hello and help please?

Hello All,

 I've been running for about a year but in a bit of a stop start manner. I can run 5k comfortably but fairly slowly and to motivate me to maintain a regular schedule  Ive entered a marathon at the end of September, with 10k and half marathons inbetween.

 With 6 months to go I have been looking at training plans. I have no time aspirations, just want to get round in one piece, can anyone recomend a particular training plan as being a beginner I have no idea which to go with?

Thanks

Morning Michaela

Here's a get-you-round schedule:

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/racing/rws-ultimate-marathon-schedule-get-you-round/133.html

or

if you know what time you do 5k in (or nip off to do a parkrun to find out) you could enter that time into a pace calculator, like this one: 

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/general/rws-race-time-predictor/1681.html

and then choose one from the time bands shown from:

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/general/big-marathon-index/7355.html

or use the smartcoach:

http://www.runnersworld.co.uk/racing/runners-world-smartcoach/3057.html

Hope this helps and that you find one that you feel comfortable with but remember to listen to your body as you go along.  Hope you have a great summer and enjoy your marathon

Great Thanks.

Most of these plans are 16 weeks long, I am actually 27 weeks away from my marathon so maybe I should spend a bit longer working on stretching distance and speed.

Thanks again.

When you've chosen a plan - maybe have a look at how your typical week looks now and at the first week of the plan - if needed you can work on closing the gap or if there's not much difference (ie less than 10% in mileage) you could repeat, say, week 1 and 2 until your 'official' start date. You don't want to overdo it before you start but I'd want to be ticking over/ slightly improving just to keep myself sane if it was me.

You're welcome

Thank you all for responses, I think the idea of repeating early weeks of a smartcoach plan is a great idea, I'll try that.

Mikefrog - my half marathon is early september, just 4 weeks before the full one. I was looking for one in early august but very little in my area and I'm reluctant to travel too far as the training will already be taking lots of time (young family!). There is an early July one that I was considering, not sure if thats too soon.... my first 10k is early June?????

 Thanks all.

You need to beware of the fact that a lot of the beginner plans have a very significant mileage increase over a relatively short period of time. This is not very comfortable and may well lead to injury.

I'm about to run my first marathon, but the one thing I would say is that it would be a lot harder if you were not used to running 10 + miles at a time before you start the schedule. I seem to have been permanently tired for the last month, so it does take it out of you.

I'd be looking for a half marathon in about 10-12 weeks time, and aiming for that as an interim step.