Olympian Jeff Galloway is a big advocate of the run/walk/run method. He is an Olympic marathoner and he uses this method for his own runs. He runs 30 seconds and walks 30 seconds. You can go to expos where he is a guest speaker and hear him lecture on this method. There are tons of articles and lots of blogs that talk about him and his method. He is the running consultant with RunDisney and he creates training plans for each of their races.
When I first started training for the 2011 Princess, I looked at his training info but decided not to follow it. I didn't like that it had a run longer than 13.1 miles before the race and I wasn't really looking to do intervals. I was planning to run start to finish(haha). I started training and soon got very frustrated. After a while I quit training and eventually went to Princess and was swept.(Which you can read about here.) After being swept and realizing that if I really trained I could do it, I decided to take a new approach. I started doing research about training programs and methods. I started with the Weight Watchers 5K program and then moved on from there. I sort of did a 10k program after the 5k one was over but I wasn't really happy with it. After I did the Labor Day 10K I started looking more at half programs. I finally decided to go with Galloway's plan for the Princess.
Even though I was planning to do Tink, I had waited too late to start that program and the first Tink fit perfectly into the Princess training by falling on the week you would run 12.5 miles so Galloway actually had the Tink on the schedule as an option instead of the regular training run. (Now that they have moved Tink to a different weekend, it falls on a day of a short run in his program so it is no longer listed on the plans.) I had also realized after my first attempt at running a full 5K that intervals would probably be better for me. I played around with ratios and tried to find the right one. It took a long time and honestly I don't remember when I first started running 1:1 intervals but they fit for me and I found myself doing better in my running.
After running regular since March 2011, I had started thinking about changing things up. Maybe I was cheating myself. Maybe doing intervals was actually slowing me down now instead of helping. I decided earlier this year that I wanted to start working on building my run time up again. I did the WW5K program again with the goal of running 30 minutes straight on my 30th birthday. I didn't get it done on my birthday because running in Florida after being at Disney for a few days just wasn't happening. However, the weekend after we got back I did it. I was surprised that I made it through but I ran 30 minutes straight. The idea behind this was to actually strengthen my interval runs. I want to start running the 30 minute runs in Galloway's training plan straight through so that when I run intervals in my long runs, I will have better endurance. After doing my first 30 minutes, I started wondering if I should just start training to just run and cut out my walks.
Last weekend, I read about the Runners World Summer Running Challenge. They are challenging people to run at least one mile every day from Memorial Day until Independence Day. I went back and forth about it for while and finally decided to do it. I am a HUGE advocate for rest days especially for people who are building their running. I have always tried to never run more than 4 days a week. However, I have significantly built my base and doing an easy mile at an easy pace isn't really going to hurt me too much. Plus, I am not starting my serious training until July anyway. Once I start it, I will go back to mandatory rest days to keep from over working my legs. Since I am just working on building my legs up for that training, I decided to become a streaker.
Monday was day one and I decided to go all out and run the mile as fast as I could straight through. I was actually surprised and really proud of myself because I did the mile in 12:21. I know that is slow to most people but considering the first time I ever ran a full mile it took me over 18 minutes, that's a huge improvement. I was really proud and excited but my legs were pretty much done. As great as that mile was, I could never keep that pace for even two miles, let alone more. The next night I decided to go back to my intervals and take it a little easier. As we were doing the run intervals, I could feel myself running faster but I wasn't really feeling too tired by the time the walk interval started. I was worried I was going to get burnt out. By the end of the run, I still felt great and I thought we had made pretty good time. I checked RunKeeper and sure enough, it took us 12:46 to run the mile. That was only a 25 second difference in time but there was a HUGE difference in how I felt. My legs felt great, I wasn't out of breath and I knew I could have continued running for a while at that pace.
It reminded me of why I started running intervals. It reminded me of how even though I am walking part of the time, I don't lose much speed and in longer distances, I can actually finish with a better pace with intervals versus without. You cover the same distance and exert less effort. It is easier on your joints and body and allows you to recover during your run so you can run farther. It reminded me that if it works for an Olympic marathoner, it will work for me.
I am considering switching up my interval ratios some. Maybe doing longer intervals on training runs along with the 30 minute runs each week so that I can be stronger on my shorter race intervals. I have plenty of time to play with it and figure it out but I was so glad to be reminded of how great the run/walk/run method really is. So I guess all of that is to say, if you have never tried it and you find yourself struggling with runs or being frustrated with your pace, give this method a shot. You just might be very pleasantly surprised.
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