TIaRT -- The Over-Training Blues

This week's topic on Take It and Run Thursday at Runners' Lounge is "Over-training." I have already given -- and taken -- my advice this week: Don't be a slave to the schedule.

I love my schedule. I have every day planned out through the marathon on October 19, fourteen weeks away. Want to know what I'm going to do on August 9? Nine miles pace. September 11? Five miles easy. October 6? Cross training. I like having it all laid out, and I like knowing that it's building me up for a good marathon.

But.

Some days, your body just isn't on schedule. It happened to me this week. I had a hard run on Monday, and though the schedule said three easy miles on Tuesday, my body said, "No." Forcing yourself to "work through it" is, in my opinion, the easiest road to over-training. Missing a day, or cutting a medium run or a long run down to a short run, is not going to sabotage your plan. Getting injured from over-training is.