Pros\Cons on 5k before Marathon

splashthecash

Hi all,

I'm doing the Chicago Marathon on 8th Oct and was thinking of signing up the Grant Thornton 5k in City Centre on 26th Sept

It'll be two weeks away from the big day so I'll be in taper but would still be putting in speed sessions regardless so thought this would be a good run out

Is it too close for a proper 5k race, or what would people's thoughts on pros\cons for this

token56

I think you would struggle to find any training plan that would recommend doing a 5K race two weeks before a marathon. The point of a taper is to safely reduce your mileage to let the body recover and allow the adaptations of the previous weeks training to take affect. If you want to include the 5K as a session at something like marathon effort etc, as part of your taper that's different but trying to do it as an all out race certainly wouldn't be recommended that close to the marathon.

adrian522

I wouldn't have a huge problem with it to be honest, P&D have a race 2 weeks out I think(with a long run the next day), I ran a hard parkrun 2 weeks prior to Berlin a few years back and didn't have any issues with it.

It depends on how well trained you are but in general I don't think its a terrible idea.

Runster

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058313233/pros-cons-on-5k-before-marathon

You'll be fine to do the 5k, you can recover from one in less than a week.

Take one day of rest per mile after it.

Lazare

This all depends on a number of factors imo.

Your fitness, your age, what you're replacing on your plan, how important your marathon target is to you.

Personally I wouldn't deviate an inch from the plan's taper as my marathon target is far too important.

What sort of speed session is on plan two weeks out?

event

Yeah Id be asking, whats the point in it really? Do you think you can get a PB in the 5k?

Murph_D

I'd only do it if you're doing both races for fun. (In the absence of any other information about your history, training and goals.)

Lumen

If you're not getting paid or qualifying for the Olympics, do the thing which is most fun.

py

My question to you would be, how likely are you to be going back to Chicago to run the marathon again? The GT5K will be there next year or the year after and whlist it is a good event, there is nothing special about running 5km around Dublin Docklands when compared to running a marathon major. I would lean against not risking it, even if you still have a bit of speedwork in your plan.