Tailored Training Techniques to Run Your Best Marathon
By now, many of you will have or are about to run a fall marathon with varying degrees of success. You followed the Marine Corps Marathon training schedule, running most of the long runs and logging high mileage. Perhaps, you did the Wednesday night track workouts or did speed work on your own. Nevertheless, your time did not meet your expectations. This article will discuss the training techniques that the coaches in the MCRRC low-key coaching program employ with their runners to run the best marathon they can. You may want to adopt some of these ideas in training for your next marathon.
First, the MCRRC coaches individualize the training program for each runner. We tailor your training to your life situation, i.e., job, family, age, running history and time goals.
We have our runners train with heart monitors to keep them from overtraining. The summer of 1995 was the second hottest on record. If you did not slow down your training pace this summer, chances are that you overtrained and ran yourself into the ground. The heart monitor helps to prevent overtraining by slowing you down on those hot and humid days.
Our runners do their long runs at 60 to 70 percent effort, meaning they are running about 1 1/2 to 2 minutes slower than 10K pace. The same holds true for their easy days. Our runners know that they will not be wiped out after a long run and, as a result, they can do their hard workouts during the week.
Our runners practice their marathon pace. We call them Planned Marathon Pace (PMP) runs. Our runners do several PMP runs from 5-12 miles nonstop in the months preceding the marathon in order to work the exact set of muscles and same range of motion they will be using in the marathon. PMP runs also teach them pace. This is called the principle of specificity.
We put our runners through several phases of training designed to build strength, endurance and speed. First, we build up the mileage, then strength through hills and anaerobic threshold training. We culminate with PMP runs and some traditional intervals.
Our runners are told to begin their marathon taper three to four weeks before the marathon to make sure they are rested before the race. We also tell our runners to take a full month to recover after the marathon before resuming training. We then put them into Phase I and work out a plan for their next race or series of races.
We also discuss with each runner the need to have a back up plan so that if the weather is bad or the runner is just having a bad day, the runner drops out of the race at a predetermined point. The runner then runs a different marathon in the next three to five weeks. This is particularly important for those trying to qualify for Boston or run a PR.
Coach West is a licensed coach, affiliated with MCRRC, and available to coach motivated adult runners. A portion of his coaching fees for MCRRC members is returned to MCRRC. For further information about personal coaching opportunities, contact Coach West at kirtwest@comcast.net.
