So I just officially signed up for the Detroit Marathon (Oct. 23rd). I’ve got some questions though for some fine tuning of my training and also for pacing on race day.
Some background - I am coming back from several years of chronic injury (shin splints mainly). I have been training regularly since January, and for the past 8 weeks have been following the beginner plan from the website. I have found it to be pretty manageable, and haven’t had any signs of pain, so that is priority #1. It maxes out at 41 miles though, so it isn’t super high mileage.
So, here are my questions. The first is how hard I should be running the key workouts? There is a mid-week run of 8 or more miles and there is a long run on the weekends. If my recovery is good, is it better to run these a little harder, or should I be trying to bump up my mileage and keep it easier? I could see myself increasing the mid-week run to 10 - 12 miles, or adding another 8 miler on another day.
Daniels says more experience marathoners run at around a minute per mile slower than marathon pace on long runs, and that less experienced run at close to marathon pace. Not sure where I fit in here. My VDOT (based on recent 5K and 10K times) puts my easy run pace somewhere between 8:32 - 8:49 per mile. When I run these paces on long runs, I am pretty comfortable. This, however, also puts my marathon pace at 7:17 - 7:32, which I am pretty sure won’t happen come Oct. 23rd. I am sure this assumes that I have the training in my legs, which I don’t at this point. I feel like a more reasonable goal is somewhere between 8:00 - 8:30/mile (I don’t know, I’m new to this). So should I continue on the beginner plan and try to keep the long runs at 8:00 - 8:15 / mile, or should I increase the mileage and pace them slower? Obviously I don’t want to go 100% on these long runs, so assuming my recovery is good afterwords.
Also, I don’t know how to run on race day. I’d rather go by PE than pace on race day and let the times fall where they fall, however, I feel I should have some kind of indication of a good pace by then. The closest thing I can think of is the 20 miler I will do 3 weeks out, but that’s still 10K short. Should I run that at expected race pace and see how it goes, even if that makes it kind of tough? In other words, how hard can I run the 20 miler and/or What’s the best indicator workout?
FWIW, I am in a period of rapid gains of fitness as my mileage has consistently been over 30 mpw. So, I would like to flex my muscles a little over this next month to push things a bit.
Thanks,
Jack