How to not train for and run a marathon

I ran my first marathon on May 5 2024. It took me 4 hours and 16 minutes to complete. Prior to this race I had never run even a half marathon or any competitive race besides middle school track where I was a sprinter. For some reason I had the conviction that I could run 26.2 miles in less than 2 months of training.

My Athletic History

I have played sports my entire life and have been no stranger to athletic challenges. I played soccer and baseball for the majority of my youth and played racquet sports like squash and tennis in middle and high school.

During my sophomore year of high school, after being persuaded by my best friend I decided to try out for the water polo team. This was an extreme challenge to pick up and I was thrown into the fire almost immediately. 3-4 hours of preseason practices daily, with hours of swimming, which I was not prepared for. I remember doing 1 lap, stopping to breath hysterically and repeating the process for weeks on end. I never gave up and progressed quickly enough to play my first season and earn Rookie of the Year. I quickly fell in love with the sport and by senior year I was team caption and a PA all-state player. For the first two years of college I was vice president of my club team at Pitt.

After my water polo career I felt like I needed a new challenge to take on and during my summer abroad in Spain. I would do calisthenics workouts at a local park and started to do some longer distance runs to challenge myself. The longest of which was just over 11.5 miles. This gave me the confidence that a marathon was within reach, if I could run almost a half with not training, with a little training a marathon would be a piece of cake (so I thought...). I signed up for the Pittsburgh marathon on May 5 and did my first training run on March 5.

Adjusting my Diet

Prior to starting my first run I had been mentally prepping to begin training by adjusting my diet. I was eating healthy clean foods with tons of protein. I was eating lots of lean ground beef, rice, and avocado which became one of my favorite meals. I also was eating chicken and salad, protein berry smoothies, yogurt, eggs, fruit, and all sorts of other food to help keep me in shape. This was one of things I felt like I did right in my training. Fueling my body with the right stuff to make my runs enjoyable.

Before runs I would typically only have a banana and some honey, or just a spoonful (or 3) of honey. I also made sure to drink plenty of water to stay hydrated.

By the time I had started my first few weeks of marathon training I had gotten in solid shape and was eating very healthy, but this was not to be enough to carry me a full marathon.

Training Plan

To be honest my training plan was okay, but but my actual training was rushed and lackluster at best. I enlisted the help of Chat GPT to help me craft a training plan. We created a foolproof plan for 3-4 runs per week. I would do one short (3-5 miles) run, a medium (5-10 miles) run, and long run (10+ miles) per week slowly ramping up the long runs for the first 6 weeks.

By the third week I had already run my first half marathon in under 2 hours and was still on track for my 4 hour marathon target. If only I had realized the difference between 13 and 26 miles.

I continued to train but was skipping the easy runs and would try to lump them into the medium runs. This led me to fall shourt of my volume goals. I needed to be running for more hours per week. My total volume was 113 miles before my marathon. This is far below what I should have hit. I should have been doing 40 mile weeks minimum during peak training.

I was consistent however on pushing myself on my long runs. I climbed up from 13 to 14 to 20 miles on my longest run. This is where I really felt the distance catch up to me. I remember literally crawling into bed from the shower after my 20 mile run. Regardless, I was signed up to run 6 miles father in just under 3 weeks so I had to taper down and get ready for race day. I went on a few more shorter runs and was ready for race day!

The Night Before

Since I wrote the night before and the day of my race I figured it might be useful to take some excerpts and comment on them.

May 4 2024 - Night before the race

I have never ran 26.2 miles before and I am ready. I do not have much nerves, I feel as though I can do this. That confidence is not to say I think it will be easy, as I know it will be one of the hardest things I have ever done.

At least I knew it was gonna be tough. Looking back I should have had more nerves, but the goal of this race was to finish, which I knew I was going to.

(Talking about my 20 mile run)

Looking back at those splits it is quite clear I was not going at a consistent pace and I had no clue where I was going. The fact that I don’t need to think about what direction I am going, I have race day adrenaline, I have proper fuel, and I will have others to pace with gives me further confidence that I will be okay and hit my goal time of 4 hours.

On most of my practice runs I had no clear course, I would just run for hit a certain amount of time or distance. I was confident that just focusing on the running and less the navigation was going to help, which it did, but the pure distance of the marathon was overpowering for any minor changes to mental load.

So I was blissfully ignorant for what lie ahead. But I was excited and ready to test myself.

Race Day

I planned to uber to race but was unable to get one due to all the roads being shut down. I decided my only option was to drive and figure it out. I drove to the course and began frantically searching for somewhere to park. I eventually found a lot that charged $13 a day. I followed everyone else that looked like they were running and ended up running over for a mile or so just to find the start. Once I got to the start I started to do some warmup. Before I knew it were were starting and I was in a huge hoard of people all running with not much space to breath. The first few miles were packed before people began to spread out. I was feeling good and kept a pace below 9 minutes per mile.

May 5 2024 - Post Race

My fastest split was actually mile 6. I remember not much pain until around mile 8-9 where my feet began to hurt. This was mostly my ankles but it always feels like that after you run 9 miles.

For the first 5 or so miles I was starting to feel out the race and I felt really good. I felt like a machine perfectly opitmized to run. Since my watch was just a casio stopwatch I had a lot of trouble pacing and ended up going way too fast for the first 6 miles. My goal was to stay around 9 minutes but mile 6 was a 7:57 pace and the others not too far off.

Hitting the halfway mark always feels good, but when halfway is 13.1 miles it is a bittersweet feeling. I still had not stopped to walk at this point, which I was quite proud of. I don’t think I have ever run that far without stopping.

I was making good time and made it just over 14 miles before I stopped to walk for a few minutes. I was starting to be in some pain but I kept pushing and reminding myself that this was gonna hurt and it was part of the process.

The rest of the race was really just fighting the urge to slow down and to just keep pushing. My AirPods died, which did not help my mental state as the music or audiobook could keep my mind focused on things other than the pain in my feet and legs.

I kept pushing and finally reached mile 24-25 where I was able to pick it back up and run the rest of the race. There was a slight downhill which aided my completely destroyed legs. I finally crossed the finish line and limped around looking for an exit. I finally found a place to get out and then found my girlfriend Rachael who met me at the finish line.

It was a relief to be finished but I really couldn’t think about anything besides the immense pain I felt from my feet to my hips. It was like nothing I had ever experienced before. Excruciating pain with no end in site. I hobbled with Rachael to a place where an uber could pick us up and we headed home. I got inside and took a shower and just laid in my bed while I waited for the adrenaline to wear off. I finally was able to fall asleep and took a nap.

Post Race Recovery

After the race I had some lingering pain. The first 3 days my knees had a strong dull pain and it hurt to walk. I tried my best to stretch and do some walking in my house but the pain was overwhelming. My toes began to turn purple as well from the repetitive slamming on the concrete during the race.

I also had some blisters on my feet. All in all my external injuries were minimal, no bleeding and no toenails lost. After the knee pain subsided a new pain began to emerge. My left foot had a sharp pain which made it extremely painful to walk. It was on the top and outside of my foot and was most likely a bone bruise. I went to the PatientFirst to rule out any fractures. I had a rough few weeks of walking on that left foot but the pain went away after a while. Since the race my ankles and knees have remainded really tight. I have continued to run but no training as intense as the marathon since then. I plan to start running for another race this summer and potentially doing a triathlon in the future. Now that I know I am capable of distance running I plan to train over a much longer time horizon and crush my previous marathon time.

Next Time Will Be Different: Marathon Tips I Wish I Knew

Thanks for reading and I hope you got some value from my story!

-Jack

Published on June 11, 2025

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