Forums >General Running>Marathon Training Pace
Feeling the growl again
If you are running enough miles to really race a marathon, MP is not your normal easy pace. If you are only running 30-40ush MPW, MP could very well be your daily easy run pace because you simply don't have the strength/endurance for the marathon distance.
Honestly, when I recommend people training for the marathon it starts at 50mpw. If people don't want to commit to that I tell them to stick with the HM for the time being. You can finish a marathon on less but you're not racing it and it's going to suck.
This is why you have to look at training of the people in the same group as you, not say elite training and try and rationalize it to what you are doing. It's apples and oranges.
There is also the possibility that you are running all of your runs so hard that you tire yourself out and don't leave much for workouts. Easy runs should really be easy, without caring about pace, and workouts much faster. If all of your runs are about the same pace, you are probably running a lot of your "easy" runs too hard. About 10-11 years ago I got into a random conversation with another runner before a HM. He was a newer runner and was going on about how he couldn't figure out why he wasn't getting faster. Turned out he was pretty much running every run as hard as he could. I advised him to truly run easy 5 days a week, and only let himself put effort into a couple days a week. A tempo run and a longer run with the last third faster. A couple years later he grabbed my arm after the same race and thanked me; he'd taken my advice and was 20min faster over HM.
So for the undertrained marathoner the distance is the issue....simply finishing the distance at easy run pace may be a challenge. It goes from there. A well-trained runner will have a MP a minute or more better than their easy pace. My current MP is likely 5:50ish, my easy runs are 6:35-7:00. But I'm doing 70-80+mpw and have ancient history doing much more.
"If you want to be a bad a$s, then do what a bad a$s does. There's your pep talk for today. Go Run." -- Slo_Hand
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Hmm, whatever works for you but I think this would be a disastrous apprroach for most of us. LT pace is roughly equivalent to 1-hour race pace. For me that's around 10-mile rsce pace. Obviously trying to run a marathon as close as possible to 10-mile race pace is not going to end well.
I've gone out too fast once, for the first quarter.
That second half seemed to last forever, and it sure took a lot longer.
It's a 5k. It hurt like hell...then I tried to pick it up. The end.
UM 45 Ohio 23
This defines my two marathons, the first more than the second, but still the case for both. I was running to finish. I was definitely not racing. When I ran my best half marathon, I was well-te=rained for it and raced it. I'm hoping to fee the same way if/when I try my next marathon.
Gang Name "Pound Cake"
As an example, Cheeseburger recently posted a BQ time of 3:23:18. My best marathon is 3:30:45. Yet, when I reviewed Cheeseburger's training log, he ran his training miles at much slower pace than I do. He did accumulate more miles than I have and, I recognize that may be the crux of the issue. But, I'm still a little baffled, and jealous, that many runners can train at 9:00 minute pace then run a marathon at sub-8:00.
Wolvmar, couple things you should know - I started my marathon training cycle by running everyday with a slower female runner friend. I tend to go too fast and running with her and talking the whole time, forced her to speed up and me to slow down which I think was good for both of us as she also killed a BQ at 10 under and went from a 4:12 to a 3:45 PR. So running and talking for most of your miles is really helpful to slow down. Also, slowing down was essential when going from barely 45 mpw to over 80. My body needed to slow down to handle the much higher volume. If you look at my log, my taper, race, and post race paces are all a lot faster than previous because the mileage is now down in the 50ish range. I just naturally slow down when piling on, and speed up when reducing the milage.
Good luck.
- Scott
2014 Goals: First Marathon - BQ2016 <3:40 (3:25:18) - 1/2M <1:45 - 5K <22:00
2014 Marathons: 05/04 Flying Pig (3:49:02) - 09/20 Air Force (BQ 3:25:18) - 11/01 Indianapolis Monumental
Cheeseburger - thanks. I appreciate the feedback; it's great advice!