Regardless of the marathon race that you are preparing for, one important piece of advice from Australian running physio Brad Beer is that you should never cram in your marathon training in at the last minute.
Instead, give yourself several months to prepare for the marathon based on your current fitness level.
Brad is the founder of POGO Physio – a Gold Coast based physio group and he is also a marathon runner himself, being a regular participant at the Gold Coast Marathon too.
The Gold Coast Marathon takes place on the weekend of 30 June – 1 July this year and the upcoming event will be the 40th edition of the race.
Never cram and pull an all-nighter to train for a marathon
According to Brad, while it is common for students to cram their revision for their exams into the one week prior to the exam and pull all-nighters, it is almost suicide if you try and do this to prepare for a marathon.
This is because doing so, would increase your chances of sustaining an injury.
Runners may cram in their training because they believe they need to clock a certain number of sessions prior to the marathon or to clock a certain distance before race day.
Come up with a structured training programme
Instead Brad advises runners to come up with a structured programme, regardless of whether it is from a marathon coach or from previous experience.
For runners who are looking to join a structured training programme, you can check out the Coached programme in Singapore, which I had used to prepare for the Gold Coast Marathon last year.
Increase your weekly mileage by no more than 10 per cent
The recommended rule of thumb also, is to increase your weekly mileage by no more than 10 per cent – even if you are beginning to realise that you are short of time.
So for example, if your longest run to date was 21km but there are four weeks left to go till your marathon race day, you should not suddenly increase your long run the following week to 30km just because you have heard that a 30km training run is the ideal training distance to clock, four weeks out.
By doing this, it will only increase your chances of an injury that may keep you from starting the race.
Increasing your training distance by such an amount according to Brad, is termed as a spike in the training load and can lead to overtraining.
But by increasing your weekly mileage by no more than 10 per cent each time and having a structured training programme, this will minimise the likelihood of cramming your training in at the last minute and doing too much, too soon.
Have a long lead up time to build to the marathon
Brad also advises runners to have a long lead up time in the build-up to the marathon. For the average runner training for the marathon distance, about 16 weeks is good enough for a training plan.
But Brad says the longer time you can commit to the marathon, the better.
So for example, if you find that you can commit to taking part in the marathon about five to six months out from the day of the race, then this is even better, as it will give you more time to gradually build your mileage and fitness levels.
But of course, sometimes though, he does realise too, that life gets in the way and this is not always possible.
These tips were brought to you by the Gold Coast Marathon.
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