Running 3:00 marathon off a 1:30 half - Old/Slow guy

Good to hear that you're encouraged to go for it.

I'll just add that I was in a similar position to you.

Ran a 2:57 at age 42 a year after a 1:30 PR 1/2 Marathon.

During that year I gradually increased mileage, and used the Pfitz/Douglas 18 week plan, averaging 60 miles/week.

Ran a 37:40 10K 8 weeks before the marathon, and a 1:23:56

1/2 Marathon 4 weeks before.

Good luck!

One way to look at it is that you have to drop 16-20 seconds per mile over your current pace. That usually leads to the ability to double the distance you can hold the same pace.

6 months is plenty of time to drop that much off your pace. I would say the odds are in your favor. If you had been running 5 years or something like that it would be less likely, though still possible.

Even if it seems like 4 months from now you haven't made progress, you've got to keep moving ahead.

My sister just ran her first marathon at age 39 in 3:29 and PRed by 2 minutes going through the half (1:44), coming back with a 1:45 which was also under her old half PR, which was set within the prior 6 months. Just 2 months before that she was lamenting that she had not improved at all, but stuck to her program (Daniels 18 week) and it came out good. Now she is thinking ahead to 3:25.

Related to this - I do not put TOO much stock into races ran during marathon training as, even if you do a "mini taper", you still have months of cumulative fatigue in your legs that will lead to a slower pace than if that particular race was your end-all, be-all goal race (ie, the marathon).

So in other words, even if you run a "checkpoint" half a month before the full and do not reach 1:25, I would not worry about it. Good luck and just train hard.

OK - I'm in. There are enough positive responses here from people who have done this to make me at least train hard for it. I can decide race day if I'm gonna go aggressive or conservative. If I crash and burn I'm still highly likely to beat my 4:10 PR.

I have 2 10ks and 2 halves built into my training between now and May. Converting the 10k times to halves (using mcmillan) the plan is to progressively take time off of each race, and go sub 1:25 mid April. (If you plot these out the progression is pretty linear, so things are going to get harder as I go on)

10k 1/1 39:50 (1:28:38)

Half 2/3 1:27:30

10k 3/9 38:45 (1:26:14)

Half 4/13 1:24:59

Marathon 5/25 - TBD

I'll let you know how it goes.....

Here's a chart of how those 4 race goals look compared to my progress since last October....

http://bp1.blogger.com/_lDwUvNoT_Yc/R1ib4l8BRDI/AAAAAAAAAF0/zmW-js_KH3c/s1600-h/85+plan+2.jpg

My best half 1:32 at 53yrs

My best Marathon 3:22.Even split and got it all right on the day.

Suggest you try to run a toughie as a leadup.

Do a good job of that and your confidence will grow immeasurably.

I'm 54, average runner and ran about the same mileage as you.

I always thought I could break 3:10-3:15 but it has not happened.No worry I qualified for Boston.

70 m.p.w. should make a big difference but only if you remain injury free.

Try to run any Speedwork with a group.

It seemed to help me a lot.

Good luck

Consistency is key so staying injury free is critical. I'm 48, have run for 3 years, and am slower than you but recently ran a 3:12 on 40-50 mpw after a half PR of 1:31. It'll take my body another year to get to sub-3 but you might be different. Shoot for your goal but there's always another marathon. As Kudzu suggested, test marathons or marathons in general have given me confidence over the distance. Breakthrough races also raised my expectations.

Quick Update: did the half M yesterday at 1:27:25 despite some pretty wet/windy conditions.

Next race is another half in 6 weeks, on 3/16 (slight change of plan). Hoping to get down close to 1:26.

Then another half on 5/3 (3 weeks before marathon) where I think I can get down under 1:25.

Training is going really well, I've got up to low 80s and I'm doing longs of 19-22 3 weeks out of 4. Not planning to go any higher than mid 80s. Based on this recent race, Daniels put my M pace at 6:58 and T at 6:34, so that's what I'll be using for training over the next 6 weeks.

I'm going for it. I'd rather crash and burn than go conservative.

I was recently in a similar situation; ran 3:20 at age 42 and 2:57 three years later.

I never broke 1:30 for a half marathon until the second half of my first sub three marathon and pr'd twice in the half during 2 subsequent marathons, finally running 1:27:10 in the first half of my best marathon.

I found it very difficult to run a quality half in the midst of the accummulated fatigue of a marthon training program. The half can be a poor predictor of marathon unless you do an adequate taper and have trained more like a 10k runner than a marathoner.

Use your paces from your long/tempo runs to predict your performance and expect to run about 10 sec per mile faster during your marathon if you have tapered properly and done the long runs and volume.

Knocking an hour or more off your time is a big chunk and you can get more than 90% of the way there without formal track work. 3 or 4 x 1 mile at 10k/HM effort with 400 jog every other week should be enough to stimulate turnover.

Long runs, medium runs, short tempos, long runs with tempo segments and/or marathon pace segments will do the trick with less risk of injury.

1:27:25... Excellent progress. You may prove some of us wrong.

I certainly hope so! Of course, I could also crash and burn.

I started running again in 2005 after a 15 year layoff. My personal experience:

2005, Age 37 - 1:29 Half Marathon as a re-beginner after 4 months of 25-35 mile weeks

2006, Age 38 - 1:24 Half Marathon - 30-40 mile weeks while trying to follow, and adapt, Hal Higdon's Advanced Half Marathon Program

2007, Age 39 - 1:21:30 Half Marathon about 1 month before my first Marathon. Mileage was 45-60 miles Tried to follow Jack Daniel's Marathon Program A, but had to modify it down quite a bit.

2007, Age 39 - 2:59 Marathon. I was probably a little conservative since it was my first one, but not much. I was spent.

Your situation is different than mine in that you seem to have the time to put in some serious miles, and that will make a lot of difference - but I don't know if it will take you that far that quickly 3 hours would seem to be a stretch for just now breaking 1:30

I would train for it as if you were going for it and make your race plan accordingly nearer to the race. But given your progression and your committment, you will break 3 hours at some point.

Goog luck!

I started running again in 2005 after a 15 year layoff. My personal experience:

2005, Age 37 - 1:29 Half Marathon as a re-beginner after 4 months of 25-35 mile weeks

2006, Age 38 - 1:24 Half Marathon - 30-40 mile weeks while trying to follow, and adapt, Hal Higdon's Advanced Half Marathon Program

2007, Age 39 - 1:21:30 Half Marathon about 1 month before my first Marathon. Mileage was 45-60 miles Tried to follow Jack Daniel's Marathon Program A, but had to modify it down quite a bit.

2007, Age 39 - 2:59 Marathon. I was probably a little conservative since it was my first one, but not much. I was spent.

Your situation is different than mine in that you seem to have the time to put in some serious miles, and that will make a lot of difference - but I don't know if it will take you that far that quickly 3 hours would seem to be a stretch for just now breaking 1:30

I would train for it as if you were going for it and make your race plan accordingly nearer to the race. But given your progression and your committment, you will break 3 hours at some point.

Good luck!

I started running again in 2005 after a 15 year layoff. My personal experience:

2005, Age 37 - 1:29 Half Marathon as a re-beginner after 4 months of 25-35 mile weeks

2006, Age 38 - 1:24 Half Marathon - 30-40 mile weeks while trying to follow, and adapt, Hal Higdon's Advanced Half Marathon Program

2007, Age 39 - 1:21:30 Half Marathon about 1 month before my first Marathon. Mileage was 45-60 miles Tried to follow Jack Daniel's Marathon Program A, but had to modify it down quite a bit.

2007, Age 39 - 2:59 Marathon. I was probably a little conservative since it was my first one, but not much. I was spent.

Your situation is different than mine in that you seem to have the time to put in some serious miles, and that will make a lot of difference - but I don't know if it will take you that far that quickly 3 hours would seem to be a stretch for just now breaking 1:30

I would train for it as if you were going for it and make your race plan accordingly nearer to the race. But given your progression and your committment, you will break 3 hours at some point.

Good luck!

sub 3 seems like a big stretch - it's all going to have to come together perfectly. why not aim for something like 3:10 and do sub 3 in the next race?

MNguy wrote:

In my opinion running a sub 3 hour marathon is a hundred times harder than a 1:25 half. Everything will have to come together to break 3 off a 1:25.

Good luck though

I could not agree more. You should go for it, but I think you need to be running a 1:22 to 1:23 half AND put in 60+ mpw for at least 3 months. Take some of the anecdotes on this string with a grain of salt.

But let us know what happens!

.. wrote:

Personally I found sub-18, sub-38, and sub-1:25 much easier than sub-3. Despite getting in the miles, the long runs, and all the other recommended training, the marathon repeatedly kicked my ass.

Again, I couldn't agree more. I ran all those other times easily, and to train for a marathon I'd up the training to 50-60 mpw for 12-16 weeks. I followed Pfitzinger's Advanced Marathoning plan. Still it took me 3 tries to go sub 3.

I'm late to this party, but here's my tuppence.

A few years ago I was in a fairly similar place.

spring 2003: started running age 35, got up to ~40-45 MPW that year

2004: ~50-55 MPW, 1:32 half, train wreck marathon 4:0x off predicted 3:15 (injury issues, stoopidity issues)

2005: ~55 MPW, more 1:32 halves, got flu day before marathon and had to bail out at mile 17 but wouldn't have made my 3:10 anyway

2006: spring 1:30 half off ~60-65 MPW, fall 1:23:xx half, probably had a shot at 3 except went into marathon too beat up ("mildly injured" if I wanted to be a drama queen about it)

In retrospect 1:30 half marathon shape was not going to get me anywhere near 3, but 1:23 was. And getting from 1:30 to 1:23 required a considerably different approach than the Daniels/Pfitz mindset which had me stuck around 1:30.

For me that meant considerably more miles and longer, slower workouts with a focus on ~marathon pace. Something close enough to Hansons' "for the masses" marathon plan but stretched to ~85 MPW with doubles most days (one very easy run 4-5 miles, the other longer).

It's clearly not universal - some of us decrepit senior citizen joggers seem to do OK with a Daniels/Pfitz approach including plenty of VO2 interval work and "hour race pace" tempos etc. - but my experience echoes Daniels' note (in first edition of DRF anyhow, and I ran his 10k training verbatim so yes I do have basis for comparison) that older beginners generally do best with a lot more tempo and a lot less interval work, and also malmo's (and others') observation that longer tempos at more like MP may be the way to go no matter what anyone in a lab coat says about optimal physiological responses as measured by blood lactate or whatever the hell. The challenge of the marathon is, as I see it, holding marathon pace for a long long time, which is a different animal from its neighbors on either side, "how fast can you run" or "how far can you run" though you need a bit of each of those too.

For me, 85 or even more MPW with a blend of workouts which include the tempos, some short fast stuff with full recoveries (Daniels reps), and some hills mostly for daily runs and tempos, is both less injury-provoking and more beneficial than 60 MPW with much emphasis on 3k to 15k paces. Can't say for sure I could've handled that mileage a few years earlier but wish I would've at least headed in that direction sooner.

Anyhow good luck. That 3 hours is a nice round juicy goal to shoot for, for people of our (lack of) skill level. If you don't get there the first attempt it remains a beacon the next time around.

Hmm... wrote: Then another half on 5/3 (3 weeks before marathon) where I think I can get down under 1:25.

[...]

I'm going for it. I'd rather crash and burn than go conservative.

Oh hey, I caught up a little after posting above. Sounds like good progress.

One bit of advice: while, yes, by all means go for it, the time to be conservative is after that 21k three weeks out. That's where I screwed myself before the fall '06 marathon: having run a big breakthrough half after a big breakthrough season of training, I was on a high and feeling invulnerable and tried to sneak in a few too many workouts when the first, second, and third priorities should've been to fully, completely, and absolutely recover. Running an all-out half marathon is no joke especially when it's at what was your 10k pace not so long ago. Circle the week after that race on your calendar, and write in big letters "THE HAY IS ALREADY IN THE BARN! DON'T BE AN IDIOT!"