Weekly Mileage for Marathon Training

Audio Transcript

Claire: Hello everyone. Welcome to the Runners Connect podcast. We have a great question today, coming in from Matt.

Matt: Recognizing that individuals are different, I have been wondering if there is a recommended weekly mileage to aim for peaking, when preparing for marathons. Assuming here she is following a sound training plan from Runners Connect, and has achieved body adaptations demanded for marathons. In other words, is there a general mileage guideline for casual runners that provides for optimum performance before crossing the injury risk territory, and how is that adjusted for age?

Claire: Is there a magic number, a weekly mileage guideline that works for everyone? The quick answer is, of course not.

We are all individuals and our bodies work differently. Some people respond really well to high mileage, and some people simply can’t handle all the pounding. Let’s talk about the benefits of mileage.

More mileage builds your aerobic system, so that you have a nice big engine to take you across the finish line, so the more you run, the better you get at it.

You become more efficient, spend less energy per step the more you practice at it. It’s just like any skill and any facet of your life; the more you practice, the better you get and then you also have the added benefit of a nice, big aerobic engine.

A marathon is mainly an aerobic event, so the more aerobic capacity that you have, the better you are able to perform at the marathon.

The best way to do that is to run more at an aerobic pace, which is an easy relaxed pace, but the more miles that you add, the more you risk being over trained and having some injuries.

If you’re injured or completely over trained, you might not even make it to the starting line, so there’s a real risk for running too much, and it happens a lot with runners of all abilities.

They take it a little too far and cross the line.

You want to know where is that line, how do I find it, how do I get the maximum amount of miles in with the least risk of over training or injury?

This question is answered like a lot of questions in running.

You figure it out by experimenting, so if you’ve been consistently running without injury for several months, try bumping it up a bit and see what happens.

If you feel good, things are going well, your workouts are improving, and here is the key, you enjoy the extra time on your feet, then it works for you and you can repeat the process again in a few more weeks, gradually adding a few miles here and there to your week.

If the opposite happens, which is fatigue, bad workouts, too much added stress with everything else going on in your life, bring it back down and stay at a lower mileage for a while.

Again, the key is that there is no magic number, as long as you are healthy, happy and improving; that’s the right number for you.

Let me give you some real numbers here.

The optimum number or the number that you should be training at, the number of miles per week is somewhere between 25 and 125.

Yeah, obviously that’s a ridiculously huge range and doesn’t help you much at all, so let me break that down a little bit.

The minimum number for a marathon to be even remotely possible or semi comfortable is probably about 25 to 30 miles a week, and that mileage needs to be spread out over at least four runs a week.

Spreading out the mileage decreases your injury risks since each individual day will have a lower volume.

I don’t want you running one day a week, 30 miles a day. Obviously, that’s not a great idea, but spread that out over at least four runs a week if you can.

Elite runners will do 100, 125 miles or even more, which is simply not realistic or even necessary for mere mortals.

The other thing to remember is that not all miles are equal. Track workouts and tempos are going to wear you out more than easy miles, which is why we always say, about 80% of your mileage should be easy.

Those easy miles will help you build that big aerobic engine I was talking about, without wearing you down as much as speedy miles will.

When you are adding mileage, always start out by gradually adding easy miles, not extra workouts.

If 25 to 30 miles is the minimum, what is optimal, because minimum and optimal are vastly different things?

The answer to that is it’s probably in the neighbourhood of 50 to 70 miles per week for a well-trained woman, and in the neighbourhood of 70 to 100 miles a week for a well-trained man.

Those ranges go completely out the window when you’re talking about individuals and when you’re talking about runners in their 50s and 60s and above.

Masters runners have a higher risk of injury, and it is essential to build mileage much slower, both with slower miles and a slower progression over time.

Those numbers that I gave you – 50 to 70 for women, 70 to 100 miles for men, that’s not necessarily going to work for most masters.

It’s going to have to be much lower than that, but again it depends on you as an individual.

It’s not realistic for a 60-year-old person to run the same volume as a 30-year-old, and expect the same results.

The key is to add gradually, I’m talking somewhere between 5% a week, maybe up to 10% a week.

Those are just guidelines, not absolute numbers, but just a little bit more so that you keep that happy momentum.

You stay healthy, happy and improving. You’re going to have to experiment on yourself, see what works for you and take it slowly; just like everything in running.

Matt, I hope that answers your question and thank you for sending it in.

For those of you listening who want to have your question answered by one of the Runners Connect coaches, head over to runnersconnect.net/daily and click the record button to send your question over.

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That’s all for today and have a great run.