Before Starting the Schedules
These schedules are challenging right from the start and get harder as your marathon approaches. So that you can progress as the training increases in quantity and quality, and to minimize your chances of injury, you should be able to complete the first week of the schedule without too much effort.
Be realistic in assessing whether you’re ready for the first week of the schedule. For example, if you’ve been running 20 miles (32 km) per week and your longest run in the last several weeks is 6 miles (10 km), now isn’t the time to suddenly jump to a 33-mile (53 km) week containing a 12-mile (19 km) run and a 4-mile (6 km) tempo run, as the first week of the 18-week schedule calls for. The idea behind the schedules isn’t to make you as tired as possible as soon as possible but to apply repeated training stress that you absorb and benefit from.
As a rule, you should be running at least 25 miles (40 km) a week before starting these schedules, and in the last month you should have comfortably completed a run close in length to the long run called for in the first week of the schedule.
Reading the Schedules
The schedules are presented in a day-by-day format. This is in response to requests from readers of our first book, Road Racing for Serious Runners, to provide schedules that specify what to do each day of the week.
The main limitation with this approach is that it’s impossible to guess the myriad of outside factors that may influence your day-to-day nonrunning life. Work schedules, family life, relationships, school commitments, and Mother Nature all play a part in determining when you get to do your long runs and other aspects of marathon preparation. You’ll no doubt require some flexibility in your training and will need to juggle days around from time to time. That’s expected, and as long as you don’t try to make up for lost time by doing several hard days in a row, you should be able to avoid injury and overtraining. By following the principles covered in the earlier chapters, you’ll be able to safely fine-tune the training schedules to suit your circumstances.
The schedules express each day’s training in miles and kilometers; use whichever you’re accustomed to. The mile and kilometer figures for each day (and the weekly total) are rough equivalents of each other, not a conversion from one to the other accurate to the third decimal point.
Following the Schedules
Each column of the schedules represents a week’s training. For example, in the 12-week schedule, the column for 11 weeks to goal indicates that at the end of that week you have 11 weeks until your marathon. The schedules continue week by week until race week.
We have included the specific workout for each day as well as the category of training for that day. For example, in the 18-week schedule, on the Friday of the 7-weeks-to-goal column, the specific workout is a 12-mile (19 km) run, and the category of training for that day is medium-long run. This aspect of the schedules allows you to quickly see the balance of training during each week and the progression of workouts from week to week. Look again at the 18-week schedule – it’s easy to see that with 7 weeks to go until the marathon, there are four recovery days (two of running, two of rest or cross-training), along with a lactate-threshold session, a long run, and a medium-long run. Looking at the row for Sunday, it’s easy to see how the long runs progress and then taper in the last few weeks before the marathon.
The workouts are divided into the following eight categories: long runs, medium-long runs, marathon-pace runs, general aerobic runs, lactate-threshold runs, recovery runs,
O2max intervals, and speed training. Each of these categories is explained in depth in chapter 7, and the physiology behind the training is explained in chapter 1.
The 18-week schedule is recommended for most situations and is ideal for preparing for a marathon of great personal importance, like the New York City Marathon.
Racing Strategies
We discussed marathon race strategy at length in chapter 6. If you follow one of the schedules in this chapter, you’re probably a midpack runner. Unlike the situation the runners at the front of the field often face, you’ll probably have plenty of people around you to run with from start to finish. This can be good and bad.
On the plus side, obviously, you’re less likely to face lonely stretches with nobody to run with. Use this probability to your advantage – soon after the start, try to find other runners who look capable of maintaining your goal pace through at least 20 miles (32 km), and encourage them to work with you. (If they fall apart at 21 miles, that’s their problem, right?)
By following one of this chapter’s schedules, you’ll be better able to hold up past 20 miles (32 km) than most of the runners who begin the race at your pace. Your superior preparation will mean you’ll have the pleasure of continually passing people until the finish. Look forward to this time. Pick a runner a few hundred yards or meters up the road, and set the short-term goal of catching him or her. Then go after your next victim, and keep doing so until the finish.
On the not-so-good side, you’re more likely than those at the front of the field to feel crowded in the early miles. Try not to let this upset you. Tell yourself that the crowds are helping you not to go out too fast, and if need be, work up gradually to your goal pace.
Don’t try to make up lost time suddenly if a break in the crowd appears. Instead, when you have clear running room, run no more than 10 seconds per mile (per 1.6 km) faster than goal pace until you’re back on schedule; you will burn less glycogen and be less likely to accumulate lactate by catching up gradually. If the deficit you have to make up isn’t too great, 5 seconds per mile (per 1.6 km) faster than goal pace is an even safer approach. Once you’re back on track, ease back to goal pace.
After the Marathon
The final schedule in this chapter is a 5-week recovery schedule for after the marathon. This is the fifth mesocycle; it completes the training program and leaves you ready to prepare for future challenges.
The recovery schedule is purposely conservative. You have little to gain by rushing back into training, and your risk of injury is exceptionally high at this point, owing to the reduced resiliency of your muscles and connective tissue after the marathon.
The schedule starts with 2 days off from running, which is the bare minimum of time away from running you should allow yourself. If you still have acute soreness or tightness so severe that it will alter your form, or if you just don’t feel like running, certainly feel free to take more than 2 days off. If ever there was a time to lose your marathoner’s mind-set, the week after your goal race is it. Even most of the top runners in the world take days off after a marathon. They know that the nearly negligible benefits of a short run at this time are far outweighed by the risks. Not running now also increases your chances of being inspired to resume hard training when your body allows it.
Of course, some people don’t consider themselves real runners unless they run pretty much every day of their lives. Plod through a few miles if you must, but be aware that you’re prolonging your recovery.