November Progress

November is almost over. I started my off-season training at the beginning of the month. My goal was to hit the gym 3x a week (Monday, Wednesday, Friday) and start putting 'humpty dumpty' back together again.

Week 1 - I made it to the gym at 5am every planned workout day. Started with a simple 2 miles each day on the treadmill. I wanted to ease my way back into running. Running only a couple miles allowed me to work on my form and breathing. I stretched and did some weight lifting to help complete each workout. Total miles - 6

Week 2 - I increased each run by 1 mile, giving me a total of 3 miles each day. I still took time to get a good stretch in after the run and hit the weights afterwards. My lungs were protesting a bit with a small asthma attack at the end of each run. Total miles - 9

Week 3 - I kept my miles at 3 each day. I didn't want to increase the miles just yet. The 3 miles were just challenging enough for my lungs and breathing, but no asthma attacks. I made sure to stretch and hit the weights before calling it a day. Total miles - 9

Week 4 - The training wheels were coming off. I bumped my daily mileage to 4. The first day was a little tough. I had to remind myself that I could do 4 miles without stopping. The remaining workout days went a lot better. I was able to break up the 4 miles into segments in my mind to help get me through. Total miles - 12

I'm hoping to continue this trend into December. Daily miles will be increased, as will the weekly total miles. I know this was the blueprint I used for my half-marathon in May where I ran a personal best. Maybe I'll get lucky and get another personal best in my half-marathon in April.

Planning For 2016 Races

The race season has come to an end for me. My last race of 2015 was the Detroit International Half Marathon about a month ago. The season hasn't ended because I couldn't find any cool races to run (there's always plenty of those). I always end the race season at the end of October. Here are a few reasons why:

* The end of October is when the high school cross-country season ends. I ran cross-country in high school. Once October hit, the season ended and we had time off before indoor track season.
* I'm able to take some time off to let any injuries heal.
* It's a great opportunity to work on strength training and slow things down enough where I can keep working on my form when running.
* I think if I raced year round I would get 'race burnout'. I like having to work towards a goal. The goal for me is making it through a few months of races.

Looking forward to 2016 I'm hoping to get at least four half marathons in, a couple 10 mile races and some 5k's sprinkled in between to help work on speed. So far I'm locked in for the Hansons/American Home Fitness half marathon in Mt. Clemens, MI in April. This is one of the races on my race bucket list. I'm really looking forward to running in my hometown. The course will take us through Metro Beach. I'm very familiar with that area as that was one of my main training areas back in high school.

Here's to a great running season for 2015. Cheers!