting back to 15 intense weeks, only one week touching 50 miles, and I sadly had to drop the Army Ten Miler from the racing plan.

My mantra for this year's Marine Corps Marathon: Forget 2011.  
(but it's usually yelled more like "F--- 2011!" in the middle of a hill repeat)

Here's how the training plan stacks up for 2012; I'm currently in the middle of week 5. You'll have to click the image to enlarge to an actually legible size:

Click thumbnail for full size.