by Randy Ashley

Thinking about seriously training for a marathon personal-best this fall? The most important element towards reaching your goals in the marathon is a solid base of mileage. The more mileage you can build as a foundation, the greater your potential will be. Hopefuly you’ve been logging mileage throughout the summer and are ready to begin building upon your mileage base.

After a thorough base has been completed, you’ll need about 14 weeks of training to get race-ready.

First Six Weeks

Each week, you’ll want to include the following workouts: speed play, pace work, and long run.

1. Speed play: Examples of speed play workouts include 50 meters hard 50 meters easy on grass for 20 minutes, 3-4 miles of 100 meters hard, 100 meters easy (straights and curves), 12-15 x short steep hill or 16-24 x 200 with 200 jog. These shorter bursts are not sprints. These efforts should top at 85-90% effort. The goal here is to establish cadence, which allows you to keep your stride consistent in the latter stages of the marathon. These efforts will also make the longer sessions to come easier. Time is not important and the efforts are best done without a watch.

2. Pace work: Repeats of 400-1600 meters based on goal specific pace. The volume of this workout will be 3-4 miles. Examples: 12-16 x 400, 6-8 x 800, 3-4 x mile. This will begin to help establish the drive.

3. Long run: Alternate between easy long runs and pace-work long runs. The easy long runs began in the base phase. Gradually you are increasing the long run to be 22 miles or 10-15 minutes longer than the goal race time. Pace is easy throughout. You should be able to talk the entire time. You should also practice hydrating on the run. The runs will end with 6-10 strides of 25 seconds each.

Pace-work long runs are usually two-thirds the length of the long easy run. The first hour is usually easy, then tempo efforts and pickups are added. Examples: 60 minutes easy, 20 minutes at 85% effort, 10 minutes easy, 10 minutes 85% effort, etc.

After six weeks, you’ve earned a week of recovery. Drop your mileage to 75%, throw in a short, fast repeat session early in the week, then ideally jump in a 10K or half-marathon race at the end of the week.

Second Six Weeks and Taper

Here the track sessions are longer and the repeats stay in the 800-meter to mile range.

1. Speed sessions to be as follows: 10-14 x 800, 10-12 x 1000, 6-8 x mile at a specific pace. Often the pace will get faster through the session.

2. Pace work: 3 x 2 mile, 2 x 4 mile, or 8-12 mile tempo runs. These are run at specific paces to lay-in the race-pace rhythm.

3. Long runs alternate between easy long runs and pace-work long runs. The last long easy run will come three weeks from the goal race. Around 10-12 days out should be the last long run at medium effort. This run will be considerably shorter than the previous runs. The taper will last three weeks. During this period, you will continue with medium-hard sessions but with less overall volume.

The day after all hard sessions and long runs is to be a day of rest. Either take the day off completely or do a jog of 30-60 minutes depending on how you feel. The days prior to the hard sessions and long runs should be easy 45-60 minute runs with 8-10 strides at the end.

If you can train hard and recover properly, you’ll be ready to roll on race day.

Randy Ashley is a ZAP Fitness coach. He can be reached at wrashley@hotmail.com.