Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #293572 in Books
• Published on: 2005-09-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Customer Reviews

A useful and informative guide
The guide is very readable and informative giving comprehensive instruction on all aspects of marathon training. It gives excellent explanations, in layman terms, for physical problems a marathon runner may experience and helps one avoid them. With the books guidance I knocked nearly half an hour off my personal best time. Highly reccomended.

An invaluable read for anyone preparing for a Marathon
I bought this book to help me train for my first Marathon and it was invaluable. I only had four months to train, which is not ideal and is not recommended by this book. Higdon's writing style is very easy to read, entertaining and conversational. He draws on many years of running experience and I found myself referring to this book time and time again. The training schedules are clearly explained and he covers all aspects of training from preparation to injury prevention to recovery. Using this book, I ran the 2001 London Marathon in just under 4 hours. Thanks Hal!

By Far the most authorative no-nonsense book on training for the distance.
Now in its second edition this book written by one of Americas top coaches and writers on athletics is full of detailed information principally designed for runners who have run a marathon and want to improve their times by the use of specific training.

Many runners believe that the more training and mileage you cover for the race then the better you will perform but its not how many miles a week you run its what you do with that mileage.Running a quality 50mpw is a lot better race terms than running 70mpw.

Intoducing Fartlek,tempo ,and speed sessions on the track will eventually reap rewards.Train like a 10k runner ie speed but increase your longer runs to include faster paced intervals so when it comes to race day your proposed Marathon pace will feel steady and controlled.

Look at the top race winners at big city marathons,they excell at all distances from 5k right up to the marathon because the majority of their high mileage is done at a significantly faster pace to allow running 26.2miles at under 5minute mileing to remain relaxed.Look how relaxed Martin Lel,Paul Tergat and the other front runners appear,mainly because their marathon pace is significantly slower than their pace for shorter distances.

Many runners run mile after mile in training at the same pace and find that their times hardly change from race to race.Hal Higdons excellent advice throughout this superb book if followed carefully will reap rewards.Each chapter deals with individual aspects of training and dietry matters.He even includes volume of oxygen tables that show what a runner should beable to achieve at different distances aslong as they train specifically for that distance ie to break 3hrs for the marathon you should beable to run a 1-25 half marathon comfortably and a sub 38minute 10k.
As i have said improve your 10k times significantly and with proper training your marathon times should also improve.

This book gives superb advice for those runners wishing to fine tune their running when all other training programmes have failed.