The Training Miles

Two-plus weeks into training for the New York City Marathon has left me reflecting on…training plans. I know it sounds extraordinarily dull. Only the most didactically inclined people would find spreadsheets and calendars of workouts to be enthralling. I, on the other hand, have become immersed in the world of training plans so of course I am fascinated by them. I have read Jack Daniels, Jeff Galloway and of course the Hanson training method. I have also used on several occasions the Virtual Trainer that New York Road Runners provides. There are easy runs, long runs, regular runs, hills, intervals, fartleks, Yasso 800s, and tempo runs. A lot of words but in the end, it comes down to two simple principles:
- Rack up the miles; and
- Don’t be stubborn.
Training for a marathon is difficult because you are essentially building yourself up physically and mentally for a challenge that you can’t duplicate until you get to the day of the event. Miles will matter more than anything in the end. There may be some human beings out there who can wake up one day and run a marathon, but it is safe to say that most people can’t do that. The one uniform part of any training plan I have used is that it requires you to log miles. If you want to do better, then you likely have to run more. During a marathon, my body has gone through several phases depending on the day. Training prepares you for most of that because you will have days that feel fantastic, days where you feel shitty and days when things out of your control (e.g.- heat, wind, rain, hangovers) trying to slow you. The one thing that stays constant is waking up and running.
The second part is about being willing to evolve. Don’t be obstinate like I was at the beginning. I fell in love with running, so I was resistant to laying out a fixed schedule that required me to do things. I liked the freedom of just running without any expectations or goals. The results of running without direction were enough. Why make this an obligation when I don’t care about the result as much? So when people told me I needed to build in speed work, I ignored them until I finally buckled down and signed up for a plan. The training required at least one-speed session per week, which was awkward for me at the beginning. In the beginning, my brain and my body could not get in sync. I would struggle to alternate my pacing and understand the need to push hard or go slower. But like so many other things in my life, I finally started listening after getting over the initial insecurities and found that I was getting better.
Now setting up my training plan is a cherished activity. I have taken the pieces of what I have done in the past and added some of my components that I know would both fit me and challenge me. For example, last year I tried the Hanson training plan, which emphasized two speed work outs per week. I liked that. It was grueling at times, but I found pleasure in challenging myself during the week to wake up a little earlier on Tuesdays and Thursdays and go out harder. The Hanson Plan emphasized “easy” runs to build up mileage but simultaneously reduced the need for a 20-mile long training run that I had become accustomed to in the past. Instead of a 20 miler, I could max out with 18 mile long runs, which accompanied those grueling tempo run and interval run. I can’t lie, I enjoyed it. At one point last summer I ran 44 consecutive days. The key component was that my legs were learning how to run when they weren’t 100% fresh. As the Hanson book explained, part of running a marathon is learning how to run the last 10 miles, not the first 16. But in the end, I regretted not doing the 22 miler peak long run that I had done in prior years. I maxed out at 19, feeling as though those extra three training miles were irrelevant. I tend to agree with that, but mentally they were material because in the end all of this is subjective. I discovered that I am one of those fragile runners that needs to suffer through 22 miles on my own to fight through the doubts on the day when I am surrounded by millions of people cheering me on.
What I have learned is that no one can give you an objective training plan that will fit you perfectly (Note: most of the plans will tell you that you are free to customize any aspect of what they are recommending). What you can do is find a template and then find your particular path within that construct. That is the fun part. That is what makes training something that stretches beyond just the finishing time. There is a reason why most runners like keeping journals and logging miles. I privately love looking at the total miles I have logged since I started. And creating and following a training plan for 18 weeks is something that doesn’t just make me a better runner, it makes me a better person. Committing to something for 18 weeks is a big accomplishment for me.
There are days like this past Tuesday, when I woke up a little late, felt the instant humidity as I walked from my bedroom into my kitchen. I hesitated, thinking for a minute that I should just skip the run and maybe run later on after work. I cringed as I remembered my planned mileage for the week. So at around 6:50 am, I skipped my coffee, drank some water, washed my face and quickly went out for an easy 4 miles. I finished in a puddle of sweat, quickly showered went into the office and then at 7:30 pm, I strapped on my flip-belt, my work sneakers and ran home another 5+ miles over the Queensborough Bridge. Sunset over the Queensborough Bridge is a nice way to remind myself of mile 16 in the New York City Marathon and the burst you get when I spill on to 1st Avenue. After showering, I sat down at the desk in the corner of my bedroom and updated my training log with the two runs for the day and checked to see what I had for Wednesday morning. I could have easily skipped that 4-mile run, which in turn would have probably resulted in me skipping the night run over the bridge. But my little training plan sat on my shoulder and prodded me on.
Those 9.5 miles probably won’t make a difference come November, but they did make me better this past Tuesday. I don’t measure these training plans in terms of results on the day of the race; I measure training by my diligence to stay on the plan and of course the incremental improvements I get outside of those morning miles.

