If you’ve been hanging around these parts for awhile you know that I have actually run a few back to back marathons. I even wrote a post about back a couple years back. In that post (which you can read here), I share some tips on how to handle running back to back marathons. I still (kind of) agree with what I wrote a few years ago but as tends to happen in life, my thoughts have indeed evolved.
Last year, I trained all summer for the Berlin Marathon. I was hoping for a big PR and put in hundreds of miles. After the race (in which I did PR but did not hit my sub-4 goal), I was exhausted. Mentally and physically I needed a break. And so I took it and didn’t feel bad at all about it. In the back of my mind, I was thinking about potentially running the Richmond Marathon, but I also thought that maybe I’d drop to the half. I took a “wait and see” approach during the six weeks I had in between the races. Which meant that I ran some but not much. I probably averaged 25 miles during that time (after two weeks off) and ran a couple of workouts (including the Army Ten Miler). I knew I hadn’t lost much fitness so I decided to go for it.
The race was painful, emotional and a struggle. You can read my recap here, but I vowed after that to stop running back to back marathons…unless…
- The back to back races were planned all along.
- I keep working on fitness after race number one.
That’s it. I only want to do back to back marathons in those circumstances. I just don’t think that running back to back marathons is good for me. I always end up regretting it. I think that if I planned to do it from the start I could be more successful. However, the other tricky part is that after running a goal marathon, I want (and NEED) time off from structured running. Returning into training again, even after a couple weeks, is just hard for me mentally. So I’m not sure that I could ever get back to back marathons right in that regard. I suppose if I ran a marathon for fun with no goal pace as marathon number one and then took a week or so off and resumed training, that might work. It is often tempting to run back to back marathons because you are already trained up – might as well get more races for the training, right? At least that’s what I’ve thought previously. But it never quite goes how I want to do so I think I will restrict my back to back marathoning to the following two scenarios listed above for now!
Tell me, do you run back to back marathons? Why or why not?
I don’t run marathons (I wish I could), but I think even back-to-back half marathons, or a bunch of back to back 5Ks even, can be rough on the body. You can only push for so long before your body starts to break down physically but you also get mental burnout from it. It’s hard to be “on” for a long time during a race and that needs recovery too, not just physical recovery.
Yeah the mental part has really done me in previously. So so hard!
For a few years Bill and I ran three marathons in four weeks each fall – Baltimore, then Marine Corps, and then Marathon in the Parks. All local and all races we loved. One of those years I BQ’d at all three marathons. Those were the days… Of course, on the flip side, I’m sure all those miles for so many years contributed to my back problems I have to work around today.
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Wow! That is impressive! But you were probably making a really smart plan for all three from the beginning. What is Marathon in the parks? I’ve never heard of it!
Marathon in the Parks was changed to a half, Parks Half Marathon, put on by Montgomery County RRCA. I heard they started it as an alternative race to the MCM since it was getting so crowded, but I guess it didn’t grow to the point they wanted it to so they changed it to a half. It was a fantastic race and Bill and I ran it all five years that they hosted it.
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Oh neat. I wondered. I ran Parks last year and really liked it!
I have on three occasions run back to back marathons. Once was a redemption race and twice was just for run. I’ll let you guess which way turned out better!
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Lol. Those redemption runs are TOUGH!!!
Well, I’m about to (try to…) run Boston on the Monday (16th April) and London on the Sunday (22nd April). Never done it before, so we’ll see.
Good luck!!
Hi Courtney! I’ve only run one marathon, and I learned that marathons are not the distance for me! I am a half-fanatic, so I can see doing back-to-back half marathons (I qualified doing 3 halfs in 60 days or something like that), but marathons seem like an impossible task, at least for me!