There’s an enormous amount of information about marathon running on the internet. Too much, if you ask me, and not always written from a place of expertise or based on current knowledge. The risk? Creating the wrong mix of this information and basing your marathon training and approach on it. So, it’s time to clarify a few things: what are three common mistakes you should avoid in your marathon training plan?

1. Training Too Much at Marathon Pace

Training at marathon pace feels achievable for many, because the volume per training session is naturally much less than the full marathon. It sounds logical too—train more at marathon pace, and you'll likely sustain it longer, right?

Not quite. The best guarantee to maintain your marathon pace during the entire race is to perform most of your training slower than this pace. To explain why, I need to discuss our energy systems and training zones.

You run a marathon below your ‘lactate threshold,’ which is a subthreshold and therefore aerobic, effort. You burn both carbohydrates and fats and do not acidify because the intensity is not high enough. Sorry for the jargon, but it helps explain the point. However, marathon pace falls into a grey training zone: you can also improve your aerobic capacity by training slower, it doesn’t have to be so fast. An additional benefit of running slow(-er) is that your recovery takes less time. Training too often in the grey zone, which corresponds to zone 3 in a model with 5 or 7 training zones, does not necessarily provide a better training stimulus but does result in higher training load. In a training period where you're increasing volume, training 'grey' is something you definitely want to avoid.

That’s why my Trenara marathon training plans include long runs significantly slower than your marathon pace, to efficiently increase your aerobic capacity. However, I've also added specific simulation runs where we do train at marathon pace, because acclimatization is a factor. Then, we often complete interval training at or just above your lactate threshold, so we can also push that threshold a bit.

2. Focusing Too Much on the Longest Long Runs

Every marathon season, this is a recurring phenomenon: discussions about the distance of the longest long run in a marathon plan. Those who know me or who have prepared a marathon with the app, know that I'm not a fan of one-size-fits-all solutions that prescribe every runner long runs of 30, 32, or 35 kilometers in marathon preparation.

2.1 The Same Distance for Everyone?

To start: everyone has a different running level, which means the time you and I need to cover 30 km can be completely different. Suppose one of us takes 30 minutes longer over the same distance, then those 30 minutes have a huge negative impact on your recovery ability. On one hand, you were exposed longer to the mechanical impact of running (= more damage), and on the other, you literally have less recovery time. Because the damage is greater, you need even more recovery time.

2.2 Don’t Focus Solely on One Training Type, the Longest Long Run

A training plan should be viewed as a cohesive whole. As a trainer, the art is to ensure that every type of training has a function. So, it’s not about making some long runs so long/heavy that they jeopardize the rest of your training plan (and thus your fitness improvement). Do not focus solely on the length of the longest long run, but know that I have carefully considered what we call the ‘time-intensity distribution’ in training science. Throughout the full marathon training plan, enough volume is trained to responsibly start the marathon. We do not seek the absolute limits, because those often do not make you a better runner at that particular moment and can even cause problems afterward.

And yes, you will often find plans on the internet that prescribe a long run of 32 km. Do not look for scientific logic behind that distance; it is just a typical American/imperial training plan translated from miles to kilometers. People like round numbers: 20 miles. That makes 32 km on the other side of the ocean.

3. Training More, but Forgetting to Recover More

You do not just achieve a strong marathon time because you train more than ever, but also because you pay more attention to recovery.

The fact is: each training session throws your body off balance. This is necessary to make progress. If you train more, you disrupt the body more. The line between more and too much is sometimes very thin. You then enter a downward spiral, where a training sessions negatively instead of positively affect your condition. This is called ‘overtraining’.

To train more, you must also pay more attention to recovery. In the plan, we do this with lighter training sessions and recovery weeks. But that is only one part of the overall picture. For the most part, you as an athlete are responsible: rest (which is more than just sleep) and nutrition are the two biggest factors affecting your recovery. No ‘marginal gain’ in recovery therapy, such as compression boots, massages, etc., can compensate for the mistakes of poor rest or nutrition.

To conclude with a cliché: overtraining does not exist, there's only poor recovery.

Conclusion

So, these are three of the common mistakes in marathon training. I hope you can now identify and correct them yourself. Also know that we at Trenara are constantly engaged with this, so the app is a very good support if you now (or ever) have the ambition to complete a marathon.