marathon training: what does the following say about my fitness?

After your buildup you need to get the snap back in your legs. Striders should be a normal part of weekly routine. Begin trackwork 12 weeks before marathon and run intervals at 8k to 10k pace for 5-10% of weekly mileage. Don't forget the hills.

Try doing strides of 8-10 X 100-150 2-3 times per week after some of your easier runs. They will help develop your turnover.

Is there a reason that you don't do any speedwork? You might try doing some mile repeats @ ~10K pace.

Doug E. wrote:

Try doing strides of 8-10 X 100-150 2-3 times per week after some of your easier runs. They will help develop your turnover.

Is there a reason that you don't do any speedwork? You might try doing some mile repeats @ ~10K pace.

the main reason is that i keep reading that the marathon is all about volume and lactate threshold...so my thinking is that i should use the limited time i have training to maximize those two variables. but i feel like, even though i run my 20k and half-marathons at 5:45 pace, it is like TERMINAL VELOCITY...like i am "sprinting" the whole way.

Those are two of the most important aspects of marathon training, but they aren't the only ones. I am curious about your LT work. What intensity do you do it at? And how did you decide that was right? If you are doing these runs too fast, then you are probably not benefiting from them the way that you should. The general rule of thumb is that they should be done at, or just below ~88%MHR. I usually set my HRM to 85-90%, and do them in this range.

Keep doing strides like I said. You will notice a difference in a couple of weeks. Maybe do some mile repeats every other week as well.

Strides will definately help, but also maybe race some 5k's...

Everyone is different, but I like to race a lot of little races during the training period for a specific longer race.

i try to vary it, but i do workouts like...

1. repeats of 1000-1600m with 100-200m recovery jogs(taking 60-90secs). i usually do these at 84-86 secs per lap, and i total 6-8 miles worth of repeats.

2. a long run of 18-22 miles, the last 45-50 minutes of which concludes on the track at as close to threshold pace as i can muster. the last one i did concluded with 6 miles on the track, begining at 6:10 pace and cutting down to 5:41...that one left me tired for a week!

so maybe i am using the term "threshold" loosely, but that gives you an idea of what i am doing. btw, my marathon is in 6 weeks.

You are doing very well. You are bound to feel tired during your races. To avoid over training plan to have at least one easy week between now and the race.

or should I say between now and your taper

should i forgo any of the above in favor of a weekly track workout at 5k and/or10k pace? i am wondering if my lack of training at that range of effort is what is making anything faster that 5:40 pace feel like 99% effort.

You're doing a lot of the right stuff.

Your true "long-runs" should beat you down a bit, that's why you should only do them every other week. Make sure that your last one is at three weeks out, and not closer to your race.

With only six weeks to go, you don't have a lot of time to see impact from any changes. Do the strides, they will help you out a lot. You may also want to increase the legnth of your recovery between intervals to 400m or so. Right now is the time to work on "learning" your race pace. You may want to shelve the 1600's, and do something like 2-3 X 5K @ mp 6 weeks, and 4 weeks out. Then try a 12-15 miler @ mp 5 weeks, and 3 weeks out. Make sure that you take easy/recovery days after these. They are workouts, and will break you down more than you realize.