How to run a sub-4:00 marathon
Advice that applies to any time goal.
When I ran my first marathon in Brighton way back in 2010, I had no goal other than to finish having enjoyed it and wanting to do another. If pressed for a time that I thought I’d finish in I’d say ‘under 5 hours would be nice’. So when I finished in 4 hours 31 mins I was delighted.
It took 18 months for me to find my way to the start of another marathon. I headed to Nottingham for the Robin Hood Marathon in September 2011, but this time I knew what number I wanted to see on the clock. I was chasing a sub-4 time, but it wasn’t to be. Lack of hill training and the weather on the day conspired to see me struggling home in 4:17 – a PB by 14 minutes but not what I’d wanted.
Six months later, and having run another marathon ‘for fun’ in the meantime, I headed to Edinburgh Marathon. I still remember ‘Titanium’ blasting out of the speakers at the start and I try to play this at least once on marathon morning now to bring me luck, because that day, despite training not going perfectly, I ran 3:59:31.
Running a sub-4 marathon was a massive milestone for me and although I’d return to Edinburgh and run 29 minutes faster a few years later, I still look back on that race as being one of my best.
What does it take to run a sub-4 marathon?
How long it would take you to train for a sub-4 marathon very much depends on what your current running looks like. If I sat down with a runner to discuss their training I would want to know:
Is this your first marathon?
What are your other race times?
How many times per week do you run right now?
How many miles do you run right now?
What is your goal race?
None of the answers to these questions are dealbreakers in terms of whether I think the runner is capable of going sub-4, but they will shape the training and indicate how long it might take to get there.
In very simple terms though, a 3:59 marathon requires the following pace:
9:07/mile
5:40/km
So it’s worth going out for a short run at that pace to see what that feels like for you and remembering that you’ll need to hold that pace for four hours.