You already have the assistant — Meta AI. Half Marathon Coach installs into it: 14 questions route you to one of three proven tracks, every pace is calibrated from your actual fitness with VDOT, and every Sunday your training log gets a genuine review with tiered intervention rules. $19 once. No app, no subscription, no $150/month coach.
A PDF plan runs $10–50 and never changes. A running app runs about $15 a month — $180 a year — and never intervenes when your log shows three rough weeks in a row. A human coach sees all of it, for $150+ a month. Half Marathon Coach reads your log every Sunday and costs $19 once.
A PDF can't read your training log. An app counts your miles but won't tell you the long run is creeping past the weekly-percentage rule, won't recalibrate paces when your fitness changes, won't call a down week when the log shows the strain, and won't adjust a thing when you get sick. You follow the plan; the plan never follows you.
No app at all — it installs into the Meta AI you already use. $19 once, yours forever. Fourteen onboarding questions assign you one of three researched tracks. Every pace comes from your actual fitness via VDOT, with your half-marathon band derived from the data and checked by a goal-time realism gate. And every Sunday the coach reads your training_log.csv and applies tiered intervention rules — green, yellow, red — with threshold-first periodization, programmed fueling, the neck rule, and a missed-session protocol that adjusts instead of guilt-trips.
The single idea that separates good half marathon training from "half a marathon plan": threshold pace is (within ~5%) your race pace. In marathon training, threshold work supports race pace. Here, it is race pace. That reorganizes everything — and most plans ignore it.
20–40 minute continuous threshold sessions, cruise intervals, LT hills — the half marathon is won on lactate-threshold tolerance, not on piling easy miles. The plan's quality architecture is built around T/HMP, not marathon pace.
The 25–30% weekly-volume rule with a 150-minute ceiling binds the long run at 10–18 miles for half marathon volumes. A 10–12 mile longest run is the evidence-backed completion predictor. There is never a 20-miler.
30–60 grams of carbs per hour, starting at 30–45 minutes in, rehearsed on long runs at effort — no marathon carb load, no multi-source sugar system. At half marathon intensity, the limiter is GI tolerance, not glycogen.
Whether or not you ever buy anything, here is the method that works — the same one Half Marathon Coach is built on. Six habits. None of them require an app.
Three-quarters of your weekly miles should feel almost embarrassingly easy. Easy running builds the aerobic base everything else sits on; hammering easy days just steals from the threshold work that actually wins half marathons.
One threshold session a week — 20–40 minutes continuous, or cruise intervals — is the highest-ROI workout for 13.1. Training all your "race pace" work at 10K pace overcooks you; calibrate to your actual fitness and hold the band.
Set workout paces from a recent result, not the goal. Your half-marathon pace is a band derived from your VDOT — within it, specificity lives; outside it, injury does. Goal times are earned across a cycle, not declared on day one.
Every third week, cut volume ~30% and let the body absorb the work. Adaptation happens in recovery, not in the workout. Sleep, illness, and life stress are training inputs — a plan that ignores them isn't a plan.
Symptoms above the neck — sniffles, sore throat: easy or rest, see how it goes. Below the neck — chest, fever, body aches: rest, full stop. Coming back too early costs more weeks than waiting costs days.
This is the part a PDF can't do: read the log every Sunday, spot the third straight rough week, and intervene — a down week, a pace recalibration, or a plain-spoken "back off." Your job is running; the watching is the coach's.
Fourteen onboarding questions — goal race, current mileage, recent results, injuries, availability — route you deterministically to one of three tracks, each researched against the canonical training systems. Graduation is earned by demonstrated durability, never by ambition alone.
Higdon-informed. First half marathons and rebuilders. Three to four runs a week, mostly easy with one long run and strides; run/walk supported. Peak 20–35 miles a week. The goal: reach the start line healthy and finish strong.
Daniels / Pfitzinger-informed. Durable runners chasing a time. Four to five runs a week, one threshold session plus half-marathon-pace long-run segments, VDOT-calibrated paces. Peak 35–55 miles a week, with a raced 10K tune-up 3–4 weeks out.
Pfitzinger / Daniels-informed. Experienced racers. Five to six runs a week, two quality sessions alternating threshold and VO₂max, medium-long runs; the long run obeys the 150-minute cap. Peak 50–70 miles a week. Hard entry gates: ambition alone never qualifies.
Track 1 graduates to Track 2 after 8+ weeks at 25+ miles a week with a 12-mile long run. Track 2 graduates to Track 3 after 8+ durable weeks at 40+ miles a week with a 15-mile long run. The coach watches the log and proposes the move — you never have to figure out "what's next" alone. And a finished half marathon earns a graduation packet that pre-fills the Marathon Coach's onboarding — the ladder is designed, not coincidental.
No apps to download. No accounts to create. It installs into the assistant you already use.
Pay $19 securely via Stripe.
Your license key appears instantly on the success page.
Tell your Muse: install the half marathon coach powerup from poweruppacks.com
Goal race, goal time, recent result, mileage, longest run, running age, availability, course, environment, fueling history, strength, sleep, injuries, vibe — then your track is assigned and your first week is programmed.
Secure checkout via Stripe · Questions? [email protected] · or see all packs
A free plan is a schedule, not a coach. It can't see your training log, won't recalibrate your paces when your fitness changes, won't call a down week when the log shows strain, and won't adjust when you get sick. Half Marathon Coach checks your log every Sunday and applies tiered intervention rules — green, yellow, red — so the plan follows you instead of the other way around.
From your actual fitness using VDOT calibration — never your goal time. A goal-time realism gate checks whether your target is reachable from where you actually are. Every workout pace is one your current fitness supports, and paces get recalibrated as your fitness changes across the cycle.
Correct — and any plan telling you otherwise is training you for a different race. The long run is capped at 150 minutes and 25–30% of weekly volume, which binds at 10–18 miles for half marathon training. The median half marathon finisher's longest run was about 11.5 miles. What wins the half is threshold tolerance, not a heroic long run.
Yes — that's exactly what the Finish track is for: first half marathons and rebuilders, 3–4 runs a week, mostly easy with one long run and strides, run/walk supported. You don't need to be fast; you need to be consistent, and the track is built for that.
The coach adjusts instead of guilt-tripping. The neck rule governs illness — above the neck versus below — with return protocols that bring you back safely. Back-off detection flags overtraining and pain signals. The missed-session protocol re-plans the week around what actually happened instead of pretending it didn't.
Your sessions, logged to training_log.csv — either from a connected source or manual reporting after each run. The Sunday check-in reads the log: mileage, long-run ratios, workout completion. The more honest the log, the better the coaching.
Email [email protected] within 14 days and you get a full refund. No forms, no hassle.
"Install the half marathon coach powerup." — that's the whole install.
Get it for $19