An Easy & Manageable Way to Train

3 days until my first 5k race this year

29 days until the last day of school

30 days until my first half-marathon ever

30 days until my cousin's wedding

39 days until summer classes start

Thinking about all of the events that are coming up has got me thinking about how fast time really does fly by. I remember sitting here 5 months ago, signing up for my first half-marathon thinking that I had all of the time in the world to train. Now it's 30 days away and I feel a little excited freaked out.

Freaked out because the longest run I have been on is 9 miles.
Freaked out because I took a week off when I was sick and another couple of days when my grandpa died.
Freaked out because I haven't been following my training schedule to a tee.
Freaked out because I have never raced anything longer than 4 miles.
Freaked out about all of the people that will be at the start line.

As you can see I am a little freaked out. So since I have missed a few long runs and workouts here and there I wanted to create something that would allow me to stay more focused and on track these last few weeks without making me feel bad if I didn't do a particular workout on the day I scheduled it. I wasn't the best with staying on track with my old half-marathon training plan because the runs and workouts were specific to the day. This new one allows me to do my easy and long runs any day I want and throw in the other stuff on the days I am busier, etc. I think this new training guide will really help me out when it comes down to finals week, which is also the week of the big race.

I made up this checklist so I can stay on track and see what I have done and what I still need to do.

So far this week (my "week" started yesterday) I have done an easy run and today I did the Dorm Room Ab Circuit. On Saturday I have a 5k race so I'm going to count that as my other easy run since it's not long nor am I going to be sprinting the entire thing!

Question

How do you train for a race?