Getting with the (3plus2) program

Here's last week's exercise log:

Monday -- 2.9 miles on the treadmill
Tuesday -- 45 minutes on the elliptical
Wednesday -- 3.5 miles on the treadmill
Thursday -- Kenpo-Cardio X in the morning, 30 minutes of baskeball and 15 minutes on the elliptical at lunch
Friday -- Hour and a half of yoga in the morning, 45 minutes on the elliptical that afternoon (had to work through lunch)
Saturday -- 5.8K on the street/trail
Sunday -- An hour of X-Stretch joined by my son, Jake. He's definitely more flexible than his old man.

After my run Saturday, Lance Armstrong complimented me on finishing my longest run yet. And today he praised me for my fastest mile since joining NikeRunning.com. Which was a pretty cool surprise. Gotta love the Nike+ program.

Today was the first day of my structured running program, the 3Plus2, or FIRST, model developed by a couple of exercises profs at Furman University in South Carolina. The basic idea is you run three times a week, focusing on different aspects of running. The three "quality runs" are track repeats, the tempo run, and the long run, which are designed to work together to improve leg speed, lactate-threshold running pace and endurance. The benefits are fewer injuries, less time spent training but with improved results (hence the name of the book, Run Less, Run Faster), training variety, maximize potential, etc.

What I like is that the method has been scientifically tested and it works. What helps me is that I live a 5-minute walk away from a middle school track, so today's track repeats -- two 400-meter runs sandwiched between 10 minute jogs -- were easy to measure. Once around the track equals 400 meters. God, I love that kind of math!

The "plus 2" means you do other aerobic activity twice a week -- like rowing, stationary bike, swimming -- to improve cardiovascular fitness. It gives you plenty of time to recover from the runs.

The book is full of tables that show you how fast you should be running the repeats and tempo runs, based on your time in a 5K, 10K, half-marathon or marathon. I'm doing the 12-week intermediate 5K training program now. My 400K times are targeted at 2 minutes, 10 seconds, since I run a 30 minute 5K. Or, the slowest 5K time available on the charts in the book is 30 minutes, so that's what I'm using. My first 400K was 2:18, so I picked it up a bit for my second 400K and did 2:08.

It feels great to have a tested and true plan to follow. What this also means is, I should be signing up for a 5K race 12 weeks hence, since the running plans are all 12 weeks long and target a specific distance event. A quick check of the Run-Tex event page shows  ... absolutely no races on July 9. However, there is the Vern's No Frills 5K on Georgetown on July 16. Sounds perfect. If there's ever been a no-frills runner, it's yours truly.