yet another marathon question...training schedule

shopaholic

Does anyone have a good training schedule for the marathon? I've been looking at Hal Higdons Novice 2 training plan and reckon its doable. I'm currently doing 3 days a week and a walk on the 4th day so I'm reckoning 4 days a week is managable.
But I'm wondering if anyone else has any other schedules? This would be my first marathond and it's Dublin 07 that I'm aiming for!

Peckham

I used Hal Higdon Intermediate 1 for my first marathon and can't recommend the man enough! I found it excellent and finished marathon in 3:25.

hunnymonster

Hal Higdon is great and most marathon training plans are very similar. If you want to read around a bit the runners world schedules are also excellent. The Furman first program is also worth looking at. The results are summarised here
http://www.furman.edu/first/FIRST_RunThreeDaysandFinish.pdf

Several friends of mine have recommended marathon running for mortals. I haven't read it though.


Good luck with your training however you approach it. The marathon is a great event and Dublin is a great race for a first timer.

run_Forrest_run

Hal Higdon is the way to go! His training schedules have a science to them! Keep with it and it will pay off.

shopaholic

thanks guys!:)

ZiggyStardust

Peckham wrote:

I used Hal Higdon Intermediate 1 for my first marathon and can't recommend the man enough! I found it excellent and finished marathon in 3:25.

Hi,
Just wondering... Do you know why Hal Higdon never goes over 20 miles in any of his training plans. I have done 2 marathons and found (without really hitting the wall) I died in the last 4 miles going from <8 min miles up to 20 and then ~9.30 min miles for the last 4 miles.
I guess I'm asking as i'm training for the NY marathon, and am thinking of putting in a 22 and maybe a 23 or is doing 3 20 milers sufficient.
Thanks,
Dave

hunnymonster

It's about balance. Going over 20 miles in training may risk a longer recovery time. You've got to decide if the lost training while you recover is worth the benefit of having the longer run(s) included.

I rarely do over 20 miles in preparation for a marathon but I don't usually suffer in the last few miles so it may be something worth trying for you. However it is also worth checking out that you have your race day preparation sopt on too. DO you carb load properly, are you taking any nutrition on bord during the race and if so is this working for you?

Peckham

Balance is indeed the key.

In planning long rungs, you have to consider that you run them slower than race pace so you are taking more strides and your feet are hitting the ground more often than if you were in a race. If you're running 8 minute miles in a marathon, and train at 9 minute miles, that would mean that after 23 miles training you will have taken the same number of strides and had the same number of impacts with the ground, as you would in the race itself. Hence the injury potential.

Going over 23 miles means putting your legs and feet through something that they won't even experience in the race itself. There's also the time issue - if you're aiming to do a marathon in 3:30, doing a training run of 3:45 doesn't make sense.

run_Forrest_run

ZiggyStardust wrote:

Hi,
Just wondering... Do you know why Hal Higdon never goes over 20 miles in any of his training plans. I have done 2 marathons and found (without really hitting the wall) I died in the last 4 miles going from <8 min miles up to 20 and then ~9.30 min miles for the last 4 miles.
I guess I'm asking as i'm training for the NY marathon, and am thinking of putting in a 22 and maybe a 23 or is doing 3 20 milers sufficient.
Thanks,
Dave

I agree with the others, it's a matter of balance. Every time you do a long run it takes a while to recover and if you did a 22 miler of something then you may not recover in time for the marathon or even worse you may pick up an injury from over-doing it.
I am also doing the NYC marathon but my training plans are going to take a hit because I am suffering from back problems at the moment..going to a physio tomorrow and have been on anti-inflammatories for the past week.

Best of luck in the the training.

ZiggyStardust

Thanks for the advice guys.

Dave

Abhainn

Just another marathon training query:
According to most marathin training plans long runs up to 20 miles are specified to be run as "easy". As I am targeting a 3:20-3:25 Dublin marathon any advice on

1. How slow or fast (min / mile) should I be covering that distance in to avoid injury etc
2. Heart rate intensity average?

Peckham

Don't know about heart rate intensity, as I don't use that in my training...but in terms of minutes per mile, it should be about 20% slower than your marathon pace.

McMillan running calculator gives a good idea of the pace you should be doing in training (long runs, easy runs, recovery runs), but this calculator should be used with achieved race times, rather than target times (but secretly I think most use the latter!)

Plug in your most recent race time and see how this stacks up against a 3:20 to 3:25 marathon.

3:22 marathon suggests long run pace of 8:13 to 9:13 (compared to a marathon pace of 7:43).

--amadeus--

Abhainn wrote:

...As I am targeting a 3:20-3:25 Dublin marathon ...

LSRs should be 30 - 90 secs per mile slower than race pace. My LSRs are 9:00 mile pace vs 8:00 race pace for example.

Quick question - how did you calculate your target time?

Peckham

Best way to calculate a target time is to run other races and feed the results into a running calculator....10 mile and half-marathon being good indicators, but need to be run in race conditions (e.g. Addidas Race series in Phoenix Park)

--amadeus--

Peckham wrote:

...Best way to calculate a target time is to run other races and feed the results into a running calculator...

There are a few people popping up on here lately looking for advice on first marathons and with quite fast targets (ie sub 3:30, which would put you comfortably into the top 25% of the field).

I think it's great and I wholeheartedly encurage people to "give it socks". But on a first marathon an over ambitious target can be a disaster and I sometimes wonder how much thought goes into picking a target time, which is why I asked the question. You're 100% right though - the only way to geta real idea of your target is to do a 10K or 1/2 & predict up from there.

quozl

And probably predict up conservatively from the 10k or 1/2 marathon. The less experienced you are the more likely you are to tail off as the distance gets bigger. I can run a much faster 1/2 marathon or 10k than my marathon time would suggest. My mile time would suggest I'd be even faster again but sadly that's a load of bollocks for my poorly trained ass

hunnymonster

but I'm the opposite. Then again, I'm just not made for speed so ever increasing distance suits me just fine.


I ran a negative split on my first ever marathon. The thinking was the longer I'm out here, the longer it's going to hurt. This was long before I had experienced the joys of DOMS.

quozl

aye Hunnymonster, but you're the exception rather than the rule. Most beginners will fade as the distance goes up, and they need to take those marathon time predictors with a pinch of salt.

hunnymonster

Very true Quozl, I've never met anyone who fitted the predictors exactly (varience being either side of the line). They are useful in a general sense to give you an aim when you try something new but some people are built for endurance, some for speed.

Abhainn

I agree "targeting" a marathon time is really a preffered time especially in my case I have never competed in a marathon before.
I have only ever completed one half marthon before (this year) in 1:42 but I was troubled by injury up to that. My goal on July 7th is now sub 1:35 as I completed a 12 mile run last weekend in under 1:26.
Conservatively I have put my Dublin marathon goal at 3:25 as I know my average mile will be at least 30 secs slower than a half marathon (Hopefully!).