After the race

After this — the running side

Finish this block and you’ll have done something most people who talk about marathons never do, and you’ll have a real marathon time to build on. The route from there:

Marathon 2 — the same shape, peaking at 80–85 km with two quality days instead of one. Aim to take 15–25 minutes off.
Marathon 3 — Pfitzinger 18/70 territory, 6 days a week, 90–100 km peak. This is the block where sub-3 becomes a live question rather than an aspiration.

The markers to watch on the way: 10K under 39 minutes, half marathon under 1:25, and 70–100 km a week sustained for twelve weeks or more. Hit those three and sub-3 is a matter of picking a flat race on a cool day. Miss them and no plan on earth delivers it.

The plan is aggressive on purpose. It peaks 45% higher than the standard first-marathon plan and it trains race pace directly, because you asked for something challenging and because the softer version would leave you on the wrong track for what you actually want.

The cost of that is that it has no slack in it. There’s no week where you can be casual and catch up later. The rules about missed weeks aren’t there for other people.

Week 1. 34 kilometres. Clear the gate first.

After the race — the strength side

Everything above is strength inside a marathon block, which means it is constrained on every side. The version of your training where strength is the priority starts about two weeks after the finish line, and it’s worth knowing it exists so that this block doesn’t feel like a detour.

Weeks 1–2 post-race. Nothing structured. Walk, swim, easy jogging if you want it. The hip block continues — it’s six minutes and it’s now a permanent fixture.
Weeks 3–10 — a genuine strength block. Running drops to 3 easy runs a week, 25–30 km, purely to hold aerobic fitness. Lifting goes to 4 sessions, upper/lower split, with real leg volume: squats to whatever depth your knee has earned by then, heavy hinges, and the weighted calisthenics progressions from your old plan run properly rather than squeezed in. Eat at maintenance or a small surplus. This is the block where the numbers actually move, and it will not conflict with anything.
Then marathon two. Your plan’s own roadmap has it peaking at 80–85 km with two quality days. You’ll start it stronger and lighter than you started this one, which is exactly how the sub-3 sequence is supposed to compound.

The strength you build in that post-race block is also what makes the next marathon survivable at higher volume. It isn’t a break from the running goal. It’s the next phase of it.

Three things, in order of how much they matter. The six-minute hip block, most days, starting today — it is the only item here aimed directly at the knee that’s bothering you, and it needs four weeks before it reports back. The heavy calf work on Wednesdays, because the soleus is what stands between you and the injuries this plan’s own author listed as most likely at 66 km. And eating enough from week 9, which will feel like giving up on the fat loss and is in fact the thing that gets you to the start line.

Everything else — the dips, the pull-ups, the arms — is there because you want to be strong and it costs the running nothing. That’s a good enough reason. It’s just not the reason this page is organised the way it is.

Two sessions. Six minutes daily. Nothing that costs a run.