mara-wha? disser-who?

i've been reluctant to pull the trigger on the whole marathon thing. it's just so damn long, not to mention all that training sucking up every weekend.

turns out my time drain excuse doesn't have legs anymore, per this article in today's wsj.
(due to technological difficulties, here's a snippit of the article)

Traditional marathon training typically emphasizes mileage, calling for 35 to 50 miles of running each week, and sometimes more depending on how long you've been training. The scaled-back programs usually don't exceed 15 to 35 miles a week. The programs vary depending on what the runner wants to accomplish. Some runners train with relatively easy combinations of running and walking three days a week. Another program has the runner do three days of higher-intensity running, and adds in two 30-minute cross-training workouts each week. The length of training also varies, ranging from 16 weeks for more-experienced runners to 28 weeks for beginners.

Mr. Galloway pushes a simple, three-day workout. The method calls for a 30-minute comfortable run/walk combination on Tuesday and Thursday and one longer run/walk on the weekend. The idea is to get in shape by progressively increasing the one long weekend run -- not by running a lot of mileage during the rest of the week.

The "long" weekend run starts at three miles and increases one mile every week. After 10 weeks, the formula changes so that the longer runs increase by two miles but occur only every other week. Once the distance reaches 17 miles, the long run shifts to every third weekend. On the other weekends, the "long" run ranges from about four to seven miles, depending on where you are in the program.

The Galloway program also advises runners, no matter what their skill level, to incorporate walk-breaks into the workout. A walk-break is a scheduled one-minute or longer brisk walk during a workout or race, taken even if the runner isn't tired, to help the body stay fresh and avoid injuries. Some free information on the program can be found at www.jeffgalloway.com. Mr. Galloway says he has trained about 100,000 runners through his for-fee clinics and e-coaching programs, and says 98% of them finished a marathon or achieved other race goals.

Another three-day running program from Furman University in Greenville, S.C., has the marathon community buzzing with a recent endorsement from Runner's World magazine. The 16-week program is shorter than many marathon-training programs and is best suited for someone who can already run eight miles comfortably.

The FIRST marathon program, which stands for Furman Institute of Running and Scientific Training, also limits you to just three days of running, even if you feel like running more. The idea is that the muscles used in running need more time to recover than many runners typically allow. The running days include speed workouts, a "tempo" run at a hard but still-comfortable pace, and a longer-distance run. On at least two off days, the runner spends 30 to 45 minutes on a different type of exercise, ideally a non-weight-bearing exercise like swimming or cycling. The details of the workouts, speed and distance all vary depending on the runner's fitness level. Information on how to personalize a FIRST workout can be found free at www.furman.edu/first.

i've also toyed with conducting my own personal experiment to determine if its harder to dissertate or harder to train for a marathon. let P represent a continuous measure of pain. my hypothesis is that it Pm is less than Pd (note: for some reason you can't use greater than or less than signs in this blog. yet another sign!).

what do ya'll think?