How much harder is a full marathon compared to a half?

5. It takes a lot of time to train. Luckily my husband was incredibly supportive, but for those 14 weeks my whole life was taken over by the training. No going out late, no drinking alcohol, eating very clean, lots of washing, lots of sleep. You get the idea.

you dont have to become a monk to train for a marathon, your other suggestions are good but i dont know anyone who gave up alcohol and "going out late" when they were training and i know easily over 100 people who have completed a marathon

I did the Marine Corp marathon last year, it was great. After running the Nike Women's marathon in 2010, I said I would never do another one but I signed up for Marine Corp and I'm glad I did. It was a great experience. I'm dong two in the fall; Montreal and NYC, maybe after that I'll stop.

Bump - so funny I was just wondering this question myself. Just finished my first half a few weeks ago and want to figure out what's next. Thanks for all of the great info on here!

The HM and the full are two completely different animals, from both a physiological and a psychological perspective.

The human body, when properly fueled, can store enough glycogen to run about 20 miles. So, you simply have enough stored fuel to run a HM and you don't for a full. So, with the full marathon, you not only are contending with fatigue, but fuel issues. So, if you happen to go out too fast and start to get tired at the end because you don't have the fitness to sustain your pace, you also have to deal with the lack of fuel for your muscles. This creates the classic bonk, where you just can't go any longer.

Psychologically, it differs because in most novice and intermediate training plans, your longest run prior to the race will be 20 miles. So, at a 9 minute mile pace, you will still have nearly another hour to run longer than you ever have when you hit the 20 mile mark in the race. Also, it's very difficult to convince yourself that a specific pace is what is right for you. You will have done so much training that you feel fantastic for the first 10 to 15 miles. You start to think "I'm running at x:xx pace right now like I planned to, but I feel great so I'm going to go 15 seconds per mile faster". Then, you hit 20 and those additional 15 seconds per mile catch up to you and you hit the wall. Had you kept your intended pace, as determined by your training and build up races, you probably would have been fine.

If you want to do it, just make sure that you continue to run consistently and that you have the buy-in from any family members. The last 8 to 12 weeks of marathon training will consume you. You will nap on long run days and be pretty useless around the house. It's a big commitment, but it's extremely rewarding.

It's harder. Much. I thought this post was spot-on. I am NOT a fast runner but I find my "happy place" to be around 11 miles. Half Marathons are the perfect challenge run for me. I like the distance, I feel good and my body is happy. Marathons are a totally different monkey. I ran three marathons before my knees said "no more".

I am a 11 minute mile runner on a half marathon, but I slow to a 12.5 to 14 minute on the marathon. My wall hits right around miles 17 and 22, likely due to the fueling issue as mentioned above. The mental achievement of pushing through the wall is what is really key - at least for me. Marathons take over 5 hours for me to complete so it's an endurance push and lots of impact.

Here is the description of MY wall - You get to a point where you hurt EVERYWHERE, you are tired, covered in sweat, the world is hyper-color and every person with you is either the most amazing runner and inspiring you to move forward, or you hate them for passing you. Then you get down on yourself for not being faster. Then you hear the bells and screams of everyone in the sidelines saying how awesome you have done and you are great and you find the will to keep moving forward, one step at a time. When you are done, it's the most fantastic feeling in the world, because you know that after all the pain you just put yourself through - you did it. 26.2 miles down, and YOU did that. The sense of accomplishment that follows is worth every step, every bead of sweat, every tear you shed and every hour you spent training. It's a badge of honor to wear that most people don't ever even think of doing. I say do it once and see if you like it. Some people get hooked, some hate it. You never know until you try, and you never know what your body can do until you push it to (carefully and with Dr. support, of course).

I just ran my seventh on Saturday and it was my best by leaps and bounds both in the final result and how I ran it.

It was pretty interesting as I had planned on running with a teammate through 10. She is overall faster than me but has a bad habit of 'bonking' so we thought if she stuck with me through the first 10, she would be better positioned to run the rest of it well. At about 8 miles, we have 3 guys behind us chatting. One of them starts to have a conversation with us, asking us what we plan on running, our names, where we are from (he's probably about 22). At 10 miles, one of the guys stated that all we had left was a 5k and a HM. As this was the chatty guy's first marathon, I calmly let him know that on no account would it feel like that. The last 6 miles are harder than heck and your body will not be your friend. For me, this is how the day went

1-10 - not feeling it. Legs are meh, little bit of a side stitch
10-19 - I feel AWESOME. this is GREAT (these were my fastest miles too)
19-24 - I am tired. are these miles getting longer
24-- 25.5- omg I just want this to be done. I cannot believe I said I was going to do X race next. WTH was I thinking
25.5-26 - omg omg omg omg omg omg - I am almost done
26 - See my crew cheering - BIG SMILE
26-26.2 - where the heck is that finish line? WHERE IS IT? Oh there it is...oh no..my legs are rubber...oh no
finish - hands on knees...breathe..oh wait..stand up quick, medics are giving me the eye.

So yeah, the whole beat you with a stick description is pretty dead on. I do believe that my skin actually hurts today. My skin!

Side note on the fuel issue: I actually sort of figured out my fuel for the race as in I took in enough (it didn't sit well all of the time but oh well). My teammate has not figured out her fuel yet. In our last HM, she beat me by 3 min. In this marathon, I beat her by 2.

I agree completely with the above posters. They are two COMPLETELY different races. A half is fun. A full is grueling. For most people it's a real test of endurance. Your body and your mind will be challenged in ways you never thought possible. I have done four marathons.... thinking about a 5th this Fall.... not sure I will do another one though. It's a big commitment of time and energy. If you have the itch though, I say go for it!

Agreed. I have finished 8 half marathons, 1 full marathon, and i have a second full next weekend. The full marathon is EXPONENTIALLY harder than the half marathon. Now, you can definitely do it with proper training, but it's considerably harder than "2x the half". Think about it, you finish the first 13.1 miles and you have depleted all of your glycogen stores, you're probably slightly dehydrated, your muscles are slightly sore, then you have to do the same distance again. You can try to prevent "the wall" with proper supplementation - but to those who think it's only twice as hard as 13.1.... i completely disagree....

5. It takes a lot of time to train. Luckily my husband was incredibly supportive, but for those 14 weeks my whole life was taken over by the training. No going out late, no drinking alcohol, eating very clean, lots of washing, lots of sleep. You get the idea.

you dont have to become a monk to train for a marathon, your other suggestions are good but i dont know anyone who gave up alcohol and "going out late" when they were training and i know easily over 100 people who have completed a marathon

I agree - no reason to be a hermit.
You run 4 or 5x a week -
I still went out (mind you, I didnt go crazy). But I still had wine, I ate "healthier" (no greasy food, more protein) but it didnt disrupt my life.
Im happy to have my Saturday mornings back (since that was my long run day - so THAT changed). But other then incorporating lots of running into my weekly workouts, nothing really changed.
But i dont think you should do anything you think is going to restrict your life to the point that you might resent it.

I was considering trying a full when that poor woman died in the London 2012 marathon. Now I'm too scared.

Don't do this - if you are an otherwise healthy individual - you can train up to a full marathon. It doesn't have to be super fast, just train for the distance. With proper supplementation, hydration and dedication to training.... you should be just fine. :flowerforyou:

Ahhhh... I agree with a lot of what's been said already. I'm kind of backwards - I jumped straight to full marathons without even running a 10k, 15k, half marathon LOL! (I wouldn't recommend it, but in retrospect I wish I did).

I did the same. Never have I ran a FM, but my first race ever was a 1/2 then I did a few 5k's and then a couple of 10k's. When I tell people this they think I am crazy. I am just one of those people who wants something and goes all in!!

Congrats on your accomplishments

I was considering trying a full when that poor woman died in the London 2012 marathon. Now I'm too scared.

What about the 40,000 who ran it without dying?

I know it's irrational. I'm not trying to say you shouldn't do it, I admire anyone who does.

It seems like doing a full takes the fun out of it. It's more serious. Halfs are kind of easy. I think the full is 26.2 for a reason. That is a very difficult length. It wasn't an accident that they picked that distance. It's very difficult, from what I hear. If it was 20, anyone vcould do it. It's the extra 6.2 that makes it a different thing entirely.

Depends upon what you consider fun. I thoroughly enjoyed the training required for my first marathon. It was hard, yet very rewarding. I did wait until I had been running for about 6 years before I decided to do it, so having that base established was a really big help.

As for the race being 26.2 miles, here is an interesting tidbit that I read in Running Times. The Olympic distance for the marathon was 25 miles prior to 1908 in London. For that Olympiad, the race was increased to 26.2 miles so that the finish line would be in front of the Royal's box in the stadium. So, it is that distance for a reason, just maybe not entirely because of the difficulty.

Ha, ha. That's awesome. I love trivia like that.

You're running mag is wrong. I just looked it up, because I always thought it was based on the Greeks and Pheidippides, and how far he ran (before he died). The distance has changed a lot since 1896, but didn't become 26.2mi til 1924.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marathon

My dear friend, if you would actually read under the "Distance" section from the link you posted, you'll see that is supports exactly what I regurgitated from memory. Reading. It's fundamental.

The Wikipedia on this is really interesting. I did not know that a marathon actually doesn't have a max distance. 26.2 is the minimum, but it could go much further if they want. LOL. Ouch. I never heard of that, but it is interesting. That would suck if you didn't realize that a certina marathong was actually 35 miles. LOL.

bump to read later

Bump!

The Wikipedia on this is really interesting. I did not know that a marathon actually doesn't have a max distance. 26.2 is the minimum, but it could go much further if they want. LOL. Ouch. I never heard of that, but it is interesting. That would suck if you didn't realize that a certina marathong was actually 35 miles. LOL.

Any certified course is going to measure longer than the race distance (thank God not by 10 miles, though!) because the certification process actually builds in extra distance to allow for error. For instance, the certified HM course I ran on Saturday measured 13.18 miles on my Garmin and I heard others report as long as 13.22. There is also the fact that the measurements take place along the shortest possible distance a runner could travel along the course, cutting off all tangents, even measure across a sidewalk on a turn even though the course is on the road.

They add .1% to the length of the course (1 meter for every 1K) after they measure it, called the 'short course prevention factor'. They measure about 1 foot from the curb and use the shortest route possible, but they don't measure across the sidewalk if the course is on the road. The route is measured on a bicycle using a jones counter.

For those with some time on their hands, here's the certification process: http://www.usatf.org/events/courses/certification/manual/

I read, on another message board from a someone who does certification, the part about going across the sidewalk . I don't remember the details exactly, he was discussing a course that he had just measured. Maybe it has do do whether spectators will be allowed in that area? Totally speculating on that. I'll see if I can follow up with him about that. This was probably 3 or more years ago.