Just running - no plan. Anyone do it?

Plans are generally designed to help you achieve the correct (and best) balance between training and rest.  For the most part they work and can be useful in suggesting a mix of training to help you improve.

The main reason that plans fail, IMHO, is that the people following them fail to listen to their own bodies.  No plan is written in stone, but it's when people following them rely on the plan rather than common sense to dictate what to do, that problems occur (injury, lack of motivation etc).  I follow a specific HR training plan but the advice is clearly stated at the start "If for whatever reason you're not up to a run, then don't do it!".  There have been days when I've cut runs short, switched tempo / steady runs to easy etc, because I know that it's better for me to do that than follow the plan slavishly . 

I like the structure of a plan and was injured myself in the past by not following one, but I'm not a slave to it.

Following a HR Plan is difficult IMO. Always seems as if you are running slow.

But, that's the point. This slowness enables you to run well within yourself (by HR standards) and for longer.  It can take quite a while to see results, but stick with it.

For my weekday runs I just use Pace, but for my LSR I use HR method.

Gazmanmeister wrote (see)

Following a HR Plan is difficult IMO. Always seems as if you are running slow.

But, that's the point. This slowness enables you to run well within yourself (by HR standards) and for longer.  It can take quite a while to see results, but stick with it.

For my weekday runs I just use Pace, but for my LSR I use HR method.

If you stick to HR, eventually you should find that you're running faster at the same HR or your HR is lower at the same pace.

Essentially the same will happen no matter how you train, you get faster and fitter, HR just adopts (as Gaz says) a longer, slower approach.

Works for me - at my age.