Key workouts for 1/2 marathon?

6x2km at or slightly under HM pace with 1-2min. jog rec.

I'll do that 1-2x in my HM build up. Might work better on a treadmill than on a 200m track, or save it for the next chinook...?

My mileage varies between 50-80km per week depending on work and family commitments, I only manage 1-2 workouts per week but usually throw tempo into my long run (20-30km). I grew up in Canada, sometimes you have to get very creative and be very flexible with your winter training. Good luck!

Hey, it sounds like your not doing bad considering weather and road conditions. Here are some things I'm planning on doing for a Spring Half. These are what I think of as Key Workouts: hard (multiple recovery days for each) and done once each in the final few weeks.

This time I'm planning a Half, done at a race, several minutes slower (10 seconds or a little more per mile slower or 6-7 seconds per km) than target pace.

One workout of (relatively) short intervals. 1 - 1 1/2 miles. I've done 9XMile, 6X1.5 M, 7X2km for the metric inclined. This is a little faster than race pace, 10s per mile (6s per k) last time I did it. Some early posters mentioned this kind of thing but have you doing less volume quite a bit faster. This is more race-specific than what some suggested as it is longer and slower, meaning closer to race in distance and pace.

An 11M (18k) progressive tempo starting slower and finishing slightly faster than target pace. I'll probably try to get race pace for the last third and faster for only last km or so. I saw essentially this workout suggested above.

One cut-down long interval workout. I've done a 6M, 4M, 2M. Not a huge rest in between (or that's the idea anyway!) This is so long that the first was probably a little slower, the middle real close and the last a little faster (than target). Very race-specific and very hard. This time I'm thinking about a 4,3,2,1 Mile. 10M (16k) total, starting at race pace and finishing faster. Rest ends up being a few minutes, resetting watch and maybe drinking. (As you can tell, I haven't timed the rest on these kind of things for some reason.)

One 8 1/2 Mile (13 1/2 km or around 2/3 race distance) at exactly target race pace in race shoes. The last real hard one. After this maybe one more light fartlek in race shoes, as final tune-up.

That's about what I would suggest once you're real fit already, like this is your last month. I like some of the ideas kicking around here. Maybe this could fit in with your program.

Good luck and keep us posted!

I'm in the same age group with a similar goal. Keeping things simple has always been good enough. Run a lot and do quite a bit of mixed running at sub 3:50 km pace.

A couple of short races before the goal half and you're good to go.

Way to hard and too much. Or you should be racing a lot harder than you are.

I would respectfully disagree here. I feel I probably can race very close to whatever genetic limits I have, possibly unlike a lot of folks, including some pro runners even. Once in a while I'll see a post in which some clown weighs in and says, "I could get [name famous runner] to run better than she is." Now, whether or not that particular joker on the boards could, I DO believe that in some cases, SOME coach could.

I agree with what Gavin Smith (worked for Canova in Kenya) has said about a lot of guys showing up to a marathon 90% prepared. He says that if the race were 4-6 later, they could run their best after a block of very race-specific training. They've done enough long, comparitively slow stuff to have the pure endurance and enough faster stuff so that their ultimate marathon pace isn't fast.

They've prepared not for the race exactly but are definitely prepared for the race-spec training. This parrots something Brad Hudson has said, paraphrased: all running is either specifically preparing for the race, or preparing you to do the specific training. You have to be in good enough shape to do the kind of workouts that he and Canova suggest, which are exactly the kind I suggested.

I believe what you are saying is: if I can do 8 or 9 miles at such-and-such a pace, I should be able to do a half, in a race situation, even faster than that pace. Ditto an interval workout of some sort totaling 10 miles. Your half pace should be faster than what you can do for that workout.

Well, Canova had Florence Kiplagat do 10X1600 at half-marathon pace. This is mentioned in the Canova 101 article in RT from which some of Gavin's quotes were taken. Canova gave Moses Mosop the following during the 3 weeks prior to his near-course-record in Boston '11: 8X3km with 1km in between a little slower (not a jog recovery). A 24km 'alternator' with 12km 'on' and 12 'off' but not much slower than 'on'. 25km hard (almost 2/3 of race distance at race effort.)

Hanson's does 26km at race pace 'simulator'. Ryan Hall did 15 at race pace. He also did 12 at race effort after 12 a little slower. Hanson's does 2X6M significantly faster than marathon pace, which is to say, around half pace. If I can do the workouts I described over a period of 4 or 5 weeks, should I be able to run a half faster than I think, which is to say, faster than what I consider race pace for these workouts? I think I'm getting all I can out of myself exactly because I'm doing a schedule such as this and believe there are a lot of you who could race faster than you are with a similar approach!

You seem to be confusing the half with the full. In any event you still are an under-achiever in actual half races for the training you do.

No confusion. If Canova prescribes 25km at marathon race pace (or very similar effort given altitude, surface, and hills) it stands to reason that 12 1/2km would be an ideal half marathon workout. If the Hansons believe 26km is an ideal marathon pace workout, I believe 13km would be an ideal marathon pace workout. I will admit my 8 1/2M at race pace is very slightly longer than either of these (less than 1/2M longer than Hanson's).

As far as an actual half marathon race done at 90%+ of my ideal race pace, Canova had Mosop do 25km, at high altitude, with hills, at about the same percentage of his marathon race pace. I didn't tell the OP he should do a hard 24 miler. I did recommend he at least consider some very race-specific workouts that are not, in fact marathon specific. Hall was running 20 miles or more with half at about marathon pace. My 11 miler with 4 miles at half marathon pace (and a mile a little fasteray is equally specific for a race half the length. No confusion.

In fact, I mentioned a F. Kiplagat workout to prepare for a half marathon. 10 miles of HM race pace running may seem hard, and I'm sure it was (the 4-3-2-1 I am considering is also 10), but Canova's recommended HM workouts often include 15km at exactly target race pace, ie 3X5km. (See old threads on this Board in which this is explained.)

To each his own, but I am just answering the OP's call with some of my favorite HM workouts. Keep in mind I approve of what he's doing now and I agree with other posters on at least one run. These are ideas; use them or not. They are not my ideas as I admit I'm getting them from the Italian school and even in a way from Hudson. But let me (rhetorically: don't answer) ask you this: do you believe the pace you can run for an all-out half is hard enough that you can't run 2/3 that distance, in race shoes, after 2 or 3 easy days when you are in peak fitness? I would propose that you won't be able to finish your half at a certain pace if you CAN'T do 8 at that pace in training.

Man, thanks for writing all of that out.

I also read your other post below. You sound like you can really handle a lot of volume at near race pace, which is cool. You must recover really well. Plus you seem to know your training sources.

Just thinking about some of your suggestions and I think that for me, if I come into the spring reasonably light and consistently running 60-70 miles with some decent workouts under my belt, I could see myself doing some version of the longer runs, particularly the progression run.

Having said that, I find it's really easy for me to get excited and in the course of two weeks go out and completely destroy myself. So working these in while maintaining the discipline to not overtrain on any other days would be the challenge because running that much mileage at race pace in the weeks before the main event would be playing with fire for me for sure.

It's really interesting to see what people are recommending. Thanks.

Forgot about this thread!

To the poster who asked about whether 6 miles was long enough. I would say yes. Like one poster say, 1/2 marathon pace is no joke. I honestly never hit 1/2 pace for this run but ended up racing at 10-15 secs per mile faster. This is likely because i didn't go into this tempo run rested.

I also found the 3 x 2 mile workout very difficult. I actually took this from Hanson's marathon training plan but adjusted the pace to be more reflective of 1/2 training.

My favorite of these is the 10 mile tempo but by the end, 1/2 pace was really, really difficult. I worked like hell to get there but didn't always make it.

I had to take a very easy day or day off after this run.

longroad wrote:

Forgot about this thread!

To the poster who asked about whether 6 miles was long enough. I would say yes. .

I race a lot so I could do a consistent 5 mile tempo at half marathon pace.

One of my friends rarely raced so he would start with 4 miles and work his way up to 8 miles at half marathon pace the week before the race.

So the answer is that it depends on what other training you are doing.

I can't even do 8km at half pace in training.

You don't sound like you have much race game.

I ran a half marathon at the end of the summer and the few months leading up to it my longest run was about 7.5 miles and weekly mileage was less than 40. I ran the half in 1:13.

You don't need alot of mileage buildup tobrun a descent half marathon. Doing some cross training can help in the mix.

Jgghj wrote:

I ran a half marathon at the end of the summer and the few months leading up to it my longest run was about 7.5 miles and weekly mileage was less than 40. I ran the half in 1:13.

You don't need alot of mileage buildup tobrun a descent half marathon. Doing some cross training can help in the mix.

And just to add to this, I wasn't even really trying that hard in my workouts. They didnt even feel like workouts

A bit off topic but I always wondered why womans elite half marathoners are so much slower than the men. The mens half marathon world record is 58:23 and Amy hastings-cragg just ran 68:27. 10 minutes slower! That's almost a life time of difference!

Why would you compare the World Record to an OK time?

Hey Howie,

Good to see that you're digesting a lot of material here (and hopefully others are getting ideas from this thread, too.) Let me clear up some things.

The very race-specific workouts I described are taken from coaches who coach athletes as much as maybe 2 minutes per mile faster than I am. So they are designed for very fit runners at the top of their games, which is to say, immediately coming from a 'Special' phase (in Renato Canova's words) which may be similar to what you're doing now. Even given the talent and potential of some of Canova's (or his protoge's) athletes, they will take 2 easy days before and often even more after a workout such as I described.

So I don't pack in any more hard running than anyone else, but in fact, probably less during the 'Specific' (Canova's term) phase. I'm also probably twice the age of most of you reading this and have found that I need more recovery than many of you. What I'm saying, boiled down, is that a sequence such as those workouts described might take about 4-1/2 weeks ending 1-1/2 weeks before the target race. So, it describes the last 6 weeks.

There is, of course, other running, but those are the hardest workouts and many of the other days are just easy recovery running. Gavin Smith, an English-as-a-first-language Canova disciple has written about what he calls modulation, which is the dissimilarity between different days in a week or month. He says that modulation will increase as the race gets closer and training progresses toward more specificity.

This means that in the 'Fundamental' phase (Base-Building) there are noe extremely hard days but no extremely easy days either. You don't need the latter if you don't have the former. You can fit in more decent workouts when none of them are so hard that it ruins the week. A lot of days are medium-hard. Ultimately, the athlete arrives at a fitness level at which he can complete workouts such as the last couple I described. Each of these is hard enough that the week isn't full of several medium to medium-hard days. There is a very hard workout followed by easy recovery running until ready for another very hard effort. The modulation, or dissimilarity between (hard vs easy) days is huge.

Well, that's an inexact simplification. If you took a month or more to do what I described you'd probably slot in a couple medium effort days but a lot of them would be whatever your easy shakeout run is. The point is that you wouldn't be tempted to hammer a blazing track workout out 2 days after 9 miles or 15km at HM pace. Maybe you'd do 2 really easy days then a moderate fartlek or diagonals then another real easy then something hard again.

I got all this from Canova 101 in RT (it exists online), Gavin Smith's blog from just a couple years ago, after he was in Kenya working for Renato, occasional other articles (RT and online), but primarily from threads on this Board. I can give links. I wish to stress that none of the ideas are mine. The 4-3-2-1 mile is taken from JT Daniels, for example, although Canova runners will do 6-5-4-3-2-km according to Smith. The mile/2km repeats and 10-11 mile progressive tempo have been recommended by other posters. The ultimate race-specific tempo is not grounbreaking either: what serious marathon doesn't try twice that distance (15-17 miles or 26km) at marathon pace? Wouldn't a serious 10km runner do 4-5X2km and a 4 mile race pace tempo?

One of my favorite threads is Renato relating Mosop's preparation for Boston starting New Year's 2011. The final phase will seem unusual for the very reasons you mentioned in your post above: there are such hard workouts that recovery may become problematic and trying to put in much more than one good day a week could get you into trouble. I took shorthand notes of this specific phase onto a small piece of paper that stays with my own training log so I see it regularly. Here is a paraphrase:

A half marathon race (his only tune-up race) at exactly marathon pace ~1:01:30. I believe this is 6 weeks out .

A week of not much running then a moderate fartlek or 2 but no real hard workouts.

A 40km run that Canova says would be about a 2:10 marathon effort if done on a flat, paved, sea-level course with lighter shoes. Mosop set the course record on this road, which is saying something given the role call of runners Renato has taken there. This is 4+weeks out from Boston.

5 easy days. Well, one of the middle days was a moderate fartlek.

10X1600 at ~4:30 pace. Not real marathon spec but more half marathon. Several easy days.

8X3km hard, 1km moderate in between, for 31km without much rest. I don't remember the pace. Very marathon specific.

3 easy days if I remember. My notes aren't in front of me.

25km hard. I believe this was sub 4:50 pace, or maybe a little slower but with altitude around that effort. Marathon specific.

3 easy days.

The 'Alternator'. 12X1km hard, 1km moderate (but not much slower than the hard). 24km total pretty hard running. Pretty marathon specific, alternating between slightly faster than race pace and a little slower than RP.

One mellow fartlek a few days later, then taper. I may have small details off (this is from memory) but the point is, it really influenced me to try to do several very hard specific workouts immediately prior to a peak race - with, of course, a lot of recovery in between these. You can add a whole lot of time onto each, a minute per mile or whatever you need, and you can adjust for a half marathon or 30km or 20 mile race or whatever. In middle-age I may need even more recovery than you, but you see, you can adjust accordingly. The concepts are sound. Good luck, Howie, and keep us posted!

How fast are you running off this? Unless you are over 90 you are not twice my age.

FL guy who runs wrote:

The long run is the bread and butter of the HM and Full IMO. I like to do one or two fast finish long runs per month as I get closer to my HM race. Basically start at your typical long run pace then drop the hammer on the last 5-8 miles towards HM pace and take a one/two mile cool down. If you're running 23 mile for your LR you should definitely be in shape to crush your half, but you could probably get away with running a 16-18 mile LR if you wanted, OBVIOUSLY the 23 mile LR will help more and make the 13.1 that much easier. Just be cautious to not run yourself into the ground with over training.

I disagree.

Many people run their HM as a product of basically marathon training (with some HM-specific work) and mistakenly assume it must have been the long run that helped. Wrong. It is just that's when they actually did real mileage and consistent long tempos.

Non-specific work is fine, but it should never be limiting you from your race-specific work.

22-23 miles slow or even with an MP finish of 5-10 miles is far from what you need to be doing for the HM, and yet is so taxing that it limits in-week mileage and HM-specific work. I'd rather run or have my runner do 16-18 with the back half at HM pace. Very race-specific effort over the final miles, something you won't get in tempos or a slow long run.

That said, if you periodize a bit and do long slow runs early in your season, fine. Just get them to a place that actually targets the HM as the race approaches. For the HM, two hours (with 45 minutes on pace) is better than three hours of jogging.

On the track, 6x1 mi, at about 12-15 sec faster per mile than goal pace. This should be 3-4 weeks before race.