Week One-Taking It Easy

     Alright this week is gonna be the most important run you will ever have, except for when you run the Chicago Marathon or any other marathon. Starting off week one we must find out what pace you will be training throughout the rest of the runs. You can do this by running 3 miles at a pace you find comfortable running in. I recommend that you run at a location that is near water because once you start running you will get really hot and a best way to stay cool is to run where a nice breeze can hit you. Before running the 3 miles you should get a watch to time how long it took you to complete the run. By doing this you can figure out the pace that you should be placed in.

"Me in the past"

     Heres a formula to figure this out: Time it took divided by miles that you ran. So lets say you ran 3 miles and you completed these miles in about 27 minutes. We would have 27 divided by 3 miles and the pace you should be running at would be at a 9 minute/mile pace. Also if your worried that you wont be able to complete 3 miles then just start off with 1 mile it should be almost the same results at the end. But I highly recommend 3 miles. For the reason that your body would be running longer which for most cases you will have to take a walk break and this will increase the time it took to complete the miles and give you an exact pace to run in.
     After you figure out your pace its now time to run during the week. You should be running at least three times a week including your long run which I recommend running on saturday mornings this will give you time to rest and recover. The two runs during the week you should be running 3 miles every time. You do this so that your body can be warmed up for the long runs and also so you don't get cramps or any injuries later in the season. Trust me I've gotten injured my first year for not doing this, learn from my mistakes.
     My schedule for this week is to run 3 miles on tuesday and thursday. Then on saturday run 4 miles because I already know my pace which is an 8 minute/mile. Try having at least one day off between your runs so your body can recover. Well hope week one goes smoothly for you and try to get a partner to run with you because it will give you more support to keep going when it starts to get difficult.

Can you challenge yourself to run 26.2 miles?

"The Marathon Figure?"

               Many say that to complete a marathon one needs to be an athlete, well fit, muscular, all that good stuff that women look in to, well some women. But in reality none of that is really true, because the only things that you really need is self-confidence, training, and a passion to run. As some wise person said " Anything is possible if you believe in yourself ", which is all you need to cross that finish line and feel proud of doing something that nearly 99 percent of the world cant do. Come on thats like trying to find a needle in a hay sack its not impossible but its freaking hard to do.            

               So can anyone run a marathon? What do you think? Let me fill it in for you…YES!. Anyone can run a marathon if they wish to do so. No matter of weight, disabilities, or gender. Anyone can run a marathon if they have the proper training. I'm talking about almost 6 months of training at least to prepare you for that big day. I know from experience because I have ran the Chicago Marathon twice and three half marathons. Im not saying that its easy to run but what I'am saying is that with the proper training you can achieve it.

"Me and my Mentor (Ant)"

                As a sophomore in high school I joined a program that trains students to run a half and a full marathon. The program approximately starts in May and ends in October once we have completed the Chicago Marathon.  We would train every Saturday along Lake Shore Drive meeting up with the other schools at around 7:30 in the morning. As the program started we ran 3 miles by ourselves to determine which minute-mile pace we should be placed to run with. After that run every Saturday we would increase the distance by one mile so it would look like this ( 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10). Then when we hit that 10th mile we would increase the distance by two miles every saturday until we hit 22 miles. As we hit 22 miles the marathon would be close so we would just have "easy runs =]" which are like 10,12, or 14 miles which you would find very easy after running 22 miles. And for every run you would have mentors to guide you through every mile and help you when you don't think its possible to run anymore. 

"The Beast"

         There are a lot of marathon training groups out there if you really want to achieve running 26.2 miles in less than 6 and a half hours. You can visit  http://m3.mgrf.org/ which is the group I ran with. They have great mentors to help you run, give you advice, and guide you through those long, painful, agonizing 26.2 miles. I hope i didn't scare you but I did say it wasn't going to be easy. Also there is the run for aids group, fleet feet but that one you have to pay some type of money to be able to train with them, run for autism, and many more that you could choose from just start looking. But the one I recommend the most is Team M3 because it feels like a family when you run with them and also they have running groups that start from 8 min/mile to 15min/mile so you can choose the pace that fits you best. 

          Anyone interested in running a marathon just stay tuned in. This year I had a knee injury while playing soccer where my knee wasn't able to keep up with the long distances so I had to drop my team. But now I feel much better and I'm going to start training for next years Chicago Marathon. So I will help guide you through the process of completing a Marathon.