TRAINING FOR THE HONOLULU MARATHON
is no different than training for any other marathon--assuming
you're willing to devote the time and effort to the
task. The training class I teach for The LaSalle Bank
Chicago Marathon lasts 18 weeks. If you have selected
Honolulu as your "fall" marathon, or are doing it as
your first marathon, please go to my Marathon
Training Guide. You will find training schedules
for novice, intermediate and advanced runners.
However, many runners select Honolulu as their second
marathon of the year, so standard training programs don't
always work, particularly if their first marathon was in the
fall with no time to recover and start a second 18-week
build-up. Nevertheless, it is possible to double up and run
two or more marathons within a short period of time. In
fact, I devoted an entire chapter in my book Hal
Higdon's How To Train to that subject. The chapter is
titled: "Multiple Marathons: Ben Moore's Repeat and
Threepeat Program" (pp. 77-84). The chapter includes four
schedules that tell you how to train to run multiple
marathons: 1) Four Weeks between Marathons; 2) Six Weeks
between Marathons; 3) Eight Weeks between Marathons; and 4)
Two More Marathons
Why would anyone want to run multiple marathons when all
the experts claim you need three to four weeks to recover
from the first one? Well, marathons are fun. There's an
excitement to traveling to some far-off place to run before
cheering crowds. Nobody can deny that Honolulu is a great
destination marathon.
One way to run multiple marathons is to not take the
races too seriously. Don't try to set Personal Records.
Quoting from my book: "In setting up his program so that
runners can continue past this first marathon to run a
second or even a third, Moore goes beyond the point where
most other training programs stop. He advises that multiple
marathoners program one easy week after their marathon
efforts. Depending on how you feel, this might mean
substituting walking for running. The final week before the
next marathon is a tapering period to gather strength. In
between these two rest weeks, runners can resume their
regular training patterns. With only four weeks between
marathons, Moore suggests running the first marathon at a
slower pace, using it as a training run for the second."
Six weeks between marathons allows you to begin to take
the first more seriously; eight weeks between and you may be
able to run both hard. Ten weeks separate the Chicago and
Honolulu marathons. With that much time, you can take a week
or two off and simply resume training at Week 9 or Week 8 in
my Marathon
Training Guide.
But Honolulu presents a special challenge-or, more
accurately, a special opportunity, because
it is so much fun running in Paradise. Also, if you've
checked the other screens in this Do-It-Yourself Tour,
you'll see that I am suggesting you do Volcano
Runs and participate in Waikiki
Workouts that are going to force you to run more
in Week 1 than you normally might run. For that reason,
I recommend that you modify your taper, doing much
less in Week 2, the week before heading to Hawaii.
This trade-off will allow you to run more after you
arrive. Here's a suggested final-four-weeks training
schedule, modifying one of the Intermediate schedules
in my Guide. (For those following the other schedules,
the numbers might be different, but the pattern would
be the same.)
In the schedule below "VR" stands for Volcano
Run and "GW" for Guided
Workout, as in the Itinerary.
