I started Beachbody’s new strength and running program, 30 Day Breakaway, on Monday and I am blown away by how incredible it is!!! As a coach, I’m obviously a huge fan of Beachbody but the company continues to impress me with its professionalism and innovation! 30 Day Breakaway isn’t like any other program Beachbody has created – not only does it have the audio guided speed workouts (that as a runner I can vouch for as legit workouts!), but the warm-up, dynamic stretches and strength moves were clearly crafted for runners.
I admit, as an avid runner who has been combining running with Beachbody programs for 10 years now, I was a little skeptical when I hear that Beachbody was coming out with 30 Day Breakaway. I wasn’t sure if it would truly serve runners performance wise or would be mostly focused on weight loss. I’ve been very impressed by 30 Day Breakaway! (To read more about what 30 Day Breakaway is, check out this blog post I wrote on it.)
Virtual Marathon Training While Doing 30 Day Breakaway
I’m currently training for a virtual trail marathon and am in the final 4 weeks of training (my race is November 14th). This program has been perfect because the strength workouts are nice and short (20-25 minutes) and there are only 4 a week. Usually at this point in my marathon training I start to slack off on the strength training because I’m running so many miles, but since the workouts are so short and start and end with runner specific mobility and flexibility moves, they are very do-able on top of my training mileage of about 40 miles per week.
When I got my completion pack in the mail, I got SO excited to do the program. I pulled out the workout calendar and made a commitment to check off every workout and make it work with my training. I’m not working with a run coach so I have the freedom to do what I want in my training (plus I don’t have a goal for the trail race other than to finish), so I got excited at the idea of completing this AND following Ultimate Portion Fix nutrition (modified to make sure I’m getting enough fuel for my training).
30 Day Breakaway and Marathon Training Week of October 19th
30 Day Breakaway is actually designed to help you train for a 5K. However, I think it can be modified to suit a half marathoner or marathoner (I actually plan to create a half marathons raining plan to share with you on a future blog post). I wanted to do these weekly recaps to show runners who you can use 30 Day Breakaway to train for a half or full marathon.
Here’s exactly how I combined 30 Day Breakaway with my marathon training this week:
Monday: 7 mile run with (Day 5) Tempo Intervals and (Day 1) Fat Blasting Ladders plus (Day 1) Total Body Strength.
I usually do a tempo run on Mondays so I decided to do 2 30 Day Breakaway audio runs along with a warm-up and cool-down. this was perfect! The tempo run was 4 x 3 minutes. I did the strength workout in the afternoon and loved it!
Tuesday: Upper Body Strength (Day 2)
I intentionally just did upper body this day to give my legs a break between hard runs.
Wednesday: 8.2 miles with speed intervals and Rest Day Roll-Out (Day 2)
I meet a few friends on Wednesday mornings to do speed workouts. This week we did 1 mile at half marathon pace, 1/4 mile recovery, 4 x 400 @ 3K-5K pace, 1 min recovery between each, 1 mile @10K pace. I felt great during this run and I really think it’s due to the quality nutrition!
That evening while watching trash TV, I did the rest day roll out (scheduled for day 2 on the calendar but I didn’t have a chance to do it then) and it was INCREDIBLE! It’s actually only about 10 minutes of rolling and the rest is dynamic stretching and even some knee and ankle strengthening using a band specifically for runners.
Thursday: 6 miles easy and Lower Body Strength (Day 5)
I went a little out of order with the strength workouts by doing leg day on Thursday. I did this so that I could give myself Friday to recover before my long run on Saturday. I loved the workout and intentionally didn’t lift as heavy as I normally would since I’m so deep into my marathon training.
Friday: Core Fuerte (Day 3) and HIIT Intervals with warm-up
I LOVED this short 20 minute core workout! It was invigorating. And again, loved the dynamic stretches in the warm up and cool down! I honestly was torn about doing the HIIT interval run but the Type A achiever in new really want to cross it off so I went out and did the run quickly with a short warm up to make it 3 miles total. I didn’t go as hard as I normally would to save my legs for the long run.
Saturday: Long run – 18 miles. I’m writing this on Friday so I’ll have to keep you posted on how this run goes but I know that since I’ve already ran this distance or longer 4 times that I will be able to handle it on more tired than usual legs.
Sunday: Rest Day Roll-Out (Day 6)
Same roll out workout, again this is planned as I’m writing this on Friday.
30 Day Breakaway Results – 1 Week In
I have to say that after just 5 days so far of following the program and using Ultimate Portion Fix, I am feeling so much better and stronger. I had actually gained 5 pounds over the last 2 months of marathon training because I was using the higher mileage to justify more food and treats (plus I’ve had a few vacations). In the last 5 days, I’ve lost 2 pounds, I’m sleeping better (I sleep with an Apple Watch and it confirmed I’m getting higher quality sleep) and feeling more energized!
30 Day Breakaway Can Be Modified to Meet Your Personal Running Goals
As you can see, I went a bit off of the traditional “plan” for this program but I still completed the 3 20 minute audio runs, 4 strength workouts and 2 recovery workouts while training for a marathon. If you do the math, the strength workouts are less than 2 hours in total, the runs are only 1 hour and the foam rolling can be done while watching the Bachelorette (yes I did this!). Any runner can fit these essential workouts into their schedule if they are serious about their goals!
I found myself more motivated than ever to get the workouts in because I was following a plan. When I simply plan to do an upper body, lower body and full body strength but I’m not actually following any type of program, I’m way more likely to skip them! And a strong runner is a faster, more happy runner, so I know I need this!
Join Our 30 Day Breakaway Accountability Group
The energy in our accountability group is incredible too and everyone is loving the program! It’s not too late to join us! If you want to get more info on joining our 30 Day Breakaway accountability group or you want to work with a coach who is a runner and understands how to modify any program, including Ultimate Portion Fix or 30 Day Breakaway to meet your individual goals, please fill out the form below.
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