Improving Marathon times
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Week of: Mon Tue Wed Thurs Fri Sat Sun TW
1/28 22 R R 10 8 8 R 48
2/4 16 R 12 R 8 10 R 46
2/11 24 R R 10 8 10 R 52
2/18 R 12 12 R 10 10 R 44
2/25 20 R 12 R 8 6 R 46
3/4 10 R 4 R 6 3 R 23
3/11 6 R 3 R R Mar.
I really appreciate your thoughts and advice!
I wouldn't suggest you make any changes for this marathon training cycle. If you insist on doing 24, which I think 22 would be more than enough, then make sure you are running really easy that week. If you feel at all overly tired or sore, cut back miles or take an extra day off.
For your next marathon (of course there will be another one!), I would recommend that you work up to 5 to 6 days of running each week instead of 4 to 5. Then you can do some easier runs in the 6 mile range. Using the schedule you have here, you are running over 90 minutes every time you go out there. That puts ever run into the LSD range which are more taxing on the body than an hour run. Aerobic fitness is built by cumulative mileage over time, so you don't need to be out there 90 minutes or more each time out. As you gain more fitness, a nice, easy 60 minute run will serve as recovery so you'll be ready for the next day's workout.0 -
Thanks, I didn't realize you had replied again! And thanks to you, too, Lucy! My 8 mile runs have been 70 and 71 minutes, but soon everything will be over 1.5h. I do want to work up to running more frequently and mixing it up after March. :-) It's just hard to really pull back sometimes...And yes, there will be another marathon, post April (when I have planned two laps of Tough Mudder.) Planning to do the MCM of course, and I'd like to do the Napa marathon next year. I love the training itself, but racing is so much fun- and it feels so much easier than training runs. If you had asked me a year ago, I would have told you that I don't run. Period. Go figure!0
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I dont want or need to argue with you, i have seen you have given some great advice on other threads! back to what the thread was about tho the lady wants to improve her marathon time, she isnt Elite I repeat isnt ELITE so can we please stop with what the elites are doing! we can learn from them yes!! she is at the moment a very average runner! the advice given was to up her milage nothing else, no intervals no tempo runs no track time no core work, nothing about how some strength training can make her a faster stronger runner! just up her mileage! she can build a perfectly good base on 40+ miles a week, where does the magic 60 come from? and how is it applicable to this lady?
I see even your 5k time isnt what I was expecting if your running 60+m a week!! we have club runners doing 16 minutes on less than 30m a week! when it comes a round who is going to be the faster 10k/10m/half or full runner?
I think we may have to just disagree, yes base mileage is great for a new runner I am not doubting that but I will still maintain telling somone just to up there mileage by 50% is poor advice
Not that it matters to anyone except maybe my wife and 3 children ...... but I'm a bloke. I'm fairly certain as of this morning I was still a male but I'll check again later tonight. Personally, I worry about any group who describe themselves as Elite.
I do core work on Mondays and Thursdays. I excercise in some fashion everyday. I'm not saying this is a one size fits all solution but I like it so far.
I'm upping my mileage by 10% each week and holding it at the weekly level for 2 or 3 weeks before upping it again. If I get injured I'll let you know but so far I've upped the weekly mileage by 4 miles in total and I'm running my long runs at closer to my race speed with no problems.
I did 11 miles on Saturday at 9:08 pace and this is closer to the way I was expecting to feel when training. Tired but not injured.
Don't underestimate us non-Elites!! By the way Scott for a 52 year old I'd take those times any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Hell I'd take them as a 40 year old....0 -
Not that it matters to anyone except maybe my wife and 3 children ...... but I'm a bloke. I'm fairly certain as of this morning I was still a male but I'll check again later tonight.
Doh! My bad! I took the bait and ran with the opposite gender as well.
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Be careful about getting too aggressive with the pace when building mileage. Generally you should go easy pace when increasing mileage and then only start going faster once you are comfortable for a while at the new level. If you are using a HRM that is around 75% max heart rate and below.I'm upping my mileage by 10% each week and holding it at the weekly level for 2 or 3 weeks before upping it again. If I get injured I'll let you know but so far I've upped the weekly mileage by 4 miles in total and I'm running my long runs at closer to my race speed with no problems.
I did 11 miles on Saturday at 9:08 pace and this is closer to the way I was expecting to feel when training. Tired but not injured.
From my personal experience if you push the pace too much above that when building it will work for a while but eventually accumulated fatigue will stop progress. A lower intensity will allow the body to recover with the higher volume and progress will continue.
Even the elites do the vast majority of their running at that intensity when running high volume.0 -
Even the elites do the vast majority of their running at that intensity when running high volume.
There you go bringing the elites into it again!
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Point taken Scott. This weeks run was particularly quick for no other reason than I felt good and wanted to see how I'd do. My daily runs are quite a bit slower. My weekend runs are usually around 9:30 min mile pace which is manageable.
Ran home in a storm last night ..... pretty cool !! Although there were times my legs were moving and I'm certain I was going backwards !!0 -
So how does age factor into training?. I am 50 and want to run a sub 3:30 marathon. After losing weight my comfortable pace Is 8:15 to 8:30. Should my pace be slower than that? How fast do I run my tempo runs? Should I still strive for 60 m.p.w.?0
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So how does age factor into training?. I am 50 and want to run a sub 3:30 marathon. After losing weight my comfortable pace Is 8:15 to 8:30. Should my pace be slower than that? How fast do I run my tempo runs? Should I still strive for 60 m.p.w.?
How many miles per week are you running now?
What is a current race time at a shorter distance?
Just as a comparison, I'm 45 and ran a 3:10 marathon last fall.
My easy run pace ranges from 8:30 to 10:00, the mean being around 9:15 to 9:30.
My tempo (LT) pace is around 6:40 per mile.
My weekly mileage is about 55 miles per week, peaking in the low 90s during the last marathon training cycle.
My 5K PR from last spring is 19:18.0 -
This has been really, really interesting for me to read through. Thanks everyone for your thoughts. I've currently got my sights on a marathon PR for the fall. I've just lowered my miles! I was training for a 50 miler and doing lots of really long and really, really slow trail runs to prep for it. Now that that's done, I was thinking lower mileage weeks with speed work and tempo should be the way to go. The plan I was going to start following in June only has between 26 and 50 miles for the week.
May need to rethink some of this!0 -
My base is 35 to 40 currently. I am just starting my build up for my Oct 5th Marathon. I am very focussed on a peak for that particular race.
I ran a 1:41 half marathon last Saturday.
Your miles peaked higher than I anticipate ( around 60 mpw). I would love to reach higher mile weeks but fear injury. Also your tempo was much faster than what I was thinking (7:15 to 7:40 vs your 6:40). How did you come up with that and how far did you go with the Tempo, 7-8 miles?0 -
The single most important predictor of marathon performance is average weekly mileage. If you want to improve then run more.
In my opinion you should aim for averaging around 60 miles per week minimum for the 20 weeks leading up to the race for best results.
Also, most of the mileage, around 80%, should be run easy, around 75% max HR if you use a HRM. Trying to get faster by running faster all the time will not work. It will only make you really tired and eventually overwhelm your body's ability to adapt during high volume training.
Really?????????????????
Yes, really.
Another vote here! I found myself running my long runs too fast and my fast runs too slow for a long time. After making the switch, my body no longer feels so beat up and I'm running better.0 -
My base is 35 to 40 currently. I am just starting my build up for my Oct 5th Marathon. I am very focussed on a peak for that particular race.
I ran a 1:41 half marathon last Saturday.
Your miles peaked higher than I anticipate ( around 60 mpw). I would love to reach higher mile weeks but fear injury. Also your tempo was much faster than what I was thinking (7:15 to 7:40 vs your 6:40). How did you come up with that and how far did you go with the Tempo, 7-8 miles?
My coach gives me paces, but they fall in line with McMillan's calculator:
http://www.mcmillanrunning.com/mcmillanrunningcalculator.htm
The longest I'll go at LT pace without any breaks is about 4 miles. Mind you, this is usually at the end of a 10 mile run, so there is significant warm up time. There are other ways to get more too. You can do 5x1 mile with 2:00 recovery, or 2x mile, etc. The further away from LT pace and the closer to AT pace, the longer the workbout is. For instance, a fast finish long run might be 18 miles with the last 8 at AT, which is right around MP. Daniels says that you don't really need to do more than 20 minutes for a good tempo workout.
Based on your 1:41 HM, your 7:15 to 7:40 for a tempo run is right about where you want to be, according to McMillan. Sounds like you are on the right track.0 -
The single most important predictor of marathon performance is average weekly mileage. If you want to improve then run more.
In my opinion you should aim for averaging around 60 miles per week minimum for the 20 weeks leading up to the race for best results.
Also, most of the mileage, around 80%, should be run easy, around 75% max HR if you use a HRM. Trying to get faster by running faster all the time will not work. It will only make you really tired and eventually overwhelm your body's ability to adapt during high volume training.
Really?????????????????
Yes, really.
Another vote here! I found myself running my long runs too fast and my fast runs too slow for a long time. After making the switch, my body no longer feels so beat up and I'm running better.
Ok, so how far did you run your faster fast runs? Did you do tempo or some other type if speed work?0 -
The single most important predictor of marathon performance is average weekly mileage. If you want to improve then run more.
In my opinion you should aim for averaging around 60 miles per week minimum for the 20 weeks leading up to the race for best results.
Also, most of the mileage, around 80%, should be run easy, around 75% max HR if you use a HRM. Trying to get faster by running faster all the time will not work. It will only make you really tired and eventually overwhelm your body's ability to adapt during high volume training.
Really?????????????????
Yes, really.
Another vote here! I found myself running my long runs too fast and my fast runs too slow for a long time. After making the switch, my body no longer feels so beat up and I'm running better.
Ok, so how far did you run your faster fast runs? Did you do tempo or some other type if speed work?
I think the point here, is emphasizing a common mistake newer runners make. They'll do their "easy" runs at the fast end (or faster) of their easy run pace and then when it comes time to do a tempo run, they are unable to run the correct pace because they are too beat up from all the faster running they did that was supposed to be easy.0 -
Got it. Thanks.0
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The single most important predictor of marathon performance is average weekly mileage. If you want to improve then run more.
In my opinion you should aim for averaging around 60 miles per week minimum for the 20 weeks leading up to the race for best results.
Also, most of the mileage, around 80%, should be run easy, around 75% max HR if you use a HRM. Trying to get faster by running faster all the time will not work. It will only make you really tired and eventually overwhelm your body's ability to adapt during high volume training.
Really?????????????????
Yes, really.
Another vote here! I found myself running my long runs too fast and my fast runs too slow for a long time. After making the switch, my body no longer feels so beat up and I'm running better.
Ok, so how far did you run your faster fast runs? Did you do tempo or some other type if speed work?
I think the point here, is emphasizing a common mistake newer runners make. They'll do their "easy" runs at the fast end (or faster) of their easy run pace and then when it comes time to do a tempo run, they are unable to run the correct pace because they are too beat up from all the faster running they did that was supposed to be easy.
Exactly!!0 -
This will probably piss a few people off, but: My best marathon time came during a season when I was also heavy triathlon training.
I had a really high workout volume, but much of it was on the bike or in the pool. I'm convinced - CONVINCED - that all the bike volume did wonders for my running. I was able to focus on improving my aerobic capacity without beating up my legs so much. And, although I did do a weekly long run, I was also able to put in at least 1 drills run or hard run a week. The combination of running drills and bike aerobic building was, I believe, where I got my marathon edge.
So my vote is, get in some good anaerobic workouts per week, a nice long run, and build your aerobic base in a manner that includes tons of cross training.0 -
Another tip, I increased the speed of my long runs. I didn't run at race pace, but I only ran about 30 seconds slower per mile instead of 2 minutes slower and I think that made a difference too.
I think a lot of this depends on what your easy run pace is anyway, as well as your race pace. I'm not one to advocate REALLY slowing down on a long run. If your easy run pace is 10:00 per mile, run your long run at that pace too. I don't see the need to slow it down to 11:00 or 12:00. Then, as your fitness improves, you'll find that the second half of the long run you'll run faster than the first half. So, if your marathon pace is 9:00 per mile, then doing your long runs between 9:30 and 10:00 per mile is spot on. If your marathon pace is 7:00 per, then I wouldn't run my long run at 7:30. Probably just a little too fast.
Interesting. I think perhaps this is one flaw I need to correct. I can run a 8:30 pace for a half marathon but I suspect I can't do that for a full 26 and even though 9:00 feels more on the easy side than effort I should probably do my longer runs at an IDGAF pace and not even worry about what the time or pace is. Just something between 9:00 - 9:30 pace with an occasional faster finish for the last 3 - 4 miles. I haven't done a single marathon yet. They cancelled the one I was going to run in last December but I was very confident of getting a sub 4 hour time.
Your marathon pace is crazy and looks like what I would run a 5k at. I enjoy running at any rate so I'm all on board for running 40 - 60 miles a week.0
