Marathon Monday: Marathon Workout Round Up + Portland Marathon Training Week 6

Happy Monday, everyone! How was your weekend?

If you haven’t already, please check out my guest post at Run to the Finish on What to Eat Before a Race: The Best Carbs for Performance and Digestion. In this post I discuss several important aspects of fueling and nutrition for a marathon. 

Today’s post is part of an on-going series of marathon training tips. You can find previous Marathon Monday posts here.

Marathon training plans call for a variety of key workouts: track intervals, mile repeats, fartlek run, tempo runs, and long runs.  Running a strong marathon requires development of both fast-twitch and slow-twitch muscle fibers, which is achieved through incorporating both speed and endurance workouts. 

While you should first and foremost follow your training plan or consult your running coach, today I want to share with you a round-up of workouts you can use during your marathon training—or any training! 

Marathon Workout Round Up

Tempo runs will increase your endurance and help you run faster! No matter what your marathon goals are, these runs should be a staple in your training. You can run them at tempo pace (slightly faster than half marathon pace) or at your marathon goal pace to practice for race day. 

If you’re bored of basic tempo runs, add variety to your training with threshold intervals. Like tempo runs, these will improve your stamina and endurance and help you run on tired legs, but the shorter intervals (1.5 to 3 miles) make the workout easier to manage mentally and physically. 

Or, you can teach yourself to start easy and finish fast (which is key for a marathon, since negative splits are the best pacing strategy for the marathon) with this progressive tempo run. You can run this workout by pace or by effort, depending on your training goals. 

Speed work will help you from losing speed as you increase your training volume. While any length of speed intervals can have a place in your marathon training, longer intervals such as mile repeats will increase your fatigue resistance and prepare you to run faster over longer distances.

Structured speed work may not be your favorite workout, but that doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice speed training. Have fun while running faster by throwing short surges of speed into your runs with a surges running workout. 

Long runs are the bread and butter of any marathon training program. Long slow distance certainly serves an essential role in training, but if you are aiming for a specific time goal, adding stuff to your long runs will vary your training stimulus and prepare your body for the stresses of the marathon. 

Hills may not be the most fun to run, but they will make you stronger, prepare your legs for hills on race day, and work as speed work in disguise. Don’t live near any hills? Try this treadmill rolling hills workout!

Marathon training entails more than running! Build a strong core with this ab workout for distance runners and power-house glutes and legs with this glute strength workout. Both workouts will help you stay strong and maintain good running form throughout all 26.2 miles. 

Portland Marathon Training Week 6

 Another week of marathon training is done! Overall, this week went well. I was able to hit all my paces in my key workouts, in part because I have been slowing down many of my easy runs to a recovery pace.

Monday: AM: 8 miles on the treadmill, 1-2% incline: 2.5 mile warm-up, 4 x 1200 m at  with 400 m recovery jog (5:14, 5:14, 5:13, 5:12), 1.5 mile cool down. PM: 15 minutes of Pilates.

Tuesday: AM: 5 miles easy with Charlie, 9:31/mile average pace. PM: Strength training.

Wednesday: AM: 10 miles with 7 miles at goal marathon pace (7:47/mile average pace). PM: Some recovery yoga and core work. 

Thursday: AM: 6 miles easy, 9:42/mile average pace, with 5 x 200 m hill repeats over last mile. PM: Upper body strength and plyometric workout. 

Friday: 10 miles, 8:39/mile average pace. 

Saturday: 8 miles on the treadmill, 1-5% incline, 9:25/mile average pace. 

Sunday: 10 mile hike, 1400 foot gain, to Goat Lake in the Cascades

47 miles of running for the week! 

[Tweet “Add variety to your #marathon training with a workout from this marathon #workout roundup via @thisrunrecipes #fitfluential #running “]

Questions of the Day:
How was your weekend? Did anyone race?
What is your favorite workout during marathon (or any distance) training?