We regularly review our training plans. The goal is to bring new insights, new features and your feedback together as seamlessly as possible. This time, we reviewed the marathon plans designed to help you run under 3:30.

These changes will not appear automatically in your current plan. The updates are simply too significant. You will need to remove your current goal and set it again. Remember: a new plan is always better because we calculate it using your most recent training load and because you have to recalibrate.

Optional volume

The biggest change you will notice is the introduction of workouts with optional volume. This extra volume is added as a cooldown.

We introduced this option for interval sessions earlier this year. It is now also available for other workout types. For those other workouts, the optional volume is switched off by default. As the coach, I decide which sessions can include extra volume. That depends on the rest of your training week, for example, or how often you train. You then decide whether to activate it.

Faster runners have regularly told us that our plans included too little volume. With optional volume, on top of the ability to adjust workouts yourself, we can now fully address that feedback.

New quality sessions

As a coach, I am always learning. My training plans are not static. The long-time Trenarians among you already know that. These updated versions include new interval and tempo sessions. They are not deliberately harder or easier. They are simply workout formats that, based on new knowledge and experience, I believe are better suited to the goal.

Looking at the full plan, I felt there were too many 1K reps, for example. So I have added more variation.

I have also defined some of the tempo runs more precisely from a physiological perspective. We have always worked with two marathon paces:

• Your fitness-based marathon pace, based on our current prediction

• Your target marathon pace

Depending on the phase of your plan, however, your target pace can create a completely different physiological stimulus. That is why I only use it during simulation workouts.

Marathon pace itself also represents a different physiological intensity depending on the type of runner you are. For faster runners, it sits closer to LT2. For slower runners, it sits closer to LT1. A marathon-pace workout is therefore sub-threshold for a faster runner, but not necessarily for a slower runner. That is another area where I have made some adjustments.

Longer long runs

Yes, this is different from optional volume.

Now that this feature is live, I can prescribe longer long runs. You have been asking for them for quite some time, but until now I did not have a sufficiently safe way to introduce them.

Those safeguards have been in place since last month. That means I can confidently prescribe more volume to runners who are ready for it. This is particularly useful early in the preparation, where I previously had to build the volume more cautiously.

Even more detailed descriptions

As both a coach and an author, I enjoy writing. You will now find even more detailed workout descriptions. More context, more suggestions and more guidance. We have been considering reserving workout descriptions for paying subscribers for years. I think we have now reached that point.


There you go. If you want to use the updated plans, you know what to do.
The other marathon plans will follow, hopefully next week.