REAL-LIFE RUNNERS: EPISODE 256 – FIVE KEYS TO PLAN OUT AND SUCCEED AT YOUR BEST HALF MARATHON
ANGIE: Hey, everybody.
ANGIE: Thank you so much for joining us today on episode number 256 of the real-life runners’ podcast. So, inside the real-life runners training academy, we have plans for all race distances. But today we want to focus just on one the half marathon. In today's episode, we want to give you five of our top tips. If you want to run a strong half marathon, many people just sign up for a half not realizing how much actually goes into it, which can often lead to lackluster results, unnecessary struggles in training, and even injury, preventing them from even running the race. So today, we want to help you avoid some common pitfalls and mistakes and understand what you need to do to complete and excel in the half marathon.
KEVIN: This is the real-life runner's podcast, and we are your hosts, Kevin and Angie Brown. Thanks for spending some time with us today. Now let's get running.
ANGIE: All right, so fall race season is just around the corner, right? Fall half marathons, marathons. It's all right around the corner. I know it's summer, right? Like, it's the beginning of summer..
KEVIN: It’s very early summer.
ANGIE: when we are recording this episode. But really, for us runners, fall racing season is just around the corner. Because if you have your sights set on a fall half marathon or marathon, your training actually needs to start right now.
KEVIN: Oh, yeah. Definitely into it. We're at the very tail end of what could be considered spring racing season. There's very few marathons still going. There's almost no good marathons going over, like, the heart of the summer.
ANGIE: I mean, there are a few key ones. Like grandma's is in June.
KEVIN: Grandma's is still coming.
ANGIE: But it tends to be a lot of races in the North, right? Like northern United States.
KEVIN: Yeah. Grandma's in Minnesota. They're still able to handle some decently chilly
ANGIE: And then probably have other areas of the world. There's some races in some cooler climates.
KEVIN: Yeah. You don't see a lot of, like, the world majors all lining up at this point in time.
ANGIE: That's true. World majors don't start again until the fall. Right. So really, kind of no matter where you are in the world, depending on what your racing calendar looks like, you may or may not be looking for a fall race, right. Fall half marathon or marathon. And we really love the half marathon distance here. I really think especially me personally, I think that the half marathon is such a great race distance. It might be one of my favorites because it's one of those distances that's long enough that you need to put in months of training to perform well, but it's also short enough that you don't need to abandon, like, all family and work obligations and to vote yourself to increase mileage in a weekend long run. That is so grueling. Like, with a full marathon. Right? Like the halfway running 100 miles or 100 miles. Yeah, like Kevin likes to get into. Right. So I personally love the half marathon. I think it's a great distance, especially for busy parents, right. When you have other responsibilities and other things going on, you might have work or family or lots of other things happening. And the half marathon, again, gives you that distance that will allow you to achieve, I would say, a pretty big goal, but without the same amount of time commitment and fatigue that goes along with a full marathon or beyond.
KEVIN: Yeah, a full marathon, the long run, the time commitment, and just the physical energy that you need to put forth to get in the long run over the weekend. It's a lot. Yeah, that's a lot. Asking time commitment from yourself and everybody around you and then just like the physical wear that puts on your body is a little different than it has.
ANGIE: Yeah. So in this episode today, we want to cover how to set yourself up for success. Whether you're looking to complete your first half marathon or you're looking to improve on your last half marathon, or you're looking to set a PR or PV in the half marathon. And quite honestly, a lot of what we're talking about today can be applied to other race distances as well. Okay. There are going to be some specific things that we talk about that are specifically related to the half marathon, but there's also going to be things that can definitely be applied to other things. What we want to talk about today are five of our best tips for you to run a strong half marathon. Again, that's if you want to complete your first or if you want to improve on your last or really run a rate of any distance.
KEVIN: Yeah. Any of the longer distances. I think it's a little bit different if you're trying to train for a five day. The commitment to it some of the keys to focus in on. But this is pretty good for training for a lot of races. We just kind of fine tune for the half marathon.
ANGIE: Exactly. So the first thing that we want you to do so we're going to go through five main points today. Number one is to set an intention. You need to understand your why. Why do you want to run a half marathon or why do you want to run another half marathon? Why do you want to run a PR? Right. What is your purpose and what is your why behind actually wanting to sign up for and train for and run this race?
KEVIN: Because so many people, they'll finish one and they'll be like, that was great. How soon can I sign up for the next one? Why is it what is it about that rate that compels you to do the next one? Or why is it that you're signing up for the first one in the first place? Because having a good understanding of that is super critical for your training, your success in the race itself. There's some issues that can show up.
ANGIE: Yes. And some of the main mistakes that we see people making is that they just decide, hey, you know what? I think it'd be really fun to sign up for a half marathon because maybe they have an idea that it's a bucket list item, right? They think it's just going to be really cool to do one. Or they sign up because their friends are doing it. They saw somebody on Instagram or Facebook, may be an old high school buddy or something. They're like, that person ran a half marathon. I bet I could do that, right? And so they see that their friends are doing it, and they just kind of get pulled into it. And so they sign up without even realizing everything that goes into it. They just sign up kind of for another reason, whether it's to do it because someone else is doing it or to do it because they think that it might be fun to do. And what happens here a lot of times is when people sign up for those reasons, they can kind of lose motivation along the way, right? Or they have a hard time, keep continuing onward when the training kind of gets hard. And there comes a time during the training for a half marathon where it's going to get hard, right,
KEVIN: Definitely.
ANGIE: you're going to feel tired. And so a lot of times when you don't understand your why, if you don't really understand why you signed up for the half marathon in the first place, a lot of times people will stop when it gets hard.
KEVIN: Right? And that's coming at some point, maybe kind of depending on your particular running history, that might becoming in the opening couple of weeks. Maybe the first week feels fine, and then the next week where you're still going does not feel as good. Maybe you're trying to come out of nowhere and you're just like, yeah, couch to half marathon. That sounds successful because I saw somebody did it online. I can do that myself. At some point, it's going to get physically challenging. It's going to get mentally challenging. If you're out there on the long run for over an hour, which can come up pretty quickly depending on what your pacing is, a long run for over an hour is just a long time to be out there, let alone 2 hours or 3 hours, depending on what you're pacing is, you can be on there for quite a long time. That's a lot of mental and physical sort of taxation that you got to go through there.
ANGIE: Well, things to overcome, right? And like when, if you don't really understand why you're doing it in the first place, it's going to be very easy to quit, right? Because you're like, why am I even doing this? I should say. I can't even tell you how many times that question has crossed my mind in all my years of running. Like, why am I doing this again? And you have to know if you don't know the answer to that question, when your brain offers you like, why are we doing this again? You're going to be like, I have no idea. Let's just stop. Because that's the easier thing to do. It's easier to just quit. Because if you're not clear on your intention, that seems like the more obvious choice here, right? Another mistake that we see people making often is that they sign up for a half marathon because they want to lose weight, and they think or a marathon for that matter, too. They decide that I want to lose 20 pounds, say. And so I need a goal. I need something to keep me motivated. So I'll sign up and run a half marathon that will help me lose weight along the way. And often what happens here is they either, A, don't lose weight because running is not the best way to lose weight. I will tell you guys that right now. Or B, they get injured because they're trying to lose weight and increase their training load simultaneously. So basically, just kind of a quick idea of how this works is when your training load goes up, so does your calorie require right? Like when you're putting more stress and strain on the body, your body needs more calories, because calories are energy. So if you are increasing your training load and trying to decrease calories at the same time, you're breaking your body down and you're not giving it the nutrients that it needs to build up stronger. Right. You're trying to run longer distances or take on more stress on the body, but when you don't give it the nutrition that it needs, it just continues to break down. So that's what leads a lot of people to injury when they're trying to lose weight and training for a race at the same time.
KEVIN: You kind of like skim past your little controversial statement there that running is not. In fact, the best way to lose weight.
ANGIE: It's not.
KEVIN: I know, but there's a lot of people that might get a little questionable about but I was trying to lose weight. I thought running would be a good plan for this. No, I feel like running can help.
ANGIE: It can. Running is a tool that you can use. I just don't think it's the most effective tool personally, especially when we're looking at race training. Right. If you are just running, I think that there is one way that you can run to lose weight, and then there is another way that you can run to train for a race successfully. And those two things don't match.
KEVIN: That's what I was going to kind of make sure that you teach that thing up, because I think that you could run in such a way that you could use that as a tool towards losing weight. It's still not the sole benefit. There are other aspects that will be.
ANGIE: Well, I would still argue that it's still not the best way because ultimately, nutrition is the best way to lose weight.
KEVIN: Right.
ANGIE: Like controlling what you're putting in your body is the best way to lose weight. That does not mean cutting calories. That's not what I'm saying here. Right. You do need a calorie deficit, an energy deficit in order to lose weight, but there's a lot that goes into weight loss, and a big part of that is building muscle. And so I personally think that weight lifting is a more effective tool in a lot of ways. Strength training plus nutrition is a more effective way to lose weight. But that's a different topic for a different day.
KEVIN: Yes. To just wrap this game up for going to move ourselves.
ANGIE: You took me off on a tangent.
KEVIN: I did take you down a little bit of tangent.
ANGIE: Just to bring I was going to just let that thing skim right over.
KEVIN: I was not going to let that one skim. But training for a race is definitely not the best way to lose weight. Consistency in exercise may be beneficial yeah.
ANGIE: Well, especially if you've never exercised before,
KEVIN: then building up consistency and exercise is great,
ANGIE: but exercise alone is not the best way to lose weight. I would argue that.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: I would argue that exercise is not the best way to lose weight. Again, going back nutrition is right. Controlling your nutrition is the best way to lose weight. But anyway sorry, continue.
KEVIN: The whole difference.
ANGIE: That’s a different podcast.
KEVIN: I guess we could argue on that one research and see what I can come up with on that one. But training for a race as much as that could help you build consistency. Training for a race, especially something longer like a half marathon is definitely not the best way because you have to increase your calorie loads.
ANGIE: Right. So let's get off this weight loss tangent for a bit here because for good I should say, for this episode. Right? And let's go back to the main point that we're trying to make here, which is having an intention to your training and understanding why you want to run a half marathon in the first place. Okay? It is absolutely critical because like we said before, if you're not clear on your why, when things get hard, you will have a much more increased likelihood of just quitting. Right. Because there's always going to get that time is always going to come along. That's going to be tough. Right. There's always going to be that point. When you're training for a half marathon, you're looking at probably about twelve weeks. So we're going to get into that in a little bit here about the appropriate timeline. But you're looking at a couple of months commitment and dedication and things are bound to happen during that time. Right. Life is bound to happen. And so understanding that deeper why behind what you're doing is absolutely critical for you to actually put in the training, get up early in the morning to get your runs in and dedicate yourself to what's required for you to successfully complete this race.
KEVIN: Yeah. Because the best way of successfully completing race is some consistency within your plan. So if life getting in the way makes following a plan more challenging, you can't just abandon the plan and be like, I guess I don't really need to train for it, I'll just wing it and show up on race day. That's just not really a good training plan. That's not going to lead to smiles at the finish line. You may be painfully able to crawl across the finish line, but it's not going to be an enjoyable experience at all.
ANGIE: And that's not one I don't think that's what you want either. I don't think that when most people sign up for a half marathon they're imagining themselves crawling across the finish line.
KEVIN: Right.
ANGIE: Most people are imagining themselves breaking the tape with their arms in the air and that's really what we want for you and hopefully the things that we're going to go through in this episode are going to help you achieve that goal. So if you go into a half marathon without really understanding your why I like to think of this as like planting a garden without intention, which is something that I have done many times in my life. Right. I like the idea of having a garden, just like a lot of people like the idea of running a half marathon.
KEVIN: I would agree with this. You definitely like the idea of having a garden.
ANGIE: I do. And I've tried it in the past and I've bought plants and I've planted them and I've sectioned off little areas of our yard and I've got big pots and planted things in pots before. But what I have learned in all of those experiences, because all of those gardens have failed, is that I like the idea of having a garden, but I don't want to put in all of the effort to actually have a successful garden. I don't want to spend time researching soil and testing soil to make sure that the PH is correct or that the minerals are balanced or that it has the right amount of sunlight and water and I forget to water my garden and there's critters like all the bugs. I finally get tomatoes on my plant and then the bugs come and they take one bite of my tomato and the tomatoes wasted. Right. I'm sure there was one point where I was kind of looking up natural ways to keep critters away. And I think I even still have some stuff out there.
KEVIN: We still have stuff in the garage that we're naturally do.
ANGIE: It’s natural plant soap or something.
KEVIN: We had a garden on the side yard. Then we had a garden that you could visually see out the kitchen window. Then you see just the garden in pots. So, we have a large amount of pots in the garage now that have nothing in them at all.
ANGIE: Some on the side of the house.
KEVIN: Possibly. Maybe just some spider webs growing inside of them. We can successfully grow spiders.
ANGIE: I can yes, we do have spiders around the outside of the house. But here's the thing. So, one of the things that I've realized, again, is that I love this idea of having a garden. If someone else were to come and plant my garden and take care of my garden for me, I would absolutely love that. But I really liked that to training for a half marathon. Right. Like there's a lot of people that like the idea of training for a half marathon but aren't really excited about doing the work. They don't actually want to do the work to get there. And so, I think it's really important for us to get very clear on that because you can waste a lot of time and effort and money and pain and struggles for no reason. Right. That's why, again, it's so important for you to really understand that deeper, why that deeper purpose. Do you really want to do this? And if so, why? What are you trying to get out of it?
KEVIN: Right. Because if all you want is the end result of being able to tell people that you ran half marathon.
ANGIE: I just wanted fresh basil from
KEVIN: for a while, we're growing basil. Successful thing that we had going there with basil in a plot.
ANGIE: But then the acids came
KEVIN: if all you want to be able to do is say you ran a half marathon, it's going to be very difficult for you to successfully train for it because you don't actually care about the training. You just want a medal. What you wanted was to be able to walk outside and pick a tomato of a plant and cut it
ANGIE: and have a delicious homegrown tomato.
KEVIN: Right! But it's easy enough for you to go to a fairly conveniently located store and get a pretty delicious tomato that it just wasn't worth the effort of putting forth to grow your own in the garden.
ANGIE: Well, we just grew a pineapple, right? And this was actually something we planted.
KEVIN: It was a covid pineapple.
ANGIE: It was a covid pineapple. Like you know, if you cut the top off a pineapple and you plant it, it will grow another pineapple. But this process takes like two years, which is so crazy, right? So we actually just got to harvest our covid pineapple and enjoy it. It's actually cut up in the fridge right now and it's delicious. But I was thinking to myself, this thing has been growing for it's like two years, right? Like a year and a half to two years.
KEVIN: Yeah, I think we started that earlier summer of 2020, right? So two years, but thinking to myself, like, pineapples at the store, $2.99. You know what I was it really worth it? That thing pretty much grew on its own. Like, we didn't fertilize it, as you guys could.
KEVIN: Probably nothing,
ANGIE: Probably already tell by my gardening skills or my desire to be a gardener. We didn't do anything. We planted the thing in a pot and we added some more soil to it. When the soil started getting low,
KEVIN: Yes, I added some more soil to it.
ANGIE: I told you too.
KEVIN: and that's how the teamwork goes.
ANGIE: I told you to add soil to it. But that's the thing. Right. But again, am I going to do it again? I don't know, maybe? Because it didn't really take much effort.
KEVIN: Right.
ANGIE: The pineapple was one of those things that didn't take much effort, but like tomatoes, basil, like some of these other plants take a lot more effort
KEVIN: And go out there and interact with the garden on a regular basis.
ANGIE: And is it worth it? Right. I'm not one of these people that loves getting out there and spending hours in the garden. That's just not something that I love and other people do. Right. They actually love the physical act of gardening.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: They like going outside and they like getting their hands dirty and they like taking care of their plants and pruning them and doing all these things. And that's amazing. I wish kind of that I had that desire. Not really, but if I really wanted it,
KEVIN: You could nurture it
ANGIE: I could develop it. Right. But I just don't have that desire. And I think it's amazing the people that do, but again, they're enjoying the process. Right. They enjoy gardening, and then the result is a beautiful garden.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: I just want a beautiful garden without actually having to go through the process of it. Right.
KEVIN: So if you don't enjoy running, signing up for half marathon is a tricky way of starting. You'll be like, what I want to do is develop an enjoyment of running. Sign up for a 5K, but don't even sign up for a race. Just try to slowly build an enjoyment of running as a supplement to other ways that you're working out and gradually increase the amount of running. Maybe you'll enjoy it more when running. Like if you set it for a half marathon with the intent of, I'm going to go through this training plan and I'm going to love running, by the end of it, you're going to hate running even more because now running is the thing you have to do because you put money down on this stupid race and it's coming whether you like it or not. And so now it's more of an inconvenience. Like it's really thrust upon you that works the garden that you're ignoring. But now someone daily drags you outside and says, you have to go through these things.
ANGIE: Yeah. And unfortunately, that is what happens to a lot of people.
KEVIN: Which is really sad.
ANGIE: And we hope that it's not something that's happened to you guys listening to this running podcast, but it is something that hopefully maybe you have other people in your life that know that you're a runner. This is something that you can maybe warn them of. I think that would be good advice. Right. Because you that are sitting here listening to a running podcast are probably of a different mindset than a lot of other people out there.
KEVIN: Right. You like running.
ANGIE: Yeah. I'm guessing you probably like running. Right. But you might be inspiring other people that are watching you run, that are saying, like, Oh, that person, you're doing a half marathon. Maybe I should do that too. You can maybe send them this episode and be like, is that a goal that you really want to have?
KEVIN: Perhaps a 5K.
ANGIE: Right. And that's totally cool if that is actually their goal, if they actually want to go through the training, because that is really one of the biggest things that we see, too, is a lot of people just, like, signup for a race and don't actually train for it, and it ends up being a really painful experience.
KEVIN: Really painful.
ANGIE: Never want to run again.
KEVIN: Exactly.
ANGIE: Yeah. All right, on to point number two. Okay, so point number one, set your intention and know your deeper why. Point number two is set an appropriate timeline. Okay. It's very...
KEVIN: week and a half
ANGIE: very important that you set an appropriate timeline and understand what that is for you based on where you are right now.
KEVIN: Oh, man, there's so much parts to that. An appropriate timeline based off of where you are right now, not just based off of well, it would be convenient because that race is down the street from me that is in the local that's in the city next to us. That seems like a fun one, and it's close enough, and it fits my work schedule.
ANGIE: It's only four weeks away.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: I just found out about it.
KEVIN: Yeah! But the convenience of the location should not drive the timeline.
ANGIE: It can influence it.
KEVIN: Sure.
ANGIE: Right. As long as there's an appropriate level of timeline there right.
KEVIN: For you.
ANGIE: For you. So, some of the mistakes that we see people here making, like Kevin saying, is like choosing a race based on a location, based on we're going on vacation and there's this race there,
KEVIN: there's a good one,
ANGIE: we might as well sign up for it or jumping into a training plan without building a proper base first. And a lot of times what happens there is that people end up over training and unfortunately, again, getting injured. Right. Because when you jump into a training and you don't have the proper base built and you're trying to ramp up your mileage too much, too soon, too often too quickly, that often leads to overtraining and injury, and then a lot of times, people can't even run the race at the end of it anyway. Right. Because they end up signing up for the race, but then overtraining because they're trying to ramp up too quickly and they end up not even being able to run the race because of an injury that they sustained along the way.
KEVIN: Right. So there's sort of a general guideline in this thing. If you can run a 10K now, you can successfully race a half marathon in about three months in Ballpark.
ANGIE: Yeah. About twelve weeks is a typical half marathon training.
KEVIN: Do we have setting appropriate goals in here also?
ANGIE: Yes.
KEVIN: We'll get back into it when we get into goal setting also. I want to retouch on the timeline when we talk about goals because you could conceivably do it in less than that, but are you to safely race a half marathon? I really want to go out there and see what I can really do from I can race a 10K.It's a good twelve weeks to get to I can race a half marathon.
ANGIE: Yeah. I think that's a safe timeline to kind of play with. If you're not yet able to run a 10K, we would suggest to then build up to a 10K first and then it would be twelve weeks after that. Right. So it really all depends on your starting point. Right. If you are currently at zero, you need to give yourself enough time to build up your mileage to that 10K point, which is 6.2 miles, and then from there you can build up to a half marathon. Right. It's a slow build and people are like, oh, well, I can just add a mile a week. Right.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: And that'll be 13 weeks.
KEVIN: You could conceivably do that. I've seen training plans that have that. They’re literally, they are couch to half marathon plan and the plan looks painful.
ANGIE: Yeah. And that's the issue, right. We're not saying that you can't do it that way. You can do a lot of different things. We're just suggesting best practices. Right. If you want to run a half marathon and feel strong and not just hate the entire process and not hate the race and not feel awful during it, it's better to allow for a longer timeline
KEVIN: Because it gives you time to fit life into your schedule. Also, it gives you time to recover off your training. Like if you've never really run farther than say, like five or six miles the first time that you go out for ten, you're not going to want to look at your next week in a training plan and be like, eleven, but you're going to want to be like, oh, ten, maybe next week I get to oh, look, seven. Like something where you get a little bit of a pullback for physical release as well as mental release of being able to be like, okay, I don't have to go even further next week and then even further the week after and oh my God, how am I going to run 13 miles? You go down this negative mental spiral. That sounds awful. That's not a great way to train. You want to have the most positive experience in the training, so you have the most confidence when you get to the starting line.
ANGIE: Yeah, that's a really good point. The other thing, too, that it's really important to think about when you're setting your timeline is, are you currently in pain? Do you currently have an injury that you're dealing with? Because if you are currently in pain or dealing with an injury, that is probably not the best time for you to jump into a race training plan either. Right. It's going to be better, and you are going to be more successful both short term and long term, if you take the time to rehab that injury, build up your strength, and then slowly rebuild your mileage while not putting too much stress and strain on those injured tissues. Okay. So, it's really, really important to acknowledge this. And this is one of the things that we see so many runners ignore. And I will raise my hand. I have been one of those runners in the past. I have run through aches and pains in the past, and I will tell you guys, like, is it doable? Yes. There are plenty of people that I know that have a knee issue, a hip issue, these various things, and they're still out there training and racing, half marathons, marathons, all sorts of things. Right. But what I often see is that those are the people that ten years down the road, aren't able to run anymore.
KEVIN: Yeah.
ANGIE: Right. Those are the people that ten years down the road, their knees are completely shot, and they have trouble even walking upstairs. Right? Like, there are things that you can train through, don't get me wrong. Wrong. Right? And you might be like, she has no idea what she's talking about. Okay, but what are the long-term consequences of this on your body? One of our local running friends, she was a relatively elite runner. I think she ran in the Olympic trials, right. Or Olympic qualifier trials. Olympic trials for the marathon.
KEVIN: It took me a second to figure out who you're talking about,
ANGIE: But that was 30 years ago.
KEVIN: Almost 40 years ago.
ANGIE: And now she goes out and she can't run anymore, and she says, Gosh, I wish we knew then what you guys know now. I just went out and I pushed myself hard every day. Right. I just went out and ran at that medium to moderate hard level and just tried to get faster every single one that I did. And it worked temporarily. She was able to run the Olympic trials, but now she limps when she walks, and she's not able to run anymore.
KEVIN: Right. Which is really unfortunate because she loves running and she physically can't do it.
ANGIE: Right. And so I think that's where we have to really ask ourselves this question is, like, am I just in this for the short term goal, in the short term benefit? Am I willing to wreck my body right now so that I can achieve this one-time goal, or do I want to run for the next 20, 30, 40 plus years of my life? Right. So, if you are dealing with the current pain injury, yes, it might be really frustrating for you to say, you know what, I'm not going to run the half marathon that I really wanted to run this year or that I've already signed up for. I'm going to actually take a step back, and I'm going to decide I need to address this injury first. And that is such a hard decision to make, but it is such a good decision for you to make if you're looking at longevity in your running.
KEVIN: Yeah, there's a lot of people in, like, the higher caliber you get. Like, she was Olympic trial qualifying level. Like, she pretty darn fast, pretty elite across the country, and there's a lot of people that are, like, Olympic level, and they get hurt between the trials and the Olympics themselves. It's like, well, we're not just going to sideline this athlete. We're going to try and figure out the best way that they can possibly be in as good of shape as possible when the Olympics hit.
ANGIE: because it's their chance. It might be your one chance at the Olympics.
KEVIN: Right.
ANGIE: And that's a different thing that you're kind of weighing out there versus us as recreational right?
KEVIN: Yes, exactly. The risk reward is a little bit different off of that one versus like, well, man, it'd be really cool to do this half marathon. I've got friends that are already signed up and we're going to do it as a big group. That was going to be such a blast, but now I might have to miss that one so that I can continue to run for another 30 years. That's a different risk reward.
ANGIE: You can just go and be a really good cheerleader.
KEVIN: Go for it.
ANGIE: Right. Like, if it's a trip that you have planned with friends.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: You can still go. You just don't have to run the race. Right. Or maybe there's an option for you to drop down to like, a 10K or a 5K that might be a good option as well. So, you can still participate somehow, but you're not putting that same level of stress and strain on your body. All right, so after you understand kind of what that timeline is, well, I shouldn't say that after you understand this, this is a part of understanding what the timeline should be, and that is being truly honest with yourself and figuring out where you currently are. And this is something that is really hard for us as athletes, I think, especially those of us that have been athletic or have been running fora long period of time in our lives. We have a tendency to compare ourselves with a former version of ourselves, or we might think that we're further ahead than we currently are. Right. We might think that, oh, well, I used to be able to run a 25 minutes 5K, or I used to be able to break 2 hours in the half marathon, but I haven't really raced in five years, but I'm shooting for that same goal. Right. Or I'll just train the exact same way.
KEVIN: Or I'll train the same exact way.
ANGIE: Right. We see this a lot, especially in women after baby, right. Like, they are runners before they have children and they're able to run a certain time or distance or whatever it might be. And then after children, maybe that's five years down the road, maybe that's seven years down the road, they try to get back into running and they start training as if they were the same five or seven years ago. But your body just went through massive changes, both physically, mentally, emotionally. Like, you have new little people in your life that depend on you. Everything about your life before and after children is different, I would argue.
KEVIN: Right. Yeah. I mean, you're pushing the timeline five years down the road. If you just haven't been trained same level for five years, you can't just jump back in and be like, yeah, I'll just pick up my training where it left off. That's not really going to work.
ANGIE: Even those of us after the pandemic, right? Like what you were doing pre-2020 and now in 2022 are probably very different, right? There were lockdowns and restrictions and all of these different and a lot of people got sick, right? And there's all these different things that affected our training and our racing and whatever over the past few years. Are you in the same place? I would argue probably not, right? You might be better than you used to be. You might be a little bit slower than you used to be. Either way, understanding where you are right now is so critical because you might not be where you think you are or where you want to be, but it's okay. It's so important to just kind of accept that, like, all right, this is where I am right now. I need to train at this level so that I can continue to improve and I can continue to be successful. Because if you're training above or below your current level, you're not going to have as much success as if you would when you train at where you currently are.
KEVIN: Right. So, it's establishing an appropriate timeline for you, which starts with a true understanding of where you currently are. This is like the classic coming up with the cookbook where it says, you can prep dinner. I'm really much slower at prepping dinner. I'm going to try and phrase this in the most positive manner I can. I am not as quick at prepping dinner as Angie is. So, if I look up a recipe and it tells me that it's going to take approximately 30 minutes of prep time,
ANGIE: which, I mean, let's be honest, do any of recipes actually take that amount of time? I think that they all underestimate prep time.
KEVIN: Yeah.
ANGIE: like you’re looking for a professional cook.
KEVIN: Right. Angie can prep it in about 30 minutes. I can prep it in about 3 hours. But my favorite part, and I think this is how it connects to make sure that you really understand all the things involved is those recipes where they've got prep work, and then you throw it into the instant pot and they're like, oh yeah, you can cook this. The whole recipe will be done in 30 minutes. It's like, Okay, well, I prepped it for five. I threw everything in the pot, and then all I did was set the pot for 25 minutes. And it skips that whole part where it takes 20 minutes of just sitting there for the instant pot to actually go up to pressure.
ANGIE: come in to pressure. Yes.
KEVIN: Like it just skimmed over that whole part. And then you look here like, we should be eating dinner by now. Why am I not eating dinner right now? It said dinner was going to be ready in 30 minutes. I was pretty quick on prep work. And then you look at the little asterisk in there, and it goes does not include the instant pot coming to pressure. You're like, Oh, but we've been sitting here for20 minutes waiting for it to come fresh.
ANGIE: Yeah. So a 30 minutes recipe is actually like a 50 minutes recipe. You can really plan an hour.
KEVIN: Right. And then it adds in that extra thing and then allow it to naturally release. Well, that's another 25 minutes.
ANGIE: That's at least ten. Natural release is at least ten minutes.
KEVIN: The 1-minute quinoa literally takes 45 minutes to make.
ANGIE: I'm like, it takes eleven minutes on my stove.
KEVIN: I do not need to use an Instant Pot for 1-minute quinoa that takes me 45 minutes. And it's awful to clean.
ANGIE: Awful to clean.
KEVIN: You're shooting quinoa out the top of the Instant pot every time.
ANGIE: It's awful. Yeah. Why are we talking about the instant pot?
KEVIN: Because you need to make sure that you understand all of the things that go into an appropriate timeline.
ANGIE: Yes.
KEVIN: You need to make sure you're like, oh, well, actually, I need to build my strength before I can actually start on a training plan. I need to build my base up to 6 miles before I can embark on a half marathon plan. You have to take into account these things that look like, oh, sure, a half marathon in twelve weeks if you're at a 10K sure. An Instant Pot recipe in 30 minutes, assuming that it magically came to pressure in half a second. That's actually not a 30 minutes recipe. That's 50.
ANGIE: Right.
KEVIN: But you have to take into account all of the timeline involved. So, a twelve week to a half marathon only if you're actually at the place where that plan begins.]
ANGIE: Yeah. And not to mention other things that might be happening in your life. Maybe you have a vacation scheduled, or maybe you have other life events going on that could disrupt or affect your training. And all of those things are important for you to take into account, too. All right, tip number three is get support. So, tip number one was set an intention. Number two, set an appropriate timeline. Number three is get support. All right, you want to make sure that your friends, your family, whoever the closest people to you, are on board with your training, right? Because a lot of times what we see is that people decide they're going to do this and then they don't really tell anybody like, that they're going to train for a half marathon. There's a lot of people that actually feel almost like they want to keep it hidden, right, because maybe they're doubting whether or not they're going to be able to do it in the first place. Yeah. And so they don't even want to tell anybody that they're doing this. And so that ends up being like a very lonely place to be, right. They go it alone and they're just kind of lonely during their training. There's no one that they can really talk to when it gets hard or when they're struggling with certain things or when they have success and want to celebrate.
KEVIN: They can't celebrate with anybody because they're keeping everything to secret. When I kind of, sort of subtly started training for a marathon after having seizures and it didn't really tell you that I was training for a marathon, yeah.
ANGIE: Like that, maybe like that.
KEVIN: You don't have to go it alone. Share this with the people around you.
ANGIE: See, we speak from experience around here.
KEVIN: We really do speak from experience. But one of the big issues out of this is it causes issues with setting appropriate priorities. You have to tell, let your family and friends and everybody know that this is something that's going to take an appropriate amount of time. This is why you establish your why, like, you know why you're doing this in first place. Because then when people are like, come on out with us on Friday night, and you're like, oh, I have a Saturday long run, they're like, why would you do a Saturday long run? That seems ridiculous. Come out with us on Friday night. You have an answer to why would you do that.
ANGIE: Yeah. So, you're able to make things in your training a priority, right. A lot of people kind of try to just get it in when they can, right? Like they decide they're going to do this and they don't really tell anybody. So, then they're kind of trying to stick their training in whenever they can, kind of fit it in. And that leads again to that guilt. Right there's a lot of times people feel very guilty about taking time away from their family. Or on the other hand, they feel resentment towards their family, or they might get resentment from their family. Their family might feel resentful against them because they're away so much or spending so much time training. And so, this is why it's so important to get your family on board ahead of time. Right? Like, when you can sit your family or friends, whoever your support system is in your life, sit them down and be like, look, guys, this is what I want to do. This is why it's important to me going back to that why and that intention. Right? And this is what my training is going to look like. I'm going to have to run four days a week. I'm going to have to strength train. I'm going to be doing this at this time of day. I might have to miss some practices or some games or some different dance rehearsals or what not. Right. Like, depending on what's going on, there are some things that I might have to miss. And I want you to know that. Right. It's important for you to be very honest with what your training is going to look like and also how it could affect that.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: How is your training going to affect everybody else in your life? And I think that this is something that I've always felt very interesting about you, because whenever you set a goal, you try to not inconvenience people, especially us, as much as possible.
KEVIN: As much as possible.
ANGIE: Like you do your best to try to not make your training affect us as much as possible.
KEVIN: That's always my general training plan. So, it's like, how do I train most effectively for this race to optimize my results as best as I can within the parameters of not completely overhaul my entire family's life.
ANGIE: Yeah, which is very interesting, considering you took on the goal of 100 miles race.
KEVIN: That was the most inconvenient thing for my family that I've done.
ANGIE: And honestly, you guys, I had to convince Kevin that it was okay for him to inconvenience us. It was crazy because he's so programmed this way. And I was like, no, your training is a priority right now. Because he's like, Oh, I could get it in later. I'm like, no, you need to get in your run. You need to get in whatever it was. Right. No, you can't go to this thing with us because you have X, Y, or Z. And I'm like, it's okay. Like, your race, your training, is apriority for all of us right now.
KEVIN: So this is the benefit of the half marathon, is the training. Well, there are certainly going to be hinds where it will affect other people in your life. It's not quite as drastically going to affect people as, say, for instance, a full marathon. The time commitment of a full marathon is a lot more involved. There's a reason why you see these memes online about like, hey, what did you do on the weekend? Well, I had a Saturday long run, and then I recovered from my long run. That's the joke. That's all I did over the weekend. When you're training for half, you can actually do some other things. Like, you can fit things in with a little bit less inconvenience to the people around.
ANGIE: A little bit.
KEVIN: A little bit.
ANGIE: But that again, also is based like that depends on your level of experience. Right. Is this your first half marathon or is this your 10th half marathon?
KEVIN: Sure.
ANGIE: Right. If this is your 10th half marathon, your body understands the distance and understands the training, you're probably going to be able to recover a lot quicker from some of those longer runs versus if it's the very first time you've ever ran up your distance to this level, you are going to be tired. And I think that's a really important thing that most people don't take into consideration. I think that a lot of people will understand, okay, I'm going to need to spend 2 hours running on Saturday morning. Right .But they don't take into consideration the fatigue that they're going to feel afterwards.
KEVIN: I'm going to spend 2 hours running and then I'm going to spend 8 hours not feeling great.
ANGIE: Right. Or like putting that time in for a nap afterwards. Right. Or understanding, okay. After your long run, maybe you don't want to go to the beach with five other families and plan this whole day outing at the park or whatever it might be. Right. That might not be the best thing. So, your training could affect kind of the rest of the weekend because you might not want to be doing the same level of activity as what other people in your family might want to do.
KEVIN: Yes, completely fair enough.
ANGIE: But like you said, the half marathon, going back to that, it is much more doable. Again, just based on your level of experience. And I like to think of this as kind of like getting a dog, right? Like our girls, they begged us for a dog for years. It was on their Christmas list for multiple years in a row. Right.
KEVIN: I think one of them, that was their first word with a question mark at the end, like, can I get one please?
ANGIE: No. Both of their first words with mom, momma.
KEVIN: Alright fine. Second word.
ANGIE: But understanding what goes into it. Right. Like getting family support on board. I got to the point where I was like, okay, they're getting older. I think that it would be really nice. There are all these mental benefits of having a dog. Like there's lots and lots of benefits out there when you look up these research articles about the benefits of having a dog. Right. So, I was getting on board with wanting a dog.
KEVIN: Me too. I was super on board with having a dog.
ANGIE: Kevin was not on board getting a dog. Right. And so, I knew I could not get a dog. I should say I could not I did not want to get a dog until Kevin was on board, until the whole family was on board. Because I know that my kids are kids and they say that they're going to help and they say that they're going to do things I know that that's going to.
KEVIN: Obviously they're not going to.
ANGIE: Right. Like so I knew that I was taking on this responsibility pretty much myself because I know Kevin wanted a dog, so I was fully willing to take on this responsibility, but I also was not going to get a dog if Kevin was against it. Right. That is not an okay thing to do, in my opinion. Some people might disagree with me, and that's totally fine, but I wanted him to be on board with that. I wanted to know I had his support going in, and I told him I'll do the majority. But let's be honest, there's going to be times where you're going to feed the dog or when you're going to take the dog out to go to the bathroom. It's not like you're going to be completely hands off, especially based on the kind of person you are and husband that you are and how we kind of run the household as a team.
KEVIN: Yes, indeed.
ANGIE: So it was important for me to make sure everybody was on board before we did that. Yes. So that we had a lot of conversations about it.
KEVIN: Lots of conversations. So, the same way as bringing an animal into the house where everybody has to be on board with this, if you're going to sign up for a race of significant distance, you have to have the crew on board. Everybody's got to agree to it, and it doesn't have to be super inconvenient to everybody, but everybody has to at least acknowledge that there could be some inconveniences and be accepting of those.
ANGIE: Yeah. All right. Point number four is set a goal. It's very important for you to set a goal that actually matters to you. And this ties back in to some of the points above with understanding your why and knowing the appropriate timeline, but you want to make sure that you're setting a good goal, because a lot of times what we see is that people will set a goal and they'll only set one goal, and that goal will be a specific time for their very first race. Right. And what is that even based on, right? Is that based on some calculator that you pulled up on the Internet? Is that based on what your friend ran and you just want to beat that person?
KEVIN: Yeah, I Googled it. It must be accurate.
ANGIE: Right. So, like, a lot of times, people just set that time role and what happens then is that they're only focused on the time. They're so focused on the time that a lot of times they end up missing out on the journey, like kind of what we were talking about before. Or if they only set one goal, what this can lead to is this pass or fail mentality, which can really, really decrease your satisfaction with journey and decrease your satisfaction with the journey and decrease your satisfaction if you don't achieve that goal.
KEVIN: Or even if you do, because the goal is not hitting a number on a clock is not as satisfying as it sounds like it's going to be.
ANGIE: It is temporary. Right?
KEVIN: Temporarily.
ANGIE: But it also depends on everything that kind of goes into that. Right. So, I think one of the things, or a couple of things that we like to coach people to do is to first set multiple goals. OK. I think that there this is something that not everybody knows about. Right. It's like to really set different levels of goals. Maybe you can have a goal just to finish, just crossing the finish line. Maybe you have a goal of crossing the finish line feeling really strong, not feeling like you're just dying as you cross the finish line.
KEVIN: Yes, we have a lot of those on our team.
ANGIE: Yeah. Maybe you have a goal of being able to run the whole time without walking. Right. That could be another goal that a lot of people set for the half marathon. Maybe you set that for your first goal and maybe you said that for like your second or third. Maybe you had to walk a couple of times in the first round and you're like, you know what, I just really want to do this when I want to be able to run the whole time without walking. Right. Maybe you do have a time goal. And again, I think that time goal should kind of be held off until you've actually done the distance at least once. You might kind of have a time goal in the back of your mind, but I like to say that you shouldn't really focus on the time until you've done that distance at least once, because you really don't know what it's like.
KEVIN: Right. It's very nebulous. You can go online, you can Google it. There are conversions. I ran this for a 10K.There's a fairly decent calculator that turns your 10K time into a half marathon estimate. But the difference between running something around an hour and running something around 2hours is very different on your body. The training that goes into it is very different. And so, it's possible that they're not going to match. You see this a lot. If you have a watch that gives you race predictors, you might be closer on the 5K predictor and pretty far off on a half marathon. We know other people that are pretty close to the half marathon predictor, and then they look at what that says about their 5K. They’re like, I could never hit that for 5K.
ANGIE: Right.
KEVIN: So, it just kind of depends on who you are of whether that race calculator works well for you.
ANGIE: Right. Because some people are built more for speed and some people are built a little bit better for distance. And I think that you can definitely train yourself to be better at either. If you want to get faster, you can get faster. If you want to be better at distance, you can get better at distance. But like in general, I'm more built for speed. So, when I look at my race predictors on my watch, if I were to take my 5K time and what it would tell me for my half marathon time is actually faster than what I've been able to complete.
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: Right. And if I were to go the opposite way and take my half marathon time and use that to predict my 5K times, it's actually slower than what I've been able to run. I've run a faster 5K than what it says that I should be able to do.
KEVIN: Right. Whereas mine suggests that I should be able to run a 5K way faster than I can.
ANGIE: Oh, really?
KEVIN: Yes.
ANGIE: Because your half marathon time or your marathon time is so much faster. Yeah. Because you're built more for distance.
KEVIN: It’s like my marathon time should make a much faster 5K runner.
ANGIE: So, you have to be careful with those time goals, especially if you're getting them from a calculator.
KEVIN: Yes. So especially the first time, having a ballpark of a time is not a terrible idea. It gives you an idea about roughly how fast should I be going at the start of it. But if you've been training a lot with effort based training, you kind of know roughly how fast you should be able to go, that you could be able to push it for about however long that race.
ANGIE: Well, you should know what it feels like. Right. And that's why we really advocate for effort-based training with a lot of our training plans and our clients. Because understanding what that pace actually feels like in your body is much more effective than just looking at a time on your watch. But that's a conversation for another day. So, the other thing that we want to say about goals is that it's important for us to set process-oriented goals, not just outcome based goals. Right? So, there are two different types of goals. There are outcome-based goals, which would be like setting a time on the clock. I want to run a half marathon in under 2 hours versus process-oriented goals, which are, I'm going to train, I'm going to follow my training plan, I'm going to run four days a week, and I'm going to shrink training twice a week. Right? That's the process. It's all about what you actually have control over, because you actually don't have control over whether or not you run a sub two hour marathon or actually hit that time on the clock because there are so many factors.
KEVIN: Stop your watch when you feel like stopping your watch, and 1:59, done, nailed it.
ANGIE: Adjusted in garment later. Perfect.
KEVIN: I will fix that.
ANGIE: I'll fix that in garment later. Right, but you actually don't because there are so many factors that go into whether or not you actually hit that time, like the weather and how your stomach was feeling and all these things that you may or may not have control over. That's why process-based goals are so much more important because those are actually the actions that you take. You can set goals based on what you actually have control over and then know that, okay, if I do these things, if I hit these processes the way that I have them set up, that should give me the best chance of success on reaching that goal.
KEVIN: Right? So the big issue here is thinking the best goal that you can possibly come up with is having a specific time in mind that it should take you, and that's either a success or fail. If you do or don't hit that time, it really makes the race experience itself black or white and totally ignores all of the training involved. So this is like if you're planning on going on a road trip, part of the fun of a road trip is the road portion of it not just getting to the final destination. So you type in the final destination, you throw it into Google Maps or whatever your favorite mapping app is, and it will spit out a time at you. Now, Angie generally regards this as a goal of, I can beat that time.
ANGIEL: Challenge accepted.
KEVIN: If it says 25 minutes, I will get there in 22.If it says 7 hours, we will get there in six. This is how she likes to put it as a goal. But if you're looking at like a road trip as, all right, it's going to be four days, and all you're saying is, I have to get there in exactly, whatever, 40 hours or less, or it didn't matter. You skip the whole enjoyment of any of the process of driving on that road trip, you don't take into account, well, what if traffic shows up? What if I had to take a detour because there was construction that wasn't on the original map? You miss any of the excitement of, well, there's a cool landmark if we just detoured out over this. If you're so focused on hitting the time, you don't get to take that detour because time is the only thing that matters.
ANGIE: Yeah. So you're missing out on the experience along the way, or, like, some of the really cool things that could happen along the way. You might not even notice them.
KEVIN: And so much of the cool things that happens in training for a half marathon happened in the training for the half marathon rather than the race itself.
ANGIE: Yes. We like to say that the race is just your victory lap, that you actually transform yourself into a half marathon or during the training. It's not by actually completing the race right. Like, by actually training for the half marathon, you become a half marathoner. And that's why the journey is really where it's all at. All right, let's wrap this up real quick with point number five. Okay, so point I shouldn't say real quick because this is, like, one of the most important things that we can talk about. Point number five is that you need to make and follow a plan, and if this plan needs to be personalized in a way that's right for you. Okay, so, like we've kind of talked about already throughout this process, you need to have that intention. You need to set a goal. You need to make sure that you have the right timeline, and then you have to personalize this plan to make sure that it's right for you. And a lot of times, what we see is that people will just download a generic training plan from the Internet and just follow it right. Like, not even taking into consideration where they are or the timeline or any of that that we've already talked about. And a lot of these generic plans that you get from the apps or various things only give you the runs, and they neglect a lot of the other aspects of training now.
KEVIN: Or they'll say strength training.
ANGIE: Right. And there are a lot of apps out there that have actually improved in a lot of ways that will give you some strength exercises or things like that along the way. A lot of those ones usually you have to pay for. Usually those aren't the free ones that you can download, just say like, three mile run, four mile tempo run, five mile run, and you're like, what the heck is this? You know, what the heck is the tempo run? What the heck is this? And so a lot of times, people don’t even understand what those terms mean, right? And so then they just kind of go out and they run and they push to that medium to moderate effort level on every single run. And they end up over training because a lot of times, if you're just downloading a plan from the Internet, it can lead to training above your current level, which can lead to overtraining and injury and burnout and fatigue.
KEVIN: Sure.
ANGIE: Or training below your current level, which can lead to under training and actually not making the progress and having the success that you deserve because maybe you're training at a level actually below what you're capable of.
KEVIN: Yeah, you may finish, cross the finish line, arms in the air, because you're not tired at all, because you just never really push yourself all that hard in the race, which then just leaves that mental disappointment of, man, I don't think I pushed myself all that hard during the day. I wonder what else is possible? Then you find a better training plan that actually works for you.
ANGIE: Right. And so this is why we believe that personalized ands comprehensive training plans are the most important five keys to plan out and succeedat your best half marathonhings that you can do, like the most critical things that you can do for success. And these comprehensive plans, they need to include all of your runs. They need to include strength training. They need to include mobility work, right? Like, is your body moving the right way? They need to include recovery. Like we talked about before, it's five keys to plan out and succeed at your best half marathon to plan your recovery ahead of time. It’s important to know, like, my training load is increasing. That means I need more recovery time. I need more sleep. Maybe before you're like one of those people that likes to sleep five or 6 hours a night, but now you're going to ramp up your training to do a half marathon or a marathon. You need more sleep. Your body needs more recovery because it is in recovery and rest where your body actually rebuilds itself stronger than it was before, and you can actually gain all the benefits of those harder workouts.
KEVIN: Right. So, your personalized plan has to take into account all the things that we've covered already, like knowing why you're doing this and having a goal in mind. The goal helps you figure out what your timeline is, which I kind of wanted to cover back there on the combo of timeline and goals. If your goal is to just cross the finish line and you're already capable of running like 6 to 7 miles, you can successfully cross the finish line, especially if it's not your first half marathon. If you've done this before, you're at 6 miles. You could successfully cover 13 miles without hurting yourself in, I don't know, probably six weeks or so. But you could get to that. But if your goal is to see how fast you could race it, that's where we go back to. Like, it needs to be a twelve week plan. If you're just like, I would like to safely get their injury free and cross the finish line. My friends are going to do this. We're just going to have a blast and do it. No one is pushing themselves. Sure. Then you need a training plan that works for that. How can you safely build up your mileage so that you're not exhausted on that day and you can enjoy the rest of the day with your friends?
ANGIE: Yeah. And that's why, again, it's so important to personalize this for each race, too. Like what you just said, you can have a goal for a race that's just like, I'm just going to go out with my friends and really run and enjoy this versus the next race. I really want to go out and it's a flat course and I want to see if I can PR. Right. Those are going to look like two different training plans. Most likely they don't have to, right? You could use the same plan for both. But if you want to really kind of try to hone in on certain things, if you're just trying to complete a race with your friends and feel good at the end, you don't need to train as hard. Right?
KEVIN: You just don't.
ANGIE: Versus if you're trying to run a PR, you're going to need more focus, more commitment, more dedication, and you're going to need to train at a little bit of a higher level. Right. You might not want to push yourself that hard. If the goal is just like hanging out with your friends
KEVIN: It's just going to take a whole lot of different motivation. If the goal is hanging out with your friends and just enjoying the experience, putting yourself through like a difficult workout every week in a super long run where you're like over distancing and everything.
ANGIE: Well, it goes back to that question of why am I doing this?
KEVIN: Why am I doing this again how come I'm going for 16 right now? I 'm just trying to have fun with my friends.
ANGIE: Yeah. Why am I on this ridiculously long tempo run? I don't really need to be doing this right now. So again, having that goal and intention is really what leads to all of this. Right? So this is why it's so important for you to have a personalized plan. This is why the environment matters. What you're doing and where you are training and how you're training and in what capacity and what environment it really matters. Right. This is why your training is much different than my training, right?
KEVIN: Because you're going for the same race.
ANGIE: Yes. Even if we were the same race distance.
KEVIN: Right. But I mean, literally, we've trained for the exact same race before.
ANGIE: Yeah, that’s true.
KEVIN: The two of us have both trained for a half marathon. That was the same event, and our training plans did not look the same.
ANGIE: Yes. They look totally different. Right. Because Kevin and I are different runners. And so, like we were talking about before, some people are built more for distance, some people are built more for speed, or some people just like speed.
KEVIN: That's what I was just going to say is you just enjoy the speedier runs more. So your plan has to have enough of those that the plan is enjoyable, even if it's not necessarily 100%.That's supposedly the magic workout for you. The magic workout is partially the one that you're going to be able to continue to do and build the consistency in your training plan.
ANGIE: Yeah, exactly. And this is why you as an individual, you as a personalized person
KEVIN: Personalized person.
ANGIE: personalized person matters. Right. This is like trying to grow a vineyard in Florida. Right. It does not work.
KEVIN: We're not known for our wine.
ANGIE: Florida is not known for its wine. They make wine, and I will tell you ahead of time, it is not very good. They make it out of all different tropical fruits and all sorts of other things, but not grapes.
KEVIN: It is alcoholic fruit juice.
ANGIE: I shouldn't say that. They do make muscadine. That's true in Florida. But anyway, the whole point of this is that when you are trying to grow grapes, if that is your goal, if you're trying to grow a vineyard, you have to put it in the right environment that's right for that grape, even a certain grape. Some grapes grow better in cooler climates and some grow better in drier climates. Right.
KEVIN: The wine industry is getting upended with climate change. You can't grow grapes where they were traditionally grown because the climate is changing.
ANGIE: Exactly. So each grape has to have a personalized environment for it to grow and flourish and be the grape that it needs to be to make the wine that it needs to be
KEVIN: To be the best grape that it can be. And to be the best grape. Is that grape destined to be wine? I believe.
ANGIE: I mean, hey, could there be a better outcome for a grape? I don't know.
KEVIN: Yes. Fuel on an older marathon.
ANGIE: There you go. So, just like a vineyard or a grape or a certain variety of grape needs the right environment, you as a runner need the right environment, the right plan that is personalized to you for where you are right now based on your goals, based on your timeline, based on your intention and your support system and all the things to help you flourish as a runner and achieve the greatest levels of success. And that personalized plan needs to take into consideration your running, your strength training your mobility, your nutrition, your recovery, all of those things need to be included in your plan. Now, does this mean that you need to be like, okay, well, I have to sleep 8 hours every single night? Like it could, right? For some people, that should be helpful.
KEVIN: Sure.
ANGIE: Do you have to plan out every single meal? You could, right? That's not what we're saying here. You don't have to plan out every single meal
KEVIN: But that might not be the environment that's best for you. That might be super stressful. For some people, that much detail removes the stress, and for other people, that much detail adds so much stress to it that you have to find the right environment for you.
ANGIE: Yes. But you have to also know that your nutrition, as your training load goes up, your nutrition also has to change too, right?
KEVIN: 100%
ANGIE: Because if you're increasing your training load, you need to eat more to fuel your body and allow your body to recover and rebuild and get stronger. That's all part of the equation that you have to take into consideration when planning out everything in your plan.
KEVIN: Okay, so let's recap here. We've got five keys to plan out and succeed at your best half marathon starting off set. Your key intention, which is the crucial aspect of all of it everything kind of falls on this guy, is knowing why you're doing the half marathon in the first place.
ANGIE: Make sure that you have an appropriate timeline in place, which basically means that you need to know where you are right now and train from there with the appropriate timeline to get you to your goal.
KEVIN: Surround yourself with the support staff that you are willing to trust and say, hey, I might need some help on this and I might be absent at a couple of things. This is an important thing to me. Here's my why that I've already determined.
ANGIE: Make sure that you're setting a good goal for you, okay? Make sure that that goal means something, that that goal has different levels of a goal, different types of a goal for you. And also set process-oriented goals based on the behaviors that you can actually control and not the outcomes.
KEVIN: And then take all of those things and make and follow-ups plan that makes sense best for you. A personalized plan. Optimized to your success towards your goal at your particular race.
ANGIE: Exactly. So, we hope that this was helpful for you guys and you can take the principles that we've taught you in this episode and apply them to you either for your half marathon or you can even apply these same things to a marathon, to a 10 K, to really any race distance that you are training for because all of these things apply. So, if it was helpful, we would love for you guys to share this episode with a friend. We'd also love it if you were to leave a review on I tunes or Spotify or whatever podcast player you like to listen to us. And the other thing I want you to do is I want to offer a little giveaway. So if you are listening to this episode, take your phone and take a screenshot of whatever you're listening to this episode on. And I want you to email that to me at [email protected] and we will send you a Real-Life Runners sticker for your water bottle, your notebook, or anywhere else you would like to place your stickers. So obviously you would send me the screenshot of you listening to the episode, and then since you already took the screenshot anyway, you might as well share it to your social media, share it to your Instagram stories and tag us there. And then also in that email, send me your address so that I can send you a sticker to say thank you for listening to the podcast.
KEVIN: You'd send the pictures, but with that address it's hard to get sticker back in return.
ANGIE: Yeah, so send that over, [email protected]. Send me the photo screenshot of you listening to this episode with your mailing address and I would love to send you a Real Life Runner sticker as a thank you for listening to the podcast. So as always, guys, thank you for spending this time with us today. This has been the Real Life Runners podcast, episode number 256.Now get out there and run your life.