Training for the marathon - at marathon pace

I know this isn't correct but I don't know why either. Can anyone throw some physiology knowledge on this?

If your MP is the fastest you can run the race, then that pace is a bit too fast to be your all the time pace. Rather than adapt, you will wear down, stagnate, and start going the other direction.

But if you are capable of a 2:30 marathon, and you just want to finish one at 3:00, sure, run all your runs at 7 minute pace. You'd be fine.

The marathon is about maximizing aerobic ability. The key to that is lowering anaerobic threshold so that you can maintain an aerobic pace for as long as possible. Thus the heavy emphasis on tempo runs - as they lower the anaerobic threshold and thus allow you to run at an aerobic pace at faster speeds. Just running marathon pace doesn't do much to lower anaerobic threshold, this it doesn't give you much of the desired adaptation.

So of the two replies - one's saying it's wrong because you need to run slower and the other is saying it's wrong because you need to run faster.

Why is a MP long run less beneficial than a Pfitzinger style 10-20% slower long run? Is it purely because MP is too taxing?

strongbear wrote:

Am I wrong? If so, why?

You're wrong because goal pace hasn't got much to do with what's physically optimal.

You've got to train slow to race fast.

Tempo pace is a once or twice a week proposition. Marathon pace is a three times per cycle proposition (for me). 5 days a week are done at easy distance/conversational pace (which tends to be 60-90 seconds slower than marathon pace).

Smoove wrote:

Tempo pace is a once or twice a week proposition. Marathon pace is a three times per cycle proposition (for me). 5 days a week are done at easy distance/conversational pace (which tends to be 60-90 seconds slower than marathon pace).

What Smoove said. MP is both too fast and too slow to be done all the time. I just happened to latch onto the "too fast" part in my initial response.

Thank you for the responses so far. They are helpful, but still do not directly address the question. Is marathon pace not optimal for marathon training? If so, why not? Is it because it is too slow? Is it because it is too fast?

What if a runner did the equivalent load of training as that of a traditional Marathon preparation program, but instead of long slow runs for recovery did short marathon pace runs, and instead of short fast intervals for workouts, did longer Marathon pace intervals?

In other words, what would happen if a runner's program consisted of basically only marathon pace, with easiness and difficulty being moderated by the distance, rather than changing pace?

Wood said runner in up slower at the marathon than a genetically equivalent runner who did a more varied training program? Would their injury risk be different? Why?

For what it's worth- trying to break 3 hrs at age 58, I came up with the idea that if I could run 26 miles in a week at sub 7 pace I would be fit enough. I didn't do it every week but did it 2x on 45-50 miles per week total, so about half my total miles were race pace. Combination of tempo longer runs, intervals, etc. I ran 2hr 59.

Thanks, naia champ.

Essentially, my question is: would naia champ have either (a) run faster or (b) had a lower risk of injury if he followed a more traditional program, rather than his "run as much as I can at marathon pace" program?

strongbear wrote:

Thank you for the responses so far. They are helpful, but still do not directly address the question. Is marathon pace not optimal for marathon training? If so, why not? Is it because it is too slow? Is it because it is too fast?

What if a runner did the equivalent load of training as that of a traditional Marathon preparation program, but instead of long slow runs for recovery did short marathon pace runs, and instead of short fast intervals for workouts, did longer Marathon pace intervals?

In other words, what would happen if a runner's program consisted of basically only marathon pace, with easiness and difficulty being moderated by the distance, rather than changing pace?

Wood said runner in up slower at the marathon than a genetically equivalent runner who did a more varied training program? Would their injury risk be different? Why?

Because you're not changing your engine. Your body needs to learn to adapt to low carb states and you can't run enough miles to get there if you do everything at MP.

No it's not beneficial to run at MP all the time. You will eventually stop progressing if at all. Like Smoove said, you should be improving lactate threshold most importantly to allow your body to hold MP for longer. Easy running to allow your body to recover and improve aerobic conditioning. And occasionally hitting MP in your long runs, and increase frequency as you approach race. If no one has yet told you the halfway point in a marathon is at mile 20. The last 10k of a marathon is when the real race starts.

When I decided to run marathons, back in the early 70s when no one paid attention to physiology, I reckoned that because I was going to be running so much farther than I normally did in the race I would need to run more slowly than I normally did. So ALL of my running, once I got warmed up and going if I wasn't sick or just generally exhausted, was at or faster than my anticipated marathon pace.

At first that was still pretty slow. I'd debuted with four and a half hours and was hoping to get under four and all of steady my runs were 7:30-8:00. I was running in college then and doing a lot of interval work too and racing at one to six miles so the 7:30-8:00 stuff seemed easy. I ran over an hour faster in my second marathon. Eventually I got to 2:35. I was out of school by then but always kept to the same idea, the marathon was such a long race that it seemed impossible that I could run it at faster than my normal running pace.

I didn't have much variation in what I did by the time I was at 2:35-2:40, everything was a bit on either side of 6:00 pace. The intervals were gone.. I didn't get into the hard/easy thing very much but was more into moderate/moderate. I kind of modeled what I did on what Ron Clarke did except for being a whole lot slower and I was pleased to have taken so much time off of my marathon best. Today I read that what I did violated all sorts of physiological principals so maybe I'd have improved even more had I done most runs slower than marathon pace but maybe I'd have improved less. Eventually I did stop improving, you're right about that. But I'm pretty sure that would have happened too no matter what I did.

OP why don't you try running every run at your marathon pace and see how long/how many miles a week you can sustain that for? Then you will have your answer.

I'm guessing if I tried to do every mile of training at marathon pace, I could do maximum 50 miles a week and doubt I could sustain that for more than 2-3 weeks, either mentally or physically. Only 7-8 miles a day at marathon pace sure would feel super easy on day 1 and 2, but after a week? Plus what would you do for longer runs? 20 miles at marathon pace? And somehow recover from that to still be running shorter runs at marathon pace the next day?

Just think it over in your head, and you'll realize why it wouldn't work. And I'm not even talking as a way to optimize performance, just physically whether it could even be possible.

I think someone who can run 70mpw with 10-15 miles at MP and some time spent at faster than MP will perform better than someone that runs 50mpw at MP only.

If you have to start cutting out other workouts such as:

lactate threshold runs to make a faster MP more comfortable,

more mileage to boost glycogen stores, increase muscular endurance, and burn fat more efficiently

in order to run MP all the time, then you are missing out on some more efficient ways to improve physiologically speaking. If you can run all of your easy runs at MP, and still increase mileage, and still hit tempo/interval workouts without getting burnt out or injured, your marathon pace goal may be too conservative.

That being said, I think MP running during marathon training is very important, and should be done at least for some miles every week...not three times a cycle as Smoove recommended. It is the most efficient way to run aerobically (since it's considered the fastest you can run and still be aerobic), doing it can make it feel more comfortable, and having a good feel for your race pace will help you pace yourself better on race day which is very important for a race that's hard to judge solely by feel unless you've run a bunch of them.

It's just too slow to reap every training benefit but too harsh to fill all the volume needed to train for a marathon.

1. Even if your principle of specificity were true, the argument fails because marathon pace is hard on the body. You can only run relatively few miles per week at marathon pace whie allowing for adequate recovery and adaptation. If you try to run more, you get exhausted and injured. By doing some running at paces slower than MP, a runner can survive significantly more total training, causing more beneficial adaptations.

2. Your specificity principle is not completely true. Marathoning has several component skills or abilities. One can improve the components more effectively by doing some training that focuses on each one individually.

Yes, people paid attention to physiology in the 70s. HRE you didn't violate anything and you would not have run faster running slower. More likely you would've been injured.

Whether or not training at marathon goal pace is helpful depends on how fast you are.

The average marathoner is running a different event than an elite or sub-elite marathoner. Most 3 hour marathoners are quite comfortable training at marathon pace. Most slower marathon runners are not really running a marathon, so much as walk/jogging a marathon.

The faster runners today are faster than the 70s not because they run more mileage but because they run more mileage at marathon pace +/- 10% thus doing far less jogging around overall.

Look at most of the women on Instagram who post their training for the marathon. Literally every run is at marathon pace or pretty close. Guess what happens to all these ladies? Ninety percent of them end up injured. Not sustainable.