Meltdown during a sub 3 marathon try

it's all about negative splits in the marathon, bro

Answers to your four questions:

1)You went out too fast

2)You went out too fast

3)You went out too fast

4)You went out too fast

Cool story bro.

I have done a half in 1:27 (as in last weekend), and I still do not think I'm ready to try for a sub 3. My goal is a half in 1:25 before I will train for a marathon, so for your question 4 I agree.

And yes, if your PR in the half is 1:30, and you go 1:27 for a full, you went out too fast.

this guy is right on all 4 of his points...patience grasshopper!

............. wrote:

Answers to your four questions:

1)You went out too fast

2)You went out too fast

3)You went out too fast

4)You went out too fast

Answers to your questions:

1. You aren't there yet, keep trying.

2. You aren't there yet, keep trying.

3. You aren't there yet, keep trying.

4. You aren't there yet, keep trying.

A three hour marathon is not a physical barrier. It is a mental barrier. If you run a 3:00.00.01, you have wasted three hours of your life and twenty four weeks of training. If you run a 2:59.59.99, you will be congradulated by all your runner buddies and have a great sense of accomplishment (and run a 2:52 next time out when you get over the whole 3hr thing). Just keep trying. You will get there. It does help to shoot for a 2:57-58 to give yourself a buffer in case the wheels come off. It took me three tries because I kept getting psyched out and couldn't convince myself that I could hold the pace in the last 6 mi. But, I finally got it done and am now shooting for 2:45. Keep at it. It will happen. Don't overthink it.

............. wrote:

Answers to your four questions:

1)You went out too fast

2)You went out too fast

3)You went out too fast

4)You went out too fast

This.

Even after seven marathons, I personally never learned to run a good one, but when looking back at them, I know that I did what you have done here...went out too fast.

You are right on the cusp, so there's no guarantee that you would have made it had you run even splits, but almost assuredly you would have run faster than 3:09. Lots of attempts worse than that out there though brother. I once went through the half in 1:20 and finished in 3:20.

thank you all for the response. Yeah, I think I was too optimistic. I am sure the psychological aspect is also playing a big part. I think I will focus on shorter races, 5, 10 and half till summer, and maybe try to go to sub 1:25 on the half before I try a sub 3 again:-)

You should have done more races before the marathon

ukathleticscoach wrote:

You should have done more races before the marathon

thanks for mentioning that. So what kind of races do you recommend? just halves or even shorter ones like 5k will help? So assuming that I want to try the sub 3 again next fall, what could be a good training strategy before I begin the marathon training around May/June?

IMO all race distances help as long as the timing is right in regards to your training. From what I've read the last few years AND what has worked for me is to run a 1/2 ALL OUT 4-6 weeks in front of a marathon to test fitness. I think most people also agree that racing other distances during training is also good. They build your confidence, show you where you're at, AND get you psychologically "race ready", after all the only place that you can duplicate everything that goes into a race...is a race!

Specifically to you, racing some halfs may help you learn to be more patient in the full, I think you had a shot at sub 3:00 but went out too fast. Don't give up, you can do it.

You asked about wearing a watch in the marathon. If you are running for a specific time, which you were, I personally think you need to wear a watch. Know what pace you need to run, and it sounds like you did, and check the watch to make sure you do not exceed this pace, ESPECIALLY in the first half of the race. If you are feeling good after 20, then you can start to exceed your goal pace. That should also ensure a negative split, if you goal pace is accurate.

If you are racing for a win or position then the watch isn't important.

I think you have the fitness for a sub 3, it's just hard to run the perfect marathon.

Good luck

ukathleticscoach wrote:

You should have done more races before the marathon

This is wrong. You didn't do enough miles before the marathon. More doubles, up your mileage by 10 mpw. Quit worrying about long runs, track workouts, races.

More doubles, 10 mpw more. You died off after 13, you may need 15 more a week. Just add 3 5 mile morning runs a week and you'll do it easy.

No I am right. Do you know how many athletes I've coached to prominence?

Your inexperience is apparent. My athletes race and all of you should close your mouths and listen when I speak.

what he said... :)

ukathIeticscoach wrote:

No I am right. Do you know how many athletes I've coached to prominence?

Your inexperience is apparent. My athletes race and all of you should close your mouths and listen when I speak.

1:27 might have been fast enough for a 3:00 but you started out and held a pace way too fast for your goal.

21:20 was your goal 5k pace and had you held that for the first 25k you would have been in a lot better shape for the rest of the race and had a better shot.

1:30 for the half isn't good enough. You need run 1:24-1:25.

And you went out too fast ;-)

Get you 10K down in the 38's too if it is not already there.

A quick and relatively accurate way of predicting your marathon time is to take a recently run half, double your time, and add ten minutes. If you do that with your 1:30 half, that puts you right at 3:10, which is what you actually did in your recent marathon.

As someone mentioned, negative splitting is the most successful way to run a marathon. Obviously, this requires good training (long runs with marathon pace thrown in, tempo runs, etc.) and also patience.

Good luck!

A quick and relatively accurate way of predicting your marathon time is to take a recently run half, double your time, and add ten minutes. If you do that with your 1:30 half, that puts you right at 3:10, which is what you actually did in your recent marathon.

Considering he actually ran 1:27 in the first half of this race, he's in at least 1:27 half marathon shape - so the formula "working" is coincidence. Plug the 1:27 back in and he should've been able to run 3:04 (off a 1:32 first half).

Or figure that he wasn't completely exhausted at the half and was probably in 1:25ish shape -> predicts 3:00 marathon. For which 1:27 was still close to 15 sec/mile too fast.