The main limitation with this approach is that it’s impossible to guess the myriad of outside factors that may influence your day-to-day nonrunning life. Work schedules, family life, relationships, school commitments, and Mother Nature all play their part in determining when you get to do your long runs and other aspects of marathon preparation. You’ll no doubt require some flexibility in your training and will need to juggle days around from time to time. That’s expected, and as long as you don’t try to make up for lost time by doing several hard days in a row, you should be able to avoid injury and overtraining.
The schedules express each day’s training in miles and kilometers; use whichever you’re accustomed to. The mile and kilometer figures for each day (and the weekly total) are rough equivalents of each other, not a conversion from one to the other accurate to the third decimal point.
Because of the large variation between runners in the time required for marathon recovery, you should approach these schedules with a high degree of flexibility. Also, if, in your first marathon, the weather was hot, you became severely dehydrated, or you became unusually hobbled, then your recovery is likely to take longer than usual. When a conflict arises between what the schedule says to do and what your body indicates it’s willing to do, listen to your body. With these tight time frames between marathons, your best strategy is first to focus on recovery and then to worry about the other aspects of training. If you’re not able to follow the schedules closely for one reason or another, then follow the priorities discussed later in this chapter in choosing which workouts to do and which to miss.
For all the schedules in this chapter, remember that in the first few weeks after marathon number 1, recovery is your primary objective, and that during the last 3 weeks, tapering to consolidate your energy reserves is paramount. If you’re worn out or injured going into marathon number 2, then any extra workouts you’ve squeezed in won’t have been worth the effort.
One way to ensure that you don’t run too hard during the first few weeks after your previous marathon is to use a heart rate monitor. As discussed in chapter 4, a heart rate monitor can help prevent you from going too fast on your easy 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 to help speed your recovery.
In 1983, I ran three high-quality marathons in 17 weeks. Nine weeks after winning the San Francisco Marathon in 2:14:44, I finished second in the Montreal Marathon in 2:12:33. Eight weeks after that, I won the Auckland Marathon in 2:12:19. At the time, the last two races were personal bests.
I did a few things wrong between San Francisco and Montreal but was able to hold my body together through a combination of luck, enthusiasm, and youth (I was 26). After San Francisco, I was remarkably stiff for several days. I’m not sure whether that was from standing around in the cold for a couple of hours after the race or because it was my first marathon in almost 2 years because of surgery on my plantar fascia. I hobbled a 2-miler (3 km) 2 days after the race and racked up 46 miles (74 km) for the week. Regular massage helped bring my legs around.
Fortunately, my body bounced back really well after that first week, and I was up to 100 miles (161 km) in the third week after, including a session of eight 800-meter repeats on the track. My mileage climbed to 116 (187) and 122 (196) for the fourth and fifth weeks, which was about as high as I used to get back then. (I hadn’t made an Olympic team yet, so I was working full time.) There was just enough time to fit in two tune-up races, a 5-miler (8 km) in 23:35 and a third-place finish in the New Haven 20K, and then it was time to taper again. Eight days before Montreal, I went to the track and did two repeats of 1,600 meters in 4:24 and 4:23, which was really fast for me and a good omen. The last 2 weeks before the race I tried to get caught up on sleep, and I felt really ready going into Montreal.
The night after Montreal, I stayed out until 5:00 a.m., took an 8:00 a.m. flight back to Boston, and caught a cab directly to work. This didn’t help my recovery. After that, though, I settled down, and in the first 3 weeks after Montreal covered 48, 72, and 97 miles (77, 116, and 156 km). Lots of sleep and weekly massage kept me injury free, and, except for the occasional “Felt like hell” notation in my diary, training went pretty well.
Three weeks before the Auckland Marathon, I started my leave of absence from work at New Balance to prepare for the Olympic trials and flew to New Zealand with my training partner, Tom Ratcliffe, who was also running Auckland. We got a bit carried away with the excitement and probably overtrained the first week there. The second week in New Zealand, I ran a 10K tune-up race in 29:12, which I was very pleased with. During the last week before the marathon, however, I could tell that my body was on a fine edge, and I decided to back right off. Three days before the race, I was still feeling pretty tired. Fortunately, on race day, I felt strong and broke away after 17 miles (27 km). It had been a very positive experience in multiple marathoning that was excellent practice for the following year’s Olympic trials and marathon.
– Pete Pfitzinger
Following the Schedules
Each column of the schedules represents a week’s training. For example, in the 10-week schedule, the column for 9 weeks to goal indicates that at the end of that week you have 9 weeks until your second marathon. The schedules continue week by week until race week.
We have included the specific workout for each day as well as the category of training for that day. For example, in the 10-week schedule, on the Friday of the 5-weeks-to-go column, the specific workout is a 9-mile (14 km) run, and the category of training for that day is general aerobic conditioning. This aspect of the schedules allows you to quickly see the balance of training during each week and the progression of workouts from week to week. Look again at the 10-week schedule – it’s easy to see that with 5 weeks to go until the marathon, there are three recovery days that week along with a
O2max session, a long run, a medium-long run, and a general aerobic conditioning run. Looking at the row for Sunday, it’s easy to see how the long runs progress and then taper in the last few weeks before the marathon.
The workouts are divided into the following eight categories: long runs, medium-long runs, marathon-pace runs, general aerobic runs, lactate threshold runs, recovery runs,
O2max intervals, and speed training. Each of these categories is explained in depth in chapter 7, and the physiology behind the training is explained in chapter 1.
Multiple-Marathoning Priorities
The following sections explain the priorities for the training schedules in this chapter. But what if you don’t have 12, 10, 8, 6, or 4 weeks between marathons?
If you have less than 4 weeks between marathons, you’re on your own. Your main concern should be recovery, recovery, and more recovery, not only from your first marathon but also from the lobotomy that led you to come up with this plan.
For other amounts of time between marathons, follow these guidelines:
• For 11 weeks between, do the 12-week schedule, but skip the week “6 weeks to goal.”
• For 9 weeks between, do the 10-week schedule, but skip the week “5 weeks to goal,” and with 35 days to go, increase the distance of the run to 18 miles (29 km).
• For 7 weeks between, do the 8-week schedule, but skip the week “3 weeks to goal,” and with 21 days to go, increase the distance of the run to 18 miles (29 km).