Quote Originally Posted by KSH View Post
Yea, running is a thorn in my side. I REFUSE to give into the pain/injuries though. Simply refuse.

I want to do an IM in 2008, but I'm so scared of a half or full marathon.

I tried to train once (1 year ago) for a half marathon. The injuries I got from that training, put me out of running for almost a year. I missed the tri season for 2006 because of it. The crazy thing is that I was training for a half, so I could get over my fear and negative thoughts about me and running distances... and my fears were just solidified.

I'm still trying to figure out if I should try to run a marathon pre-IM. There are many people who do their first marathon at an IM. I think I might go that route, to keep injury away. Plus, if I try a marathon pre-IM and I fail, then I might get it in my head that I can't do the IM.

Not sure what I will do.

When is your marathon? Soon? What year are you doing an IM? 2007? 2008? Which one?
Hi KSH,

To answer your questions in a slightly delayed fashion, (I don't usually get much time at the computer), I'm doing IM Can in Aug 2007 and I'm thinking of doing The Ave of the Giants Mary in May as part of my training.

My first Mary was at IM Can in 2003. During my training program I never ran for longer than 2.5 hrs, that's about 15 miles for me on a training run. My coach told me that the only reason to run longer was for confidence and that if I was confident in my ability to finish IM than there was no need to run past 2.5 hrs. Apparently, physiologically anyway, if your body learns to process energy for that long it can do it for 6 hrs, the rest is muscular strength of which we should have lots from the cross training etc. I had a 4:20 split at that IM.

The next year I coached my DH to his 2nd HIM finish. He is a much slower runner than I am. We did training runs up to 2.5 hrs at a 11 to 12 min pace most of the time, my heart rate was very low - 105 to 115. I was painfully bored during these runs but I wanted to support him fully, he was really nervous about his race. So I think that year I ran about 2 times per week, one long run and the other about 1 hour of hills usually. On race day we both competed and I had my 2nd best HIM finish ever, even with a flat tire. I'm sure that I would have PRed otherwise. Best of all, I had my best HIM run ever both in terms of time and how I felt. BTW DH had a great finish, he took a full hour off of his first HIM time.

So no, you do not need to do a mary before IM and I also recommend doing all your long runs really slowly, painfully slowly. Worry only about the time you spend and not on the miles, time is more important for training the way your body utilizes your energy systems.

Have fun training and feel free to ask more questions. I've got a few races under my belt.

Cass