There’s a reason why I decided I wanted to lean into fitness this June, but I didn’t state it publicly before, because it was a big, scary goal and when you make it public, people see.
And when people see you declaring that you are going to do something, they expect you to actually do it.
I’m going to run a marathon. The Mississippi Blues Marathon, in February 2020.
I want to run a marathon because it is hard – there’s a joy in tackling hard things just because they are hard, and this is one of those things. For me, training for a race makes me a million times more motivated to run – the knowledge that I will be tackling this hard thing on a predetermined date pushes me to train harder now.
Another thing that I’m thinking seriously about with the marathon is a time goal. I used my most recent half marathon time with the FiveThirtyEight marathon calculator, and it projects that my time for a marathon would be around five hours and forty-five minutes. Frankly, this seems like a very long time to spend running, so I’d like to get somewhat faster. I still have eight months until the marathon, so there’s time for me to get faster. According to the calculator, if I could run a half marathon in about two hours and fourteen minutes, I’m on track for a five hour and fifteen minute marathon.
I’m also registered for another half marathon in November. My thought is this – if I can run that half marathon in two hours and fourteen minutes, I’m on pace to be where I want to be for the marathon. That breaks it up into chunks – right now, I’m not training for a five hour and fifteen minute marathon, I’m just training for a two hour and fourteen minute half marathon.
I’m planning on following the Hal Higdon Novice Marathon plan to train for the marathon, and the Hal Higdon Intermediate 2 Half Marathon plan for the half marathon this November. I’ll start training for the half marathon at the end of August, and I’ll have about three weeks of overlap between the programs in November – I’ll figure out how to navigate that when the time comes.