Running Plan Review Runner's World 40+ Beginner Run Plan

Does it build you up smartly?

Not really. The 6 weeks run as one block, with no phases and nothing that changes what the training is for along the way. The sessions are laid out clearly enough to follow, but none of them tells you why you're running it.

Honerkamp starts sensibly. Two weeks of easy running come before anything hard, and every harder Tuesday is written out from the warm-up mile to the cool-down. From week 3, each Tuesday brings a new kind of session, which gives the plan some shape of its own. This plan is written for runners over 40, who are told up front that they're not as young as they used to be, and a simple, steady layout suits that reader.

But a runner coming back after years away has the most to gain from knowing what each session is for. The first set of hill repeats arrives with the climb and the jog back down, and nothing about what it should build or how a good one feels. The notes on the page give the workout, and the reasoning is yours to find. "With most runners, when I ask them what they're hoping to accomplish on a given run, they look back at me with a blank stare," says Bill Pierce, a co-founder of the FIRST training program. On this plan, asking that question before each Tuesday is up to you.

Does it protect you from injury?

Partly. Two things here protect you well, but the plan leaves gaps where a runner over 40 needs cover most.

Hard days never land back to back, and every hard Tuesday starts and ends with a mile of easy running.

The biggest gap is the build. Weekly running goes from 5 miles to 10 to 14 in the first 3 weeks, holds near 14, then rises to 16 in the last week. In a study of 874 new runners who wore GPS watches, researchers led by Rasmus Østergaard Nielsen found that those who added "more than 30%" to their distance over 2 weeks "seem to be more vulnerable to distance-related injuries than runners who increase their running distance by less than 10%." The authors called the study exploratory, and overall injury rates were similar across the groups. Still, by that measure, this plan's opening weeks sit far past the line. The rise into week 3, 40 percent on top of week 2's doubling, comes in the same week as the first hard workout, and no week after it is light enough to count as a rest. A fixed plan needs relief built in, since load that piles up without a break tends to raise the risk of injury and illness. The PDF calls recovery as important as the running itself, but in 6 weeks the plan never steps back to give your legs that chance.

Your breathing sends good news early: your heart rate at the same easy pace starts to drop within roughly 8 weeks of steady running. But tendons take weeks to a few months to adapt to new loading, and bone longer still, so your legs can run on a slower clock than this whole plan. Lorraine Moller, an Olympic marathon medalist from the Lydiard school, puts it as a golden rule: "you can never progress faster than your slowest part will allow." For the runner this plan is written for, the risk sits in the Achilles and the knees, not the lungs.

Honerkamp does give one rule for pain: when it crops up, cut the mileage, the intensity or the time. That's sound, but it stops there. Nothing describes the early signs worth acting on, how much to cut, when to stop running altogether, or at what point an ache needs a doctor. That matters, because a low-grade ache that hangs around may raise the risk of a full injury that interrupts training, though so far that's been measured in footballers rather than runners, and a runner who can't tell passing soreness from a warning will often run through it.

Strength is missing from the calendar too. The PDF recommends 2 to 3 sessions a week, ideally right after a run, but it gives no program and schedules no sessions. For a runner over 40 that's a real gap, because strength training substantially lowers the risk of sports injury. Twice a week, two-time Olympic marathon champion Eliud Kipchoge and his training partners do an hour of strength and mobility work: resistance bands, bridges, planks, single-leg deadlifts, and balance work. He doesn't lift weights. "The exercises are not something where you suffer," says Marc Roig, the physiotherapist who oversees the routine. The PDF already asks for sessions right after a run, and a few moves like those after Thursday's easy miles are a simple place to start.

What happens when you miss a day?

Honerkamp wants this plan treated as written "in pencil, not pen," and he says so clearly. If you need an extra day off, take it. If you need to swap days, swap them. With 3 or 4 rest days every week, there's room to do it.

That covers a lost day. But a lost week is different, and in a 6-week plan, a week is a sixth of it. Writing about older runners, running writer Scott Douglas described how fast one sore week can grow: "One week of trying to finesse your way through a tender calf becomes two, then four, and before you know it you haven't done anything fast or long for two months." On a plan this short, even one lost week leaves a hole. Miss week 4 and you come back to a 7-mile long run with a 5-mile one as your most recent. Nothing says whether to repeat a week, skip ahead or rebuild. The calendar makes Tuesday and Saturday look like the runs to keep, but it never says so, and since no single session comes with its own reason, it's hard to judge which one to give up.

The effort doesn't ease off at the end, either. Week 6's longer repeats are harder than week 4's short ones, so a runner coming back from a missed week meets the toughest Tuesday with less behind them, and nothing on the page says to soften it.

Are the workouts varied enough?

Yes. In 4 weeks you meet 4 different hard sessions, and each one works your running in a different way.

Most coaches would have easy running make up most of your week, since it's the base that carries harder training. About 93 percent of this plan's running is easy. On top of that sits one clearly hard Tuesday, and it changes every week: a run that builds from easy to hard, short fast repeats with walking breaks, minute-long climbs with a jog back down, and longer repeats to finish. Many coaches favor mixing easy running with clearly hard efforts over long stretches at a steady, medium effort, and this plan keeps the two well apart.

That suits a runner over 40. Hard running isn't something to fear at this age. Short, hard intervals added to easy running are a common way to build fitness, and these are short, with plenty of walking or jogging between efforts. The plan calls its hills hidden speedwork, and they work the same way: a minute of climbing is hard enough to count, and over before it wears you down.