Blew off training plan for my first HM. Race is 2 weeks away. What now?

I'm going to be blunt.

You were following a minimalist plan, then did less than half of that.  That's a recipe for suffering at best, and injury at worst.  And LOTS of walking.

You don't need a week of taper.  You haven't trained, so there isn't any fatigue accumulated to warrant it.

My suggestion is a DNS, and selecting another HM in a few months.  Go volunteer for the race in 2 weeks.  Hopefully it will inspire you to train for the next one.

If you are dead set on doing this race...All you can do is damage control.  You can't gain much fitness in 2 weeks, but you can gain some.  Forget about the long run.  Run 20 minutes at an easy effort every day for the next 10 days.  Take the 4th day before the race as a complete rest day.  The 3rd day before, run for 20 minutes.  The 2nd day before, complete rest.  The last day before, run 15 minutes.  On Race day, Use a run/walk interval strategy.  Run easy for 2 minutes, walk for 2 minutes.  You'll be sore, and tired, but hopefully you won't get hurt.

Again, if I were you, or you were my athlete, DNS would be the call.

Never mind

Originally posted by amalgamate I'm going to be controversial on this one and say that you SHOULD do it. There will be some walk/run in there but there a ton a walkers at most half's. For some people to say to DNS seems a little excessive. I came to TRI from being a runner so I've ran a ton of races that I probably could have trained harder for. Your first half marathon should have the goal of "just finish", 13.1 isn't that far I did a 15k(9.3 miles) 1 month into running, which was stupid because of possible injury(ended up being fine). I did a walk run and averaged 11 minute mile, it wasn't the fastest but I was just happy to finish. YOU CAN DO IT! I don't remember who exactly it was (maybe Hal Higdon) but he preaches run/walk for injury prevention and his times were pretty decent. If done right walk/run can get you through when nursing an injury, you screwed up your pacing, or you're undertrained. get a better time than straight run. Whatever your usual long run is for the week..... aim to run that before walking. Then anything above that you can play it by ear. walk if you need or run if you need. You only fail if you don't try.

Fixed that for you.  

Being able to do something does not make it a wise decision to do so.

ETA:  I've personally seen people who did that one long or hard run too many that pushed them over the edge to injury.  It's a bad idea for the OP to attempt to run this race.

I didn't say it screws up your pace.  I said it was a valid strategy if you screw up your pacing early in the race, and blow up.  It's a way to salvage what's left of your race.

And, it's not faster than a steady run pace if you're adequately conditioned and uninjured.  It's a strategy that has it's place, but I've seen too many people stick to it when it's not the best tool for the job.  Sure, you can drive screws with a hammer, but a screwdriver works better.

^^^This^^^

Proper training isn't just about performance.  It's just as much about injury prevention.  As I stated earlier, runners get hurt when they do that one run that pushes them over the tipping point.  It's almost always either a long run or a hard run.  13.1 miles is very long run for someone who's only been running 30-40 minutes 2 x / week.

That's the point of a DNS.

It's an internet forum, so you will get advice about your situation even if it isn't answering the exact questions you had.

Because you haven't "built" to run the distance yet. You build up your entire training program over time, including the long run to handle the increasing stress. Be it from running faster or farther.

Amateurs are not immune from pushing too much. Many problems an amateur has can come from not comprehending how much they are pushing themselves. Be it too hard by intensity or by distance. Earlier postings of yours did not do much to alleviate concerns of this. Current ones aren't doing much either as there hasn't been much shown in understanding training paces or building up in distance.

Anyways thanks for all the opinions because it really has helped me to see how unprepared I am so I will likely adopt a much more conservative strategy than I would have thanks to the expert opinions in this thread. I will come back and post how it went in 2 weeks!

Did you state why you are going forward with this anyway? I'm reading quickly and may have glanced of it. I see people post about regretting not doing something all the time, but they completely skip over the regret of doing something they shouldn't have. There is going to be regret of some type no matter what in this situation. And it seems to be coming from not having trained as well as had been hoped for so that is what needs to be fixed to have a good race.