Hansons Method

You chose the plan for a reason, that logical reason still exists and it sounds like you're still onboard with it.

In my experience, people who deviate from this particular plan tend to struggle a little on race day and then blame the plan that they didn't stick to !

I wouldn't go over on the steady long run, that's a tough, tough run at the end of a tough week, as someone else has pointed out, these weeks have you right on the edge for a sustained period of time, there's nothing to be gained from extending right into the red. You can take great confidence from hitting those sessions week after week, we tend to obsess too much about hitting magical\mystical numbers on the long run, its amazing really when you think about it.

I think someone mentioned it on this thread before but if your focus is on the length of the long run then you're possibly missing the point of the structure of the plan, not only do you not need 30k, its counter productive given the nature of that structure

Stick to it, trust your training

I've only done Hanson once, and that was on my third marathon (last year). Looking back, regardless of what I think of the long run tapping out at 27k, I'd be of the mind that you've followed the plan so far and you shouldn't start messing with it 4 weeks out.

The only advice I would offer at this stage is see the plan out but be careful of the 10 day taper. I read loads that suggested my legs would feel fine on the day, but they didn't. I think that's ultimately what got me, not the lack of distance in my long runs. Hopefully it won't be an issue for you.

Regarding paces, I am pretty crap at those. I tend to bank pace, so my tempo runs, which were supposed to be at 4:30 were pretty uniformly 4:27, the 4:55 long runs were between 4:45 and 4:50 and the strength runs were 4:15 instead of 4:20.

Of those, the hardest runs I found were the tempos

Boston is a tough course, and one of the things about it is the deceptively easy downhill start, gentle drop for six miles as far as I remember it. So it's easy to get carried away - super important to have a conservative start on that course. A brilliant race and experience, enjoy the taper and the pre-race.

last 16k tempo before boston done today. I really hope the next ten days sees an amazing recovery 😂

that's a hard no from me on the hansons method. Waited and waited for the legs to come good during the taper but they just felt dead the whole time. I knew from the first km today that it was going to be a struggle and it was. Legs had nothing from the start and got worse from there on. Trained for a 3:10, finished 3:37. Luckily it was a great day and the experience was fantastic, but HMM will be not considered again for future events.

Gutted to read that. Really thought you were going to smash it.

looking back over the splits, I had two KMs that were on PMP and they were both in the first 5k. After 3k I knew I wasn't going to get anywhere near the goal so resigned myself to that and decided to just enjoy the run, but legs felt so tired I didn't even enjoy that. I did, however, enjoy the occasion, it was amazing from the time we got here. The heat was a possible factor but mainly the issue was the legs.

We live to fight another day. With a different plan 😂

Sorry to hear that Paulie.

As I said before, the taper on the Hanson Plan is short and not very refreshing. I have never got to the line thinking "I'm fresh". I normally reduce the last 10 mile tempo to a 10k tempo as I feel I would be better off with a little less fatigue and more recovery than any potential benefit of the few extra km.

Before completely blaming the taper and the plan, I think you should just bear in mind the conditions. Of all the people I followed on the day (from elites to 5hr runners), and reports that I have read about subsqeuently, not one had a good experience in terms of goal pace or negative splits etc. 20 degree heat and direct overhead sunshine is definitely not something I have experienced during my running in Ireland in the last 3 months. I would say I have ran 3 times without a base layer and gloves (2 of the times were races, and I still wore the gloves and a buff :D). If you trained here, I can safely assume you were not acclimatised to such conditions as you experienced in Boston.

You alone can decide if it is for you or not. But you have serious training banked, it's just a pity the race didn't work out. If I were you, I'd look for a half marathon within the next 4-6 weeks to see if you can bank a performance that you have earned.

Kudos for grinding it out on the day, the race looked fantastic on tv.

Less than 3 weeks out from Edinburgh now and I had my last 16 mile run yesterday morning.

Starting to feel very confident now, I’ve been hitting my targets in the tempo runs pretty comfortably. I find the hardest part is not getting carried away near the end of the run to push things harder.

My first marathon last year came in at 4:05 after the wheels came off in spectacular fashion after 18 miles.

I followed this up with a 1:38 in the Waterford half last December which gave my confidence a huge boost.

If things go well I am hopeful of 3:45.

Edit: My tempo runs are being run at 5:00 per km and I’m hitting them all along with strength runs but I think I’m still a bit nervous after the last marathon that it could all go belly up.

I think I said it on this thread before but one thing I have noticed with this block in contrast to my last marathon effort is I am running my easy runs much slower than I did last year and I find it definitely helps me to hit the strength/ tempo work hard.

As it turned out I was in Limerick over the weekend for a family event so ended up doing my run around the city.

Well done to all who raced in that heat. It looked to have caught out quite a few.

Thanks, Murph. I think 3:30 is doable but I’d need a lot to go right. That’s why I’ve been using that pace.

For example on my first 16k tempo last week my 2k splits were 5:03,4:59,4:56,5:00,4:59,5:04,4:58 and 4:55.

I felt great after it.

3:45 could be ridiculously conservative. It could just be the fear of blowing up again.

In all honesty, training has gone great. I have only missed 5km from one 13km run over the whole block whereas last year we had a newborn to contend with and training suffered near the end.

Writing this post, I think the biggest obstacle to contend could be my head.

I'm a long time lurker, first time poster on this thread but I had to pop in to report another Hanson success story at the Limerick Marathon this weekend. My last couple of marathons didn't go great, just dying a death in the second half. Last year's Dublin marathon bonk was probably my own nutrition mistakes rather than the plan I was following. But for the Limerick block this year, inspired by this thread I said I might as well give it a go. I ended up following the last 12 weeks of the Advanced Marathon plan without any modifications or issues luckily. Goal was 2:59. Went through first half in 1:28:45 (54th place) and went on to finish 2:57:56 (38th place). Absolutely delighted. A slight positive split but I'll take that considering the 2nd half this year. Every hill I felt like I was backing off pace and taking it easy but still found myself going faster than others beside me. I always felt I had an extra gear. A very stage experience. The plan works for sure. Even though I had my doubts, I stuck to the 16 mile long run and 10 day easy run taper. Thanks to all the all the regular posters here, this thread is a nice Hanson faq trove of information.

Currently mulling over plans for the Frankfurt marathon this autumn and wondering whether following Hanson for a third year in a row is a good idea or not. I've had great success with it but I'm a bit concerned that three times in a row might lead to a lack of motivation, particularly given the repetitive nature of the plan. It does suit my schedule particularly well, however, so switching to something like Pfitz or JD might be counter-productive.

Hey MooShop, well done on the PB! They were hard earned on Sunday for sure! Especially an 11 min one!

I didn't do a whole pile after Dublin marathon 2023 (3:05:19). I ended up spraining my ankle the start of November so took a few weeks to get back again but then it was winter/holiday season so backed off anyway.

I wanted to start into again in January but ended up getting COVID then the middle of January so weeks were as follows:

Week 6 05.02 - 11.02 6x 85,8 km

Week 5 29.01 - 04.02 5x 45,7 km

Week 4 22.01 - 28.01 2x 14,0 km

Week 3 15.01 - 21.01 2x 20,9 km

Week 2 08.01 - 14.01 4x 50,1 km

Week 1 01.01 - 07.01 5x 64,2 km

Week 6 was the start of the 12 week Hanson block so I had to ramp it up a little fast. Ideally I would have gradually built it up from 18 weeks out for sure, especially the Thursday’s. The first few weeks of the Thursday tempo runs were very difficult.

What I really liked about the Thursday tempo was you had a good weekly pace/heart rate/effort level to gauge how things were progressing. It takes a few weeks but you can really see it improving after 6/7 weeks of those sessions. That was the only session I wore a HR monitor for. Easy was always easy and never pushed a pace for these. They ended up being anything from 5:00/km to 5:45/km. I felt that was very important to make sure I was getting full active recovery to be ready for the next session. I see too many people with “Easy” pace being 30/40s/km slower than their planned MP which makes no sense to me.