Using McMillian for marathon pacing. I am much faster at the shorter stuff and really can’t imagine running a marathon at pace predicted. If I am shooting for a goal time, what about starting from goal time and basing training on that? I would keep the tempo based shorter stuff at faster paces but use different pacing for the longer stuff(runs over 10m). Is this a reasonable plan??
Not being a runner naturally, take what I say with a grain of salt. MY bf, a very good runner and my coach, is basing my training off of a Jack Daniels plan. The McMillan calculator and the Daniels VDot tables are a bit related - - one thing Daniels points out is that while the predicted times are the results of YEARS of coaching experience with a variety of athletes, most folks are tilted toward the shorter or longer distances and either faster or slower range of times…If you can’t do the tempo intervals suggested based on your 5K time and have a marathon goal that is a little less ambitious than what the calculator suggests you could do, then train at a lower intensity. If you can do the tempo intervals but are just not sure if you could do the time then do the intervals and do your best on race day…and que sera sera.
at risk at getting flamed, id direct you to the FIRST program for Run Less Run Fast for your paces. They are free at the website
http://www.furman.edu/first/fmtp.htm
McMillan is just a guideline (as is JD and any other pace predictor). I am a female, and my best performance is probably in the mile (5:08). This would put me at a marathon time in McMillan and JD that I would think is simply unattainable. I think the pace charts also put my 100m time at like 15-16 seconds. Um, NO, I can run a helluva lot faster in the 100 than that, and I am no sprinter. So the paces are wonky at both extremes and I also think they are based more on male than female times. I’ve had them lead me astray into planning workouts too fast based on “projected” times for different races.
Whether its Mcmillan or JD the paces are supposed to be the pace you should be running at in training, based on current fitness. Picking at desired marathon time and training at those paces is pretty much guaranteed to lead to frustration or overtraining. Im more familiar with Daniels plans and his workouts tend to be pretty challenging as is.
Styrrell
Hi,
Like any tool, the calculators will serve you best when used properly. If you are training for a marathon, you will not get good resolution if you are using your mile time to suggest paces, and vice versa. If you used your current half marathon or even 10K time to suggest your paces, you would likely get a much more reasonable prediction of paces that matched your current fitness.
Yes, it would be silly to think that Usain Bolt is going to run a sub 1:54 marathon based on his 100meter spli being plugged into McMillan…for that matter it also has him running a sub 12 minute 5k…and I think the guy is fast but not that fast at the longer stuff!
I have running friends who insist that the 10K is a better indicator of marathon performance - - I did one last week to fine-tune the remainder of my marathon training paces and to guage increases in fitness. Despite how much my running has improved since I did my 5K PR 6 months ago, I still could not hit the tempo intervals suggested by plugging my 5K into McMillan…but my 10K is spot on and super challenging.