Making the Leap From 5K to Half Marathon

[yensid1071]

I have participated in several 5Ks and will be in a few more this spring and am considering a half marathon on Memorial Day this year. I am a wogger and am curious how much training time you think would be needed to properly prepare myself for the half. I found info from Jeff Galloway on the runDisney site and one of his programs is set up for a 19 week training session. The half marathon I'm looking at is setting a pace of 18 min/mile (must complete the entire event in 4 hours, which is encouraging for walkers). Since I've been in several 5Ks, including the Family Fiesta 5K, I'm wondering if I have time to prepare for this. Any thoughts or info you have would be greatly appreciated!

[Hypermommy]

I don't think 18 min/mile is sufficient for the Disney events. If I remember correctly I read somewhere that you must maintain a 16 min/mile pace. I haven't done a Disney race yet (or any race yet for that matter) so I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure that's what I read.

Not trying to bust your bubble or anything. Just that I find being realistic and accurate to be useful. And besides, there's no reason you can't make that! :-) If not for the Memorial Day timeframe, come do the Wine & Dine in the fall! ;-)

[yensid1071]

Hypermommy, no worries about bursting bubbles. You are correct. The minimum pace for a Disney event is 16 min/mile, but for the event I'm looking at (a local, non-Disney event), they're setting an 18 min/mile pace. My 5K pace is 12-13 min/mile, so I'm not worried about the pace. My main concern is if I have time to train and adjust my body for the longer race and how it will affect my current pace. Since I've never run in a half before, I'm curious what others think about the short time frame for training, training tips, and how I can expect my body to react. And, frankly, if it's worth my time. I don't want to cram in a shortened training routine and end up injuring myself. If it will be too stressful on my body, I can enter the 5K instead, which will be on the same day. But I figure a no-pressure, slower, local half-marathon may be worth trying (and add some bling to my collection, even if it's non-Disney bling). And if I decide to do it, the hard part will be convincing DW that I want to do this... lol. Besides, it will give me another chance to wear my WDW Radio Running Team shirt!

I'd love to make it for the Wine & Dine or the ToT race, but, unfortunately, I won't be able to make it down for either of them... So I'm making it up by entering local races instead. Eventually I *will* make it to WDW for another run!

[Hypermommy]

Yes, that you will!

I'm hoping to join the WDW Radio running team soon. Just have to wait until I can put together the $$. It's not that much but I have two teenaged boys, otherwise known as eating machines, and they probably wouldn't appreciate Ramen every night.

Good luck on your training!

[lorilovestigger]

I think you're pushing it to get ready for a half in about 2 months but that's just me. You can do but expect to be very sore for a few days afterwards. The biggest concern is injury. I once decided to do the Disney half in November, yep 2 months before and pushed my training too hard and ended up with a stress fracture. It took me 3 months to get over it.

Try and find a 10k and work your way up to a half so you have proper time to train.

JMO

[yensid1071]

Hypermommy, thanks! I bet you'll be part of the Team in no time!

Lori, thanks for the info. That's really why I'm asking: to get real-life feedback from others who have tried to be in a half with short training time. As you mentioned, I want to avoid injury. My main thought is that the time limit is 18 min/mile, so I thought I could do this and just go a bit slower. It's the actual distance that has me wondering if this is something I should skip. On the plus side, if I wanted to stop at a couple places on the course, I could just walk home. The course is an out and back which passes not far from where I live, so I could just turn and go home if I felt discomfort. Seriously tho, this half marathon is as close as I can get to home, so I don't have to arrange travel or anything. That makes it look really good when planning to participate. There are only one or two 10Ks that are in the area, but they're not all that close, so that makes things even more difficult (gotta find a babysitter for the kidlet, ya know). Desicisions, decisions.....

[JavaPuppy]

Hi Jay,

I have a couple questions for you before giving you a training schedule for your rapidly approaching Half Marathon:

1) What is your longest Run the past three weeks?
2) How many times are you running per week right now?
3) What is the longest Run you have ever done?
4) Are you nursing any injuries right now?
5) Have you joined the WDW Radio Running Team (benefiting The Dream Team Project) yet? ;-)

If you want to e-mail me directly, please feel free to do so at wdwradiorun@gmail.com.

[yensid1071]

Happy, email sent. Any tips/thoughts are appreciated! Thanks!

And I'll answer question 5 here... yep, I have joined the team! I have my shirt all set for a couple 5Ks in the next couple of weeks!

[PinkTink918]

My boyfriend and I are making the leap from 5k to half marathon as well, with a brief stop at the Tower of Terror 10 Miler in between ;-). We've begun the Galloway program that's on the RunDisney page for the ToT. We started early to build in time for injury, and/or to work up endurance. We're pretty excited!

[JavaPuppy]

My boyfriend and I are making the leap from 5k to half marathon as well, with a brief stop at the Tower of Terror 10 Miler in between ;-). We've begun the Galloway program that's on the RunDisney page for the ToT. We started early to build in time for injury, and/or to work up endurance. We're pretty excited!

Being a Galloway Run/Walk person myself, I am pretty biased towards his system. It has greatly reduced the amount of time I spend injured, and increased my speed (my 5 fastest halves and 10 fastest fulls have all been done doing a Run/Walk).

If you want/need any help with the Magic Mile calculations for the Long Run, or anything else for that matter, please don't hesitate to write me here (or directly via the e-mail address in my Sig).

[yensid1071]

PinkTink, congrats on making the leap to the half marathon! Good luck at the ToT 10 miler! I wish I could be in it, but schedules didn't work out. Good luck training for the half! Can't wait to hear how you and your boyfriend do in the ToT 10-miler!

If you have any questions or need any tips, I would definitely suggest contacting Happy. We've exchanged emails and he's answered a number of questions for me and given me a few tips in my training. He responds quickly and has been very helpful! Thanks, Happy!

[JavaPuppy]

You are correct. The minimum pace for a Disney event is 16 min/mile, but for the event I'm looking at (a local, non-Disney event), they're setting an 18 min/mile pace. My 5K pace is 12-13 min/mile, so I'm not worried about the pace. My main concern is if I have time to train and adjust my body for the longer race and how it will affect my current pace. Since I've never run in a half before, I'm curious what others think about the short time frame for training, training tips, and how I can expect my body to react. And, frankly, if it's worth my time. I don't want to cram in a shortened training routine and end up injuring myself. If it will be too stressful on my body, I can enter the 5K instead, which will be on the same day. But I figure a no-pressure, slower, local half-marathon may be worth trying (and add some bling to my collection, even if it's non-Disney bling). And if I decide to do it, the hard part will be convincing DW that I want to do this... lol. Besides, it will give me another chance to wear my WDW Radio Running Team shirt!

I'd love to make it for the Wine & Dine or the ToT race, but, unfortunately, I won't be able to make it down for either of them... So I'm making it up by entering local races instead. Eventually I *will* make it to WDW for another run!

I would recommend a minimum training time of 8 weeks if you have completed a Half Marathon before, and 16 weeks if you have not.

I also highly recommend doing a Run/Walk for all endurance events due to the decrease in injuries and recovery time after doing the weekly Long Run.

Just my two cents...