Forums >General Running>Racing before the Marathon
Hey guys,
question about marathon training. Today I finished week 15/18. It has been a good training cycle (4th).
Due to living in beautiful Snowy Minnesota, I did not do any racing to gauge my fitness.
There is a 10k in town this Saturday, and I was wondering if I should do it or not.
Do you guys race that close to the marathon? Any positive or negative experiences?
10K: (44:33) 13.1 (1:41:48) 26.2 - TwinCities17 (3:49:07)
Pfitzinger has a race (8-10k) two weeks before the marathon. It is short enough you should be able to recover quickly.
Are we there, yet?
I've raced as far as 12M two weeks before a marathon with no apparent ill effects, and raced at 90% as close as a week before.
2024 Races:
03/09 - Livingston Oval Ultra 6-Hour, 22.88 miles
05/11 - D3 50K 05/25 - What the Duck 12-Hour
06/17 - 6 Days in the Dome 12-Hour.
A general rule of thumb is one day of recovery for each mile that you raced. For a 10K raced you should be recovered in about 6 days, so you should be fine if you race 2 weeks in advance of the marathon. Of course YMMV.
It does vary a bit for everyone, but I would say no problem running a 10km two weeks out from a marathon. Recovery is not bad from those shorter races and you will be starting to taper for the marathon anyway. I ran a 10km TT a week out from a half marathon and ending up PBing at the half by almost 2 minutes.
3,000m: 9:07.7 (Nov-21) | 5,000m: 15:39 (Dec-19) | 10,000m: 32:34 (Mar-20)
10km: 33:15 (Sep-19) | HM: 1:09:41 (May-21)* | FM: 2:41:41 (Oct-20)
* Net downhill course
Last race: Waterfront HM, 7 Apr, 1:15:48
Up next: Runway5, 4 May
"CONSISTENCY IS KING"
Thanks for the feedback guys. I'm going to go ahead and race the 10K.
Waltons ThreadLord
Jack Daniels recommends an easy/rest day for every 3k of the race, which would be three days for your 10k, which sounds manageable. I'm in the midst of a 7-day easy/rest period after running a half.
Enjoy your 10k.
5k 23:48.45 (3/22); 4M 31:26 (2/22); 5M 38:55 (11/23); 10k 49:24 (10/22); 10M 1:29:33 (2/24); Half 1:48:32 (10/22); Marathon 4:29:58 (11/23)Upcoming races: Clinton Country Run 15k, 4/27; Spring Distance Classic 5k, 4/28
SMART Approach
Add a mile or two warm up jog and 2-3 easy miles after the race and you have an excellent work out. This race can be beneficial In multiple ways.
1. Race toughness. If you haven't been in a race in a while, this gets you ready to deal wirh the stress of racing and your ability to dig deep. I call it it "muscle/mental memory". It also will teach you hopefully, to not start too fast. We need to know what pre race adrenaline feels like and cope or tame it. We all want to just take off too fast.....you can't. The more you race the better you get at it.
2. As you mentioned, this race gives you feedback on your fitness level and can help with your marathon goal and pacing and give you enhanced confidence.
3. When adding miles around this race, you get a great work out that has some carry over to the marathon. Generally a hard work out shows itself 10-12 days after so this event can help your fitness a tad for race day.
Run Coach. Recovery Coach. Founder of SMART Approach Training, Coaching & Recovery
Structured Marathon Adaptive Recovery Training
Safe Muscle Activation Recovery Technique
www.smartapproachtraining.com
Pace Prophet
Personally I would NOT add too much to the 10k, since at this point recovery is critical. The main point of this workout is as a fitness assessment, with its workout stimulus less important, and I think just the race itself is a fine workout. I'd warm up however much you typically warm up for a 10k - for me it's about 1.5 miles - but I wouldn't add miles at the end other than perhaps a short cool-down jog.
Mmmm Bop
The mpw you’ve averaged this cycle is a factor. Running the 10k should be fine, but the workouts in the remaining two weeks are also important. The Pfitz 18/55 plan has a 8/10k race scheduled 15 days out (9/11 miles total) followed by a 16 mile long run on the Sunday. If your mileage is lower then you might want to add miles before and after the 10k to make it a bigger workout and rest the following day.
5k - 17:53 (4/19) 10k - 37:53 (11/18) Half - 1:23:18 (4/19) Full - 2:50:43 (4/19)
Thank you guys for the inputs. Now guess what, snow stoooorm coming our way tomorrow, and it is brining 4-6 inches of snow.
Fortunately, I knew that this was coming since Monday. So I planned ahead, and decided to do a 10K on my own today.
1.5 warm-up, and 1.5 cool down.
6.24 in 44:33. I'm very happy about it I actually never raced a 10K or a 5K before. So I did not know what to expect. I did well I guess.
However, I did not feel I pushed it to my limit. The whole workout feels almost like my weekly 5 tempo workout ( abit tougher). Let's see how I feel tomorrow. I also had a soccer game last night, and eating rice and beans (with Soda) 3 hrs before the workout might have slowed me down a bit.
This was my split:
1: 7:18
2: 7:27 (stopped to tie my laces)
3: 7:08
4: 7:07
5: 7:06
6: 6:58
0.24: 1:37
My average bpm was 171 (90% of Max) with Max HR at 190 bpm (100% of Max)
According to G.Connect I spent 9% at Zone 3, 52% at Zone 4, and 36% at Zone 5.
I will go for a recovery run tomorrow, and maybe Sat. too. Then I will do my last LR 15sh on Sunday before tapering.
HELLO,
Go Go Go Marathon Hurry up gyu's.
Best Regards
Ajay Ahlawat
In 2012 I wanted to run a Boston qualifier in the Chicago Marathon. I was 37 at the time and I just started running when I was 36 and I was coming off a injury which sidelined me for 3 months in early 2012. I basically signed up for the Chicago marathon as motivation to stay in shape while I was on crutches for months.
Anyways, I ran a 130:00 half marathon a little over 3 weeks out from the 2012 Chicago Marathon, and that was a huge mistake. I ended up developing IT band syndrome and even though I made it to the half in 135:00 during the Chicago Marathon I felt crippled by mile 16, and the remainder of the race was absolute torture as I limped to the finish line in 355:00. I was so disappointed in myself that I pretty much never ran seriously as far as training for long distances until recently. In my opinion, there is no sense pushing yourself that close to a marathon when you should already be in shape to complete 26.2 at your desired time.
Maybe one is not just interested in 'completing' the marathon but actually 'racing' it? A very, very strong case can be made that racing a 10K 3 or 4 weeks out is additive to marathon fitness and most certainly not subtractive to that fitness. My own experience is that my last three marathon PRs were set with a 10K RACE 10 days out from the marathon. You may think that is too close but it worked great for me running in the 70mpw range year-round. Individuals vary but I was never one for a long taper doing very poorly with a 3 week taper and not a whole lot better with a full 2 week taper. 10 days was about optimum.
If you're wondering how you get a 10K race 10 days from a marathon race, the Cal Int Marathon is the first Sunday in December and I always ran the local turkey trot 10K on Nov 24th, which was always 10 days! I don't think it ever hurt my marathon performance or I wouldn't have done it.
Mother of Cats
Maybe one is not just interested in 'completing' the marathon but actually 'racing' it? A very, very strong case can be made that racing a 10K 3 or 4 weeks out is additive to marathon fitness and most certainly not subtractive to that fitness. My own experience is that my last three marathon PRs were set with a 10K RACE 10 days out from the marathon.
I have similar thoughts. In my case, I prefer racing a half-marathon three weeks out from the marathon. I do my last 20 4 weeks out, then do the half the weekend after, with a slight taper for the half. Then go into full taper after the half.
The half itself rarely goes well, but it doubles as a tune-up and a big lactate threshold workout.
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