Pfitzinger Pete - Advanced Marathoning

During the race, try to find others who appear to be able to sustain your pace until the end and run with them.

In chapter 6, we also discuss the importance of a conservative early pace. Although you’ll be well trained if you follow one of these schedules, you won’t have as large a margin of error as those who have regularly put in 85 miles (137 km) a week or more. If you run intelligently in the early part of the race, then you’ll have runners to pick off regularly in the last 10 miles (16 km) or so because others who are either less prepared or more foolhardy will come back to you.

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 will also increase 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.

What better aids recovery during this time is light cross-training, such as swimming or cycling. These activities increase blood flow through your muscles without subjecting them to pounding. Walking will also achieve this in the week after the marathon.

One way to ensure that you don’t run too hard too soon after your marathon is to use a heart rate monitor. As discussed in chapter 3, a heart rate monitor can help prevent you from going too fast on recovery days. During the first few weeks after the marathon, keep your heart rate below 76 percent of your maximal heart rate or 70 percent of your heart rate reserve. Running at this intensity will help your body overcome the stress of the marathon as quickly as possible.

During this 5-week recovery schedule, the number of days of running per week increases from 3 to 5. At the end of the 5 weeks, you should be fully recovered from the marathon and, with a little luck, injury free and mentally fresh.

Mesocycle 1 – Endurance

Mesocycle 2 – Lactate Threshold + Endurance

Mesocycle 3 – Race Preparation

Mesocycle 4 – Taper and Race

Mesocycle 1 – Endurance

Mesocycle 2 – Lactate Threshold + Endurance

Mesocycle 3 – Race Preparation

Mesocycle 4 – Taper and Race

Mesocycle 5 – Recovery

This chapter is for high-mileage marathoners. It includes two schedules: an 18-week schedule that starts at 65 miles (105 km) per week and a 12-week schedule that starts at 67 miles (108 km) per week. Each of these schedules increases weekly mileage progressively and builds to a peak of 87 miles (140 km).

As discussed in chapter 1, it’s useful to divide your overall training schedule into phases, called mesocycles. The training schedules consist of four mesocycles that focus on endurance, lactate threshold and endurance, race preparation, and tapering, respectively. A final schedule, which contains a 5-week postmarathon recovery program, can follow either of the training schedules.

Of the two training schedules presented in this chapter, we recommend the 18-week schedule for most situations. Eighteen weeks is plenty of time to stimulate the necessary adaptations to improve your marathon performance. At the same time, 18 weeks is short enough that you can focus your efforts without becoming bored with the process.

At times, however, you simply don’t have 18 weeks to prepare for your marathon. The 12-week schedule includes the same mesocycles as the 18-week schedule, but because of the short time for preparation, each of these mesocycles is abbreviated. If you go into a marathon in a rush, you must realize that your preparation won’t be as thorough as if you had longer to prepare. The 12-week schedule takes into account that sometimes circumstances don’t allow you the optimal length of time for preparation and strives to provide a compact yet effective training program.

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 40 miles (64 km) per week and your longest run in the last several weeks is 12 miles (19 km), now isn’t the time to suddenly jump to a 65-mile (105 km) week containing a 17-mile (27 km) 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 55 miles (88 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.