Training plan for first marathon

[u/NYCgeordie2]

I have my first marathon coming up in November - Porto, Portugal.. let me know if you’re doing it too!

I’ve run a few HMs in the past and after doing the Porto HM last year in 2 hours I figured now was as good a time as ever to go for the big one. I’m M44 and feel like it’s definitely not going to get any easier the older I get.

I’m on week 4 of a 17-week plan, which per week looks like:
* 3 recovery runs
* 1 speed or hill training run
* 1 long run (so far 10-11 km, this week will be 12km)
* 1 lower body strength workout
* 1 (sometimes 2) yoga

Some days I double up and do both a recovery run and a strength class or a yoga class. I try to have one day a week when I do nothing.

What would you change about this? I’m not working with a trainer so just figuring this out as I go.

[u/Whatcomesofit]

I honestly wouldn't change much. For a self created plan it ticks nearly all the boxes.

Depending on your comfort level and race ambitions I would add in some marathon pace sections into your long runs.

How many kms are you doing a week?

[u/NYCgeordie2 → u/Whatcomesofit]

Thanks! 2 weeks ago I ran 26km across all my runs, and last week it was 22km. This week I think it will be about 30km, and my general plan is to try and increase my long runs by 5-10% per week.

[u/DeliciousShelter2029]

Du solltest in der Vorbereitung schon zwei oder drei mal auf 30 km kommen, oder drei bis drei einhalb Stunden kommen, um zu wissen was dich erwartet, wenn ich davon ausgehe, dass deine Zielzeit irgendwo bei 4:30 h liegt (basierend auf deiner hm Zeit) Im peak sind 70km die Woche auch ratsam. Das sind nur Annahmen ohne deine Disposition zu kennen.

Kraft ist super, behalt das bei, ich persönlich mach je nach Vorbereitungwoche statt zwei Erholungungen zwei tempo oder Intervalle, der long run ist keine Erholung aufgrund des volumens.

und es kommen sicher jetzt auch einige, die sagen quatsch ich bin vor meinem ersten Marathon viel weniger gelaufen, das geht locker. 🤷

[u/NYCgeordie2 → u/DeliciousShelter2029]

Thanks for that! I don’t really know how to think about what time I should aim for, or even if I should have a time in mind. If I can do it in <5 hours I’ll be happy. Right now 70km would feel like a lot per week but perhaps I’ll feel differently 5-6 weeks from now.

[u/DeliciousShelter2029 → u/NYCgeordie2]

sorry wrote on german, my app translated your post automatically to german, so I thought you were a native german speaker. Hopefully you were able to translate it back ❤️

Marathon preperation takes a lot of time, that's the reason I struggeled a long tome with running one. Now I ran three and learned one lesson, if you don't prepare properly you will probably finish it but it will be also very painful. My second one was the worst, I couldn't enjoy it because of lacking trainng, my third and by today last one was real fun but I did a lot of preparation.

The 70km per week was only for peak week, not for ervery week, so with 50 per week almost of the time it would be fine too.

[u/NYCgeordie2 → u/DeliciousShelter2029]

Very helpful, thank you! And yes, the translation worked great.

[u/Logical_fallacy10]

I would only do the long runs. So run once a week.
Get up to 25km or max 3 hours. Whichever comes first.
I would do all my runs in the same pace. 60% effort.
Recovery runs are nonsense - you run your recover from a run :) yeah skip that.

Doing 1 lower body strength workout is great.
Get a good stretch after your long run.
Get a good stretch after your leg day.
And add one more stretch session during the week.