I’ve got 3x1600m at 4:40/km tomorrow morning then half an hour 5x5 squats, press and dead lift…I don’t see why anyone else should be happy! 
1 Like
I suspect you’d be borderline, it’s double plus 13 minutes, partly depends on how your long runs go.
Jeff
Interesting…
I did a 1:29 half last year and gunning for a sub 3:15 marathon this year so as long as I get plenty of long runs in it should be doable.
1 Like
If you read @stenard’s comments on the sub 3 thread he did a lot of miles at MP rather than too fast I think, so long sessions at target pace.
A lot of my club mates do a 5-4-3-2-1 session with those reps ( in miles) being at MP with a mile recovery between, works out about 22 miles but you probably need to be fairly fresh to do it and maybe do it a couple of times in the build.
This session came from someone who I think has something bonkers like a 2:2x to his name but the key is the pace.
Too often people do a lot of faster reps which will help fitness but not the specific paces you will be doing on race day.
Also, the Daniels pace chart is your friend if you do know your current form.
It’s important you pick a pace you can currently do and not what you want to do.
Jeff
1 Like
I will def be giving it a go this year, just gotta decide on the race, most likely will be one of the Phoenix Running events early summer time
Thanks for the info @jeffb and that long run session looks a good one so will give that a go.
Put in my 5k time from yesterday into the Daniels pace chart and it came up with a 3:10 marathon and a half of 1:31 so hopefully with the right prep and training I should hit my target.
4 Likes
Yep, my experience would lead to being a big advocate of pace specificity
That is a tough word to say first day back after the new year 
I’m drinking red wine in Sydney. It was hard enough to type!
2 Likes
Haha 
When you did your long runs with MP in there did you do many shorter runs faster than MP pace per week?
No, not really. If you read what I wrote on the sub3 thread, or maybe more easily findable on my race report blog post, the fastest I ran was really some under/over MP sessions. And you are talking about +/-15s/km on MP in those cases.
As I said for my 10k race two weeks out, I’d not done any running at 10k pace at all in the lead up to that and still pb’d. The only “speedwork” I did at all was a 3x1mile session during taper, after the 10k. Which I blew up on and had to quit rep3 at 1.2k as I was cooked trying to run at that speed!
Interesting. I found several sites last night from sub 4 and sub 3 runners that said something similar, in that most people are doing their long rungs at too slow a pace (slower than MP).
I think my main issue is trying to live at all ends of the spectrum. I have a 10km in Feb I want to do well in, a 20 miler that will be at MP, if I can sustain it (5.20/kms). I have 7hr endurance event on Jan 19th, Newport Mara in April and Endure 24 in July.
So I try to keep up speed work and long runs tend to be a mix of trail and mostly done at 6.00- 6.15/km and are approx 30km.
In fact, looking at my typical week, I do very very little at MP. It’s either over or under!
My experience has been that unless you’re a seriously good 5 or 10k specialist, consistency of training for a marathon or longer will carry over to those shorter races. 10k more than 5k, but I’ve pb’d at both off the back of marathon training.
I’d focus on the MP sessions, along the lines of my key sessions. You’re going to build a big threshold endurance engine doing that, which will aid a decent 10k attempt, and then the pace needed for the ultra should feel relatively comfortable. I’ve never done an ultra myself, but everything I’ve read is that ultra runners rarely run more in a single session that you would on a marathon plan
Some of the discussion on Scientific Triathlon is just that, train all systems in your training to get the best results.
Yep I’d agree with this. Most of my road running friends have set their short course pbs off the back of a mara training program - even their during the build or shortly after. I think it’s only when you’re starting to get ‘really’ fast do you need proper specific training. Obviously the fast is all relative to each individual.
1 Like
Thanks all, very interesting.
Interesting reading and I like the sound of not doing any speed work.
A couple of questions…
How do you know what your MP would be if you haven’t done a marathon?
I want to do a GFA for London which is a 3:15 but maybe I can go faster.
Would I use the 3:15 as a starting point for MP and see how ‘easy’ it felt in training?
I’m very confused by some of this stuff. For every opinion I find saying ‘run lots at MP pace’ and I can find an equal amount saying ‘don’t do long runs at MP pace’.
I have to admit, that once a distance gets past HM or longer, I have a hard time replicating the distance/pace in training but seems to have some kind of confidence that my speed work plus endurance helps me pull it out of the bag on race day.
I’m planning approx 20km tomorrow and the thought of holding 5.20s for that seems a little strange to me but I held 4.40s at Reading, having never done that in training.
Am I way off base?
As Stenard says I think it will be a tough ask to try and peak for all distances, speedwork and endurance don’t really go hand in hand, but I think you’d be better off targeting one pace like the marathon and you’ll probably find your 10K improves anyway.
I did about one tough session PW early last year and was mostly concentrating on the 55 mile ultra, but as I was regularly doing hilly runs it was building leg strength and fitness anyway and a hard parkrun every other week or so was beneficial.
Be careful with the 20 though, you probably need to factor in 2-3 weeks recovery if you do it at MP, I’ve known people that have done 20’s too hard and totally derailed their marathon, including myself, although others I know have seemingly got away with it and gone sub-3.
Really, just consistent running and recovery on a weekly basis will bring decent results
Jeff
1 Like
Everyone has an opinion 
Each worth as much as you paid for them 
Joking aside, from the variety of sources I’ve read there’s a sliding scale they all more or less adhere to. But I don’t think anyone says do all your 20+ mile runs at goal marathon pace. But you can substitute distance for intensity…so if my plan had a 20 miler at MP+45s, I might substitute that for a 16 miler at MP - don’t quote me, that’s just illustrative.
There’s no single way to do long runs, it has to fit in with the rest of your training.
I used the fellrnr comparison to select the program I wanted to follow.
https://fellrnr.com/wiki/A_Comparison_of_Marathon_Training_Plans
There a specific section on long run analysis.