Spirit of St.Louis Marathon

Training Guide: Marathon

These schedules are only guides. Take breaks and make adjustments according to how you are feeling. It is also a good idea to check with your physician before starting any kind of training program.

Experienced Program
This program is designed for those runners who have become relatively comfortable with the marathon distance or have been running as many as 50 miles a week on a regular basis. This training guide is designed to challenge you and hopefully prepare you for a new P.R.!

• This schedule is only a guide; take breaks and make adjustments according to how you feel. As an experienced runner, you know your body best. It is also a good idea to check with your physician before starting any kind of training program.
• RECOVERY: These are the most basic runs on the schedule, but they are actually the bulk of your training. Recovery runs should be done at a pace at least one full minute slower per mile than your marathon race pace need. These runs give the body a chance to rest from some of the harder days, but still accomplish the goal of increasing aerobic capacity. Every time you run, you teach your body to more efficiently transport oxygen from the legs to the muscles regardless of pace. When a day on the chart below just has a mileage number, such as 6, that means a 6-mile recovery run.
• SPEED: Speed workouts should come early on in a marathon segment as a way to tune up the legs before the more important strength workouts begin. Speed workouts should be based on current 10k race pace and should total between 3 and 5 miles worth of hard running. Examples follow the marathon chart.
• MP: Marathon pace workouts are essential in any marathon training program. These should be run at your goal marathon pace at an even pace. Training your body to hit the exact pace that you want to run on race day is key to preventing going out too fast or too slow on the big day. These workouts should total between 6 and 10 miles in length and should be run on a well-marked course so you know exactly where each mile mark is located. Recommended distances are indicated on the chart below. Example: MP 8 means you should do an 8-mile run at goal marathon pace.
• STRENGTH: Strength workouts are the most challenging workouts in this training program. Done at half marathon pace, they are designed to increase your threshold so marathon race pace feels easier. To accomplish this, strength workouts need to be faster than race pace. The workouts should total between 4 and 6 miles of hard running. Examples are shown below the marathon chart.
• LONG RUNS: The long run is done most weeks and is the workout that will enable you to run the entire distance on race day. It is NOT, however, any more or less important than any other run on your schedule. In other words, there are no 20-mile long runs every week (in fact there is only one), because marathon training is all about consistency. Putting too much emphasis on the long run takes away from the speed, strength and marathon pace workouts and recovery runs. When following this schedule, the workload is substantial enough that you will enter each long run with a certain amount of cumulative fatigue already in your legs. This fatigue essentially equates to already having run a few miles before you take that first step out the door. So when you run a 16-mile long run it is more like running the last 16 miles of a marathon as opposed to the first 16. On race day, when you are tapered and your legs feel “fresh,” the 26.2-mile distance should not be a problem. One final instruction on long runs is that pace does not matter. It is all about covering the distance so a normal recovery pace is fine.
  

Speed Workout Examples

IMPORTANT: Before any “workout” where you will be running at a pace equal to or below race pace you should do a warm up consisting of an easy mile or two of jogging, followed by some light stretching. Ignoring this step could lead to injury. These workouts should be followed by a cool down which consists of another easy mile or two of jogging and another set of stretching.

Mile Repeats- A mile repeat workout consists of one mile of hard running, followed by a three to five minute rest interval depending on how long it takes to run your mile. These workouts can be done at your local high school track, a marked running/bike path or a course of your own design. The miles should be run at a pace that you can currently race a 10k. If you are unsure, estimate. It is probably about 40 seconds slower than marathon pace. Based on this mileage schedule, it would be appropriate to run three or four mile repeats in one workout. Your rest interval should be roughly two minutes less than the amount of time it takes to run your repeat. During the rest period you should maintain a light jog.

½ Mile Repeats- A ½-mile repeat workout applies the same basic principles as the mile repeats. They should still be done at 10k race pace and the overall volume should stay the same, but the rest should be a bit shorter. A good ½-mile repeat workout for this mileage schedule would consist of eight repeats. Your rest interval should be roughly 30 seconds less than the amount of time it takes you to run the repeat.

Fartlek- Once you get past the funny name – Swedish for speed play -- you realize that a fartlek is one of the best workouts around. Less structured than a repeat workout, a fartlek can be done anywhere because it is not based on distance. It is running fast for a certain amount of time and then slow for a certain amount of time. You can set those times beforehand, for example, and run for 40 minutes with 3 minutes hard, followed by two minutes easy. If you run around the neighborhood or a park, pick out a landmark. Run hard until you get to there, then take it easy and continue that pattern for the duration of the run. For this mileage schedule your fartlek should be about 6 miles total, but no more than half of that should be hard running. Again, the hard segments should be at 10k race pace, but you will have to go by feel.

Tempo Run- These should be done at ten seconds faster per mile than marathon pace. The most basic is a straight tempo where you will run 4-6 miles at ten seconds faster than marathon pace and that is it. For variety, you can break these up and run three miles of tempo, take a mile jog break, and run three more miles of tempo or run two miles, break, two miles, break, two miles. Break it up how you wish, but never run any segment for less than two miles. These workouts should be done at an even pace. Like the marathon pace workouts, Tempo Runs teach your body to find a rhythm and stick to it. It may feel natural to pick up the pace, especially when you feel good, but it is a bad habit to develop when training for a marathon.

ONE MORE THING: HYDRATION…HYDRATION…HYDRATION!!!
When you commit to a marathon or Half Marathon training program you commit to a lot of running. When you run you perspire and when you perspire you lose essential nutrients needed for muscle recovery. In other words, if you do not replenish those nutrients before, during, and after exercise you will feel sore, tired, and run-down. In addition to water, you should be consuming energy drinks and gels. These provide electrolytes that are absent in water. Practicing water stops during your everyday runs is also a good way to practice for race day when you should be taking water at every station and trying to take in as much as 70 ounces during the entire race.

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