Assuming you gave it all for the first marathon.
Can you PR a second marathon after three weeks?
If not, is there a better strategy for running two marathons in three weeks?
Assuming you gave it all for the first marathon.
Can you PR a second marathon after three weeks?
If not, is there a better strategy for running two marathons in three weeks?
If your marathon PR is around 5 hours, it's quite possible to PR in both races. If your PR is around 3 hours or faster, no, it's completely bonkers. A hard marathon usually means 1-2 weeks of no running just to start recovering, and back to easy base-building after that, and that's if recovery goes well. What kind of PR are you looking at?
A better way to run 2 marathons close together is to treat the first one as a long training run. Three weeks out is about right for peak weekly mileage and your longest long run. You can even run some of the miles at MP if you want, IF you keep it reasonable for your fitness and don't try to race the whole thing. Hopefully marathon 1 is a small local race and marathon 2 is Chicago or something similar, rather than the other way around.
Marathon PR wrote:
Assuming you gave it all for the first marathon.
Can you PR a second marathon after three weeks?
If not, is there a better strategy for running two marathons in three weeks?
Run the first marathon with a short taper, about a week and you will probably recover faster than if you did a three week taper.
colder and wiser wrote:
If your marathon PR is around 5 hours, it's quite possible to PR in both races. If your PR is around 3 hours or faster, no, it's completely bonkers. A hard marathon usually means 1-2 weeks of no running just to start recovering, and back to easy base-building after that, and that's if recovery goes well. What kind of PR are you looking at?
A better way to run 2 marathons close together is to treat the first one as a long training run. Three weeks out is about right for peak weekly mileage and your longest long run. You can even run some of the miles at MP if you want, IF you keep it reasonable for your fitness and don't try to race the whole thing. Hopefully marathon 1 is a small local race and marathon 2 is Chicago or something similar, rather than the other way around.
Yes, this.
If you want to improve your marathon PR of 5:10 to a sub 5 hour marathon sure go ahead you have nothing to lose.
If your marathon PR is 3:15 or faster, no way that this will happen.
Swedish runner David Nilsson ran a 2,11 PB. Two weeks later he ran 2,10.
I'd recommend reading the multiple marathoning schedules in Advanced Marathoning by Pfitzinger to get an idea of what might help in terms of juggling this.
Not an easy feat, especially of the first effort was truly 100%, but everyone responds to the distance differently.
well,, wrote:
Swedish runner David Nilsson ran a 2,11 PB. Two weeks later he ran 2,10.
Nilsson Schmilsson. For every Nilsson you've got 50 sore or injured or DNFs or......
I ran Chicago in 4:20 in oct and Philly in 4:17 5 weeks later. Both PRs.
3 week interval might be tough though. I was still pretty banged up after 3 weeks and the extra two weeks provided much needed recovery time to go hard again
I was old and slow by the time I attempted this (>50 yrs after decades of no running). Your personal circumstances may be different.
colder and wiser wrote:
If your marathon PR is around 5 hours, it's quite possible to PR in both races. If your PR is around 3 hours or faster, no, it's completely bonkers. A hard marathon usually means 1-2 weeks of no running just to start recovering, and back to easy base-building after that, and that's if recovery goes well. What kind of PR are you looking at?
A better way to run 2 marathons close together is to treat the first one as a long training run. Three weeks out is about right for peak weekly mileage and your longest long run. You can even run some of the miles at MP if you want, IF you keep it reasonable for your fitness and don't try to race the whole thing. Hopefully marathon 1 is a small local race and marathon 2 is Chicago or something similar, rather than the other way around.
Agreed. I did it often when running marathons, but my times were around 4:00 hours then I dipped to 3:50s. I think if you have a crappy day and bad weather affects you, sure it's possible to PR in the second. Sara Hall often runs marathons kind of back to back it seems to work for her. But yeah, if you really hit your PR in the first one, and give it your all - it's going to take a miracle of recovery to PR again.
I’m surprised that no one’s mentioned this yet, but 11 days before Derek Clayton broke his own world record in Antwerp with a 2:08:33.6 on May 30, 1969, he had won a marathon in Ankara, Turkey, in 2:17:26.
Clayton later claimed that he had to run faster than he expected to win that Ankara race, and if that had not been the case he would have gone 2:07 in Antwerp,
twomarathonsaday wrote:
If your marathon PR is 3:15 or faster, no way that this will happen.
Wrong.
3:09 then 3:07 3 weeks later 2 years ago.
Marathon PR wrote:
Assuming you gave it all for the first marathon.
Can you PR a second marathon after three weeks?
If not, is there a better strategy for running two marathons in three weeks?
If you run the first marathon all out, beating that time 3 weeks later would be very tough. I'd guess 90% of people couldn't do it. On the other hand, if you sandbag the first one, of course you could PR 3 weeks later. I guess it depends which race is more important to you. Whichever one is, run that one all out, and cut the pace way back for the other one.
Birkoboy wrote:
twomarathonsaday wrote:
If your marathon PR is 3:15 or faster, no way that this will happen.
Wrong.
3:09 then 3:07 3 weeks later 2 years ago.
I knew that would be that one guy who proves me wrong.
Welcome to the elusive 3:07 club, our friend Greg from Edmonton will never be part of.
My marathon career was three weeks! Chicago and NYC. I entered both because I had a qualifying time for NYC (Half time) and didn't know if I'd get into Chicago. Then decided to do both just in case the weather was crazy in Chicago. This was just before my 55 birthday. Ran 2.51 in Chicago and 2.56 in NYC. Everything went almost perfectly in Chicago. NYC was a struggle from the start even though in training I felt totally recovered. I think I was a "natural" marathon runner for what its worth. I had a massage from an ADP girl who said I was only the second runner she even seen that didn't suffer with some weird thing she did after Chicago. Something to do with your toes curling when she did my calves after a marathon. Mine didn't. I definitely thing part of NYC was just one of those days. My first mile was incredibly slow even allowing for the hill.