Even pace vs even effort during the race

rybo

Any thoughts from experienced marathoners, especially pertaining to a hilly course?

Intuitively it seems like if you tried to maintain an even pace, you are essentially adding “speed” bursts throughout your race in order to keep that pace on the up hills.
Where as even effort lets you slow down/speed up depending on terrain, but allowing you to maintain that steady effort & heart rate.
Is there an advantage to one over the other, and if you do opt for even pacing, do you run your long runs that way, pushing hard up the hills to keep pace?

jturnerx

I train on and do a lot of trail races with a lot of elevation change so the issue of hills, pacing and effort are even more exaggerated there but I think it's still applicable to hilly road races. Personally, I go by perceived effort. It's easy to blow out all your energy if you try and maintain your flat road speed on hills. Keep it steady and hammer the downs. You'll make up the time there. As you get around the last 5 or 10k push the pace on the ups. If you've been patient and smart it's likely you'll be passing a lot of people at this point.

Train your downhill running. I think a lot of people overlook this because they think running downhill is easy. It's not. It feels easier but it can really thrash your legs if you aren't prepared for it.

arc918

Effort is the way to handle the big hills. I know I can't power up a hill at the same pace I run flats or downs.

If you are going in to a race looking for a certain time, then you need to account for the hills.

I have a friend who has a crazy mile by mile pace chart for Boston.