You could say that I ‘retired’ from marathons after I ran the Boston Marathon in 2016. But, in reality, I knew that I’d come back eventually, after having kids, to see what I could do.
By that point, I was burnt out from the distance. I had trained for and run seven marathons over the course of roughly three years and the cycle no longer brought me joy. So, I scaled back on my mileage and set out to break 20 minutes in the 5K.
Despite having three kids, I hit (and destroyed!) various race goals, one after the next. I set personal bests in the mile, the 5K and the half marathon, which evidently made my slow-twitch marathon running muscles, well, twitch.
When my youngest turned one in July 2023, I thought I’d target an autumn marathon. I returned to running stronger than ever after having her, thanks to a diligent postpartum recovery plan from my pelvic floor physiotherapist. But I was also experiencing intense leg fatigue that made every workout feel like I was trudging through mud. I didn’t want to rush my return to 26.2 miles and risk having a miserable experience – at least, not any more miserable than those later marathon miles – so I held off a year.
A complete guide to running in the dark week strength training plan for runners in the US city of Lowell, Massachusetts – a race with a fast, looped course and roughly 500ft of elevation, held in late October.
After months of preparation and somehow skirting my four-year-old’s pneumonia the week of the race (thanks to wearing lots of masks), I completed the marathon in 3:23:25. It was my fastest marathon so far – and my most enjoyable. I had one of those rare days when every little thing that could have gone wrong actually went right.
Here are the strategies that helped me to break 3:30 in the marathon, shave eight-and-a-half minutes off a 10-year-old PB and quite possibly have my best day of racing yet.
Starting with a fresh mindset (and legs)
They say that the body never forgets a marathon. (They also say that the body forgets childbirth and I politely disagree.) But spending some time away from 26.2 miles and the training it requires rejuvenated me.
‘The purpose of breaks is to take the opportunity to step back,’ says Hiruni Wijayaratne, of break 20 minutes in the 5K – my coach for this marathon training block, who also holds 10 Sri Lankan national records including a 2:36 marathon.
Wijayaratne adds that a break ‘allows you to be intentional about your next step’ and ‘kind of makes the heart grow fonder’. I agree.
Going into this training block back in June, I didn’t look at my long runs of 16, 18, 20, or 22 miles long runs with dread (other than for the heat). I was excited – and that’s because I was coming back refreshed.
Although I hadn’t taken time off from running entirely over the past decade, I subbed in some swims and scaled back my long runs from the usual marathon-training distances to 10 miles, every Saturday. My weekly mileage during the downtime hovered around 25 miles across four days and included a speed workout, a couple of easy runs Runners World US.
When I started training for the week strength training plan for runners, though, my weekly mileage went up and peaked at 46 miles.
Working with a coach
Since I wanted this training block to be successful (and feel fun), I wasn’t afraid to invest in it financially. That included hiring a coach – the same one who helped me to nab a half marathon PB of 1:32 in 2021, when I was eight weeks pregnant.
As a seasoned runner and marathoner (and journalist who writes about running), I consider myself pretty knowledgeable in this field. However, I knew that I would benefit from a coach with incredible accolades and experience working with a range of athletes – and who would tell me exactly what to do.
While Wijayaratne wasn’t on the course with me, her 20 weeks of training and guidance were. Because I trusted her and the process, race day was a banner day.
I spoke with Wijayaratne every two weeks to discuss what was working and what wasn’t. She was my cheerleader, yes – but she also helped me to adjust workouts that felt too easy or too hard.
When I travelled to France in late August, she helped me to adjust the training week so that I could make the most of my trip without losing fitness. (As it happens, hiking in the French Alps is a great workout for the glutes.)
I panicked after some crummy long runs during which I couldn’t hit goal splits for the workout portions or felt extra fatigued. She assured me that it was 100% normal to feel this way during that point in the cycle and that those tough runs were not indicative of my potential. She was right.
Wijayaratne was building my toolbox, as she liked to say. Of course, a workout might have been particularly hard, like an evening 5K race after a hard hill workout that morning. But, this kind of training taught me to get comfortable with the uncomfortable, which is something that I knew I’d have to do during the marathon.
Smart goal setting, based on data
Although I didn’t have a recent marathon or even half marathon to reference when mapping out my race goals, I did still have nearly a decade of data and races to help guide the way. Across distances, I was getting faster after having kids, so why wouldn’t I be able to do the same for the marathon?
Sophie Raworth on her lessons from injury Warts n Hall. ‘You did have data points, even if they weren’t directly [related to] the marathon.’ she notes.
When we discussed my race objectives, I wrote out A, B and C goals. I actually tweaked my pie-in-the-sky A goal three weeks before the race to run a little more conservatively. But, having run a 3:31 marathon a decade ago, I felt confident that I would comfortably run under 3:30 this time. I trained at a 7:30 min/mile to 7:40 min/mile pace, knowing that if I could run between 3:20 and 3:25 on race day, I would be ecstatic.
You could say that I retired from marathons after I ran the training paces. Then, we used real-time feedback from my workouts to adjust where necessary. For the most part, we stayed the course and had a range for my goal marathon finish time, which helped to remove some stress and allowed me to make peace with imperfect workouts.
In addition to having hard numbers to help contextualise what a hard-but-attainable marathon goal could be, Wijayaratne and I wanted a goal that would excite me and let me enjoy the hard work that was required. I knew that I had a 3:20-something marathon in me and I got butterflies thinking about seeing the clock read that time – the lower the 20-something, the better. This excitement, Wijayaratne told me, would help me to embrace the 19 weeks of work I would be putting in to achieve it. And, once again, she was right.
Many threshold runs
The reason lactate threshold runs are so effective for long distances is because they help the body to become more efficient at clearing the lactate. That way, you can maintain a faster pace for a longer amount of time, says Wijayaratne.
The lactate threshold workout, continues Wijayaratne, ‘is science’s way of saying that yes, you can train at the top end of speed and you can train your slow-twitch muscles with long, slow distance – but you really need to be spending a lot of focused time in the middle’.
This workout has become incredibly popular in recent years, since the principle applies for anyone: first-time marathoners, those trying to qualify for Boston, as well as Olympians.
Wijayaratne prescribed different types of lactate threshold workouts – some were broken up into intervals with short recoveries (which she says is key to keeping the heart rate up), while some were longer, steady-state efforts. After a warm up and drills, for example, I ran six sets of five minutes at lactate threshold pace, with two minutes of jogging recovery in between. The goal was to feel like I was working, but that I could do another five-minute repetition if I needed to.
I ran lactate threshold runs roughly once a week. Sometimes, to mix things up, I would also do a mile at marathon pace followed by shorter repetitions at 5K pace to encourage leg turnover.
Instead of running at lactate threshold pace for 30 minutes straight, Wijayaratne also gave me a couple of 30-minute marathon pace runs to get me comfortable moving at race day speed.
Regular strength training and physiotherapy
Runners World US regular strength workouts. But, finally, I decided to go for it – and just under a year before my race, I started weekly barre classes.
Women start to lose muscle mass when they turn 30 and, because I was a woman comfortably in my mid-30s whose only strength work was lifting kids, I decided it was time to start something consistent.
What is the average marathon finish time glute activation. Published: 24 December 2024 stretch Runners World US mindful breathing.
As Wijayaratne notes, running is a linear sports where ‘we’re always moving forward in a line’. However, to build a strong and powerful body, we also need to move in other directions and train the muscles that play a supporting role in our running performance. Often, the only time that we can target those muscles is with focused strength work.
Activities like barre and Pilates, says Wijayaratne, hit internal and external stabilising muscles, which we don’t touch while running – but which help us to become better runners.
In addition to my strength work, I visited my physiotherapist regularly. She worked out the kinks in my very tight left glute and did active release exercises to help to open it up. Now that my race is behind me, we’re working on fixing my left side more broadly, as it isn’t as good of a mover as my right side and has a hard time keeping up. We’re focusing on single-leg movements to address the root of the problem.
A runner’s work is never done.
Slow long runs
If there’s one thing that runners struggle with more than regular strength training, it’s running easy on easy days. Early on in my training, Wijayaratne had me run the last four miles of a long run progressively faster, working down to an 8:10 mile. The problem? I was already running my entire long run at this pace.
‘Are you running your easy runs easy enough?’ she asked. Of course, I was not.
So, I slowed down – and during long runs with friends and in the heat and humidity, I slowed down even more. I targeted a pace around 9:15 min/mile to 9:30 min/mile during those distance workouts.
‘I believe in easy days being easy,’ says Wijayaratne, who also notes that there are, of course, still plenty of days when you need to go hard and fast.
As she explain, when you run slowly, a lot of important things happen to your body. You train your cardiovascular and respiratory systems, as well as your neuromuscular system, which is responsible for controlling your movement, posture and breathing.
One of the most crucial benefits of slow running is that it increases the quantity and size of your mitochondria, which create energy for your cells. When mitochondria are bigger and more plentiful, you have the energy to go faster and farther.
By running my long runs slower than usual, I ran my marathon faster than ever.
