Klaas Lok wrote:
Sorry for my late reply, haven't been here for a week.
Regarding your first question: I would suggest to do a fast run of 8-10km with a few surges as exchange for the 10km races. Please read at the bottom of page 59 in my book about this type of runs.
Regarding your second question:
“Going by feel and increasing gradually from the lower range of the speeds defined at your starting fitness point, up to the high end of the speed range over the course of the 13wks of the program”, sounds like a logic approach.
However, firstly, as you can read at the start of the half-marathon chapter, the ideal starting point is that you start your half-marathon preparation after a period of training for and racing of 10km’s. So, in that situation you will probably already in the first week be able to easily run the times in the middle of the speed ranges.
Secondly, always run by feel: on bad days, in a bad week, you can’t increase your speed compared to the week before.
Due to the fact that a half marathon schedule is a bit heavier than a 10km schedule, I would suggest to limit the number of sessions at the high end of the speed range. And don’t strictly follow the times in the table, but run by feel. The times in the table are a starting point, as I have explained in the book.
Thank you for your reply. Appreciate it. I know that it's not optimal, but I'm coming from marathon training with low volume and lots of quality running, so this is not too stressful for me. I feel much snappier by following your program. i just in the second week, but I feel great. I'm going to give this a chance and train like this for a year or two in order to see what it does to my over all performance.