Eight questions to ask yourself when creating a training plan

It feels like I’ve been gone forever! I just got back from a holiday driving trip to Maryland. I love long driving trips.

Anyway, a long driving trip gives you a great opportunity to read a new book. The book I read was Daniels’ Running Formula. This book was chosen because it is supposed to contain the key to making you faster.

So far, it’s a great book. There is plenty of information I’d never heard before so maybe I’m learning something. I’ve made it through about half the book so I can’t do a full review just yet. However, here is an interesting list of questions to ask yourself when figuring out your training needs.

1. What is your current fitness level? The book tells you how to figure that out.
2. How much time (weeks) is there until your key race / races?
3. How much time can you devote to training (hours per day)?
4. What are your strengths and weaknesses in areas of aerobic capacity, endurance, speed, etc.?
5. What kind of running do you like to do?
6. What event are you training for? I’m always working toward marathons.
7. What conditions (environment, facilities) do you have for training?
8. How solid is your joggling ability?

Answer these questions for yourself and it’ll be a lot easier to put together a training program. In future entries, we’ll look at next steps to creating a training program.

Also, look for some upcoming entries based on much of the content in this book such as Breathing Tips, Treadmill Workouts, and Adjusting to the wind.