Recently, I had a new athlete sign up for coaching and we have them complete a training profile. One of the questions is “what are some of your training weaknesses?” The point of this question is obvious, what do you think you need to work on? However, we are also looking to see if you really think about what those needs are and then really establish a starting point for a conversation about those perceived weaknesses. 



Her main weakness was that she said she needed more speed work. However, I took a look at her other personal bests and questioned that conclusion. When I looked at her 5k, 10k, and half marathon best, these all suggested that she could run a marathon in anywhere from 4:37 to 4:45, significantly faster than the 5+ hour marathon she just finished. So, the reality is she is already fast enough to run a better marathon time. The issue lies somewhere else and we’ll go over potential reasons as we move forward. 



To be clear, I am not picking on this young lady at all. This is just a recent interaction regarding something I come across as a coach pretty often. Honestly, I think when she said speedwork, it was really in reference to structured work. If that is the case, then what she is saying is true in principle. Looking through her training history, she could add structured work and it would probably do amazing things. 



The moral of this story though is that running a certain time requires you to be “fast” enough first. This is where your own racing history in combination with the use of a race equivalency chart can come in really handy. What do I mean by that? I’ll use myself as an example. My fastest marathon is 2:14:38. If I plug that into a calculator is shows that I should be able to run 1:04:10 for a half marathon, a 10k in 29:08, and a 5k in 14:00. Comparing that to my actual PR’s, I ran 1:03:52, 29:02, and 14:10, respectively. 



There are two ways to look at this. One is that I pretty much maxed out what I could do, across the board. Based on my half PR, I probably could have eeked out a high 2:13 marathon. What’s interesting is I ran that 1:03:52 in February of 2011, then turned around and ran my marathon PR in June of the same year. Second, as my race distance decreases, the further away I got from what I was expected to run. This is why it’s important to know what your strengths and weaknesses are as a racer. This allows you to take generalities and turn them into specifics. 



Going back to my history, I was pretty much maxed out. For me to really make another step forward, I needed to improve my shorter distances. I probably needed to recover from my marathon and then move down and do some sport of speed segment. I didn’t necessarily need to improve my 5k and 10k times, but I definitely needed to at least get back to that level and maybe tolerate some workouts that would be in line with faster times. Then maybe use that speed work to run a faster half. Finally, come back and attempt a faster marathon. 



Going back to our young lady her quest to break 5. We already established that she was “fast enough” to run under 5 hours. What else could be the issue? To me, there are two big issues that need to be looked at. The first is you have to look at your training throughout the months and years previously. I’d really take a look a consistency over long periods of time. Many recreational athletes train for a specific race once a year, or a couple of times a year. Then they take summers or winters off. I am not knocking this at all, but when it comes to improvement, consistency is king. Even if it’s not hard training, being fairly consistent with staying healthy, and putting blocks of solid running can move your fitness up a couple of levels on its own! Secondly, within a training segment, does the training match what you are training f...