Tips for Two Marathons in One Season

Don’t like to train in the winter for a spring marathon, or have too many weddings to attend in the fall (not at all speaking from experience or anything), but want to still get 2 marathons in for the year? Training for a marathon is an impressive feat, but managing two big races within a couple months of each other can be even more daunting. I personally completed two fall marathons last year, running the Berlin Marathon in September, followed by Philadelphia 8 weeks later. 

Here are some tips that could help you have a strong double marathon season:

• Have a strong sense of which one is your “PR/Goal” Race. Depending on when your race falls with your schedule, thinking about which race may have the best chance for setting a personal best or hitting a particular goal time in advance will make it easier to train for both races. Things to consider may involve historical weather patterns for each race, which one is easier to travel to, or the course profile. 

• Try to give yourself at LEAST 4 weeks to recover and start training again. A marathon is incredibly tough on the body, and not just physically. You need to let practically every system in the human body recover, and that doesn’t happen overnight. Give yourself a week or two before you even start considering running again, and then use the remaining weeks to get back into a running routine.

• You are STILL FIT from your first marathon; you do NOT have to go through a ton of hard workouts again to “get fit again”. Having two big races in one season can make it very easy to overtrain, which can lead to overuse injuries or burnout from putting too much strain on your body. Trust the training you have already put in. Either work on maintaining fitness until the next one, or if you have several months, build up volume with the 10% rule from your baseline mileage until it is time to taper for the second race.

• Adapt your training and listen to your body. Your body is going to need stime to recover and heal. That means the training plan you have for that second race may not go exactly according to plan, and that’s okay! The key is to listen to what your body is telling you. Need to take an extra rest day because your legs are struggling to recover from your first speed workout back? Need to cut mileage off of the long run? No biggie. It’s better to get through the training healthy than risk burnout and injury.

If you plan on completing multiple marathons, please consult your primary care and/or physical therapist about how realistic that could be for you to accomplish. Making sure you start healthy is very important when you start the journey of doubling marathons within the same season.