Early and late in the marathon requires completely different approaches.

very elite runner has certain physical and mental benchmarks, checkpoints, F and strategic goals that can add up to a successful race. On paper, it always works. In training, it always fits. In a race, it’s always a mystery.

The master plan that each athlete constructs and executes is as varied as the individuals and the courses themselves. With 26.2 miles to cover, some segments are given less attention and focus (such as the opening miles), and some are given more attention and focus (such as the closing miles). Not all 26 miles require the same level of energy and guts.

“To be honest,” said dual Irish/South African citizen Alistair Cragg of Mammoth Lakes, California, “I don’t have a plan besides to get comfortable.” But upon further thought, he says, “If it’s with the lead [of] three or four the whole way, then I want to sit there and be with them.”

The first miles

For Kim Smith, a Providence College grad from New Zealand, her advice to herself is simple and familiar: “You just have to kind of stay relaxed and not go out too hard and just make sure you don’t get too excited.”

Smith, a four-time NCAA champion, said she doesn’t worry too much about the start, such as whether to begin on the left side or the right side of the road or to get a fast jump at the gun. This is the approach of most elites, including U.S. Olympian Kara Goucher, who ran a PR 2:24:52 at the 2011 Boston Marathon just seven months after giving birth.

“T like to not really be thinking about anything. Just stay in the pack. There’re so many people, let somebody else do the work and just sort of let your body warm up. There’s so much time [in a marathon], so for me, I don’t really like to get going from the beginning . . . just get in the pack and take this time to warm into the race,” said Goucher, who won bronze in the 10,000 meters at the 2007 World Championships and in the 3,000 meters at the 2006 World Cup. “My marathon warm-up is so much shorter than my track warm-up. That’s because I feel like

you have to warm into it. Just take your time and warm into it. Then get into a groove, and then you can really start thinking about what you want. And by then you’ve warmed up and you’re more aware of what you’re doing.”

Around the 5K mark is where some runners check in with themselves, so to speak. By then, the prerace preparation and emotions have been replaced by the rush of adrenaline and competition, and monitoring of oneself and of others can begin in earnest.

Olympian Blake Russell, the 2006 USA national champion in cross-country and 2003 Twin Cities Marathon winner in 2:30:41, also recognizes the importance of keeping herself in check in the early miles. She likes to maintain a regular schedule of checkups while staying in contention from the get-go.

“T like to be up front and feel like I’m in the race and feel like I’m part of the race from the beginning. And usually at the [first] 5K, you can start feeling your competitors out a little bit more and maybe you can feel a couple of the packs getting ready to break up a little bit,” she said. “And hopefully at that point I’ll be running my own race, which is a great thing about the marathon—you can kind of do your own thing.”

Settling down and establishing himself is most important in the first miles for Olympian Ryan Hall, whose honors include a stellar PR of 2:04:58 as the first American finisher in Boston 2011.

“T think the first mile or 5K is just kind of feeling yourself out and just getting your legs under you and getting the wheels turning, yet at the same time establishing a quick turnover and a quick cadence,” Hall said. “Sometimes I feel when I try and work into races it’s really difficult

b> About the first miles of a marathon, Ryan Hall says, “I think the first mile or 5K is just kind of feeling yourself out and just getting your legs under you and getting the wheels turning, yet at the same time * < establishing a quick turnover and a ee

quick cadence” a

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compared to if I just set a hard pace and maintain it.” Desiree Davila, a member of the Hansons-Brooks Distance Project, echoes that thought of using the first few miles as a testing ground for the rest of the marathon.

“Generally, the first 5K is like a warm-up for me. You want to find your race thythm and your pace. The second mile, you should start settling into that and you shouldn’t be stressed or anything,” she noted.

As a four-time winner of the Boston and New York City marathons, Bill Rodgers believes that while the opening miles are not necessarily as strategically vital as those in the latter stages, they still possess some importance. The marathon can easily be lost there if the runner doesn’t take into account the various mental and physical obstacles that are always present.

“Mainly, you’re just checking yourself out. It’s like a race-car driver checking his gauges and everything; you’re doing the same with your body a little bit, and [checking yourself] mentally to see how you feel. And you make sure you don’t get tripped, and you get yourself into position to be with the competition, and if the wind’s hitting you, you draft,” he said. “Usually, a lot of these top runners are coming [into a marathon] with something bothering them, and some of them won’t make it. You check out the competition and you’re assessing yourself.”

Rodgers, who notoriously dislikes hot weather, would also monitor the weather conditions at the start and within the first few miles. He would instantly realize whether he was in for a long haul and, within that first 5K or so, would know how to handle himself.

“Oh, yeah. I always checked the weather. I did not like the heat. It made it a mental struggle—immediately—and I didn’t like that. I knew it would be much tougher,” he said. “But the first 5K is a critical part of the race because of that. It’s a good time to hold back. And don’t take the lead.”

Robert de Castella of Australia, a four-time Olympic marathoner with a 2:07:51 PR at Boston in 1986, provides some insight into why he was always known for his competitive calm.

“The first 5K is really just about shaking your legs out and getting off to a good start and making sure that everything’s going OK. You can’t tell very much, unless you feel bad. If you’re having problems in your first 5K, then you know it’s going to be a real struggle,” he said. “But this first part is pretty relaxed and easy, and you just settle down. It’s too early in the race to really make any sort of judgments as to what’s going to happen.”

The unknown

Since each marathon presents different challenges, marathoners respond based on their strengths and weaknesses. Some elites are extremely meticulous with their strategy, and some are less measured and stringent in their approach.

“| think it’s important to check in with
yourself every 5K and make sure you’re
not running too hard or overly slowy,’ says
Kara Goucher.

“T think it’s important to check in with yourself every 5K and make sure you’re not running too hard or overly slow,” Goucher stated. “Just listen to your body and listen to your breathing. But I think it’s really important to remember that the race is 26.2 miles long, and really the race starts at 20 miles—that’s when your body starts breaking down. So it’s important that no matter how great you feel at 12 miles, remember that you really haven’t started running yet. That’s great if you feel good at 12 miles, but remember the hard part is yet to come.”

In addition to monitoring the distance, Cragg also watches his competitors.

“It’s hard for me to know how it’s going to pan out because there are maybe 20 athletes who think they have a chance of winning, and everyone has their own little secret that they think will put them ahead of the rest of the field,” Cragg said before the 2011 Boston Marathon, his first at that distance. “I need to just remember it’s 26 miles, and everyone on the starting line’s gotta get through it, and we’re all gonna go through a patch where we want to throw in the towel. It’s going to be somebody’s day.”

Also worth noting are the early front-runners who routinely never finish the race, or if they do it’s so far back that their names are quickly forgotten. Whether their goal is to be seen on camera in the early miles or quick exposure for commercial reasons, they can’t totally be ignored.

“Problem is,” observes Rodgers, “sometimes you get an unknown that takes off, and they’re a headache for [however many] miles. Now and then there’s someone who’s making money for their shoe company or doing something for a sponsor, and they jump in the lead. Sometimes they’re pretty darn good runners, but usually they don’t last. You have to look at the people that are really going to go for the win.”

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These components—the marathon distance itself, varying course layouts, fast and not-so fast athletes—can also change enough over the course of two-plus hours that an elite runner may need to adjust along the way.

“My coach has some ideas [for me, saying], ‘Feel free to do this,’ or, ‘If you’re feeling a little bit tired, make sure you don’t do any moves until you get closer to the end,’” Russell said in reference to advice from her coach, Bob Sevene. “I’ve definitely got a few ideas, but it all depends on how the race goes and how you’re feeling. Sometimes everything goes great in training, but you just don’t feel on during the race. I don’t think you can force your strategy, and you definitely don’t want to be running outside your comfort zone in a race like this because you’ll pay for it.”

Added Cragg, “If I feel stretched at all for the first 16 miles, I want to be able to step back a little bit and just be below being stretched out for the first 16. Sixteen for me is my goal to be OK at.”

The last miles

Conventional wisdom dictates that real competition begins in a marathon around 20 miles. With the race roughly broken down into four sections, this is the final quarter, and this is when most elite athletes narrow their focus.

“That’s when a race kicks in, and I’m going to go for the next guy ahead of me or try and drop the guy with me. I don’t think it’s a good time to do a body check because it’s not going to feel good,” said Cragg, who ran 1:03:22 for second place at the 2011 Rock ’n’ Roll Arizona Half-Marathon. “You’re going to be in pain and probably don’t want to be there—you want to be somewhere else. And it’s a lot easier to back off because it won’t be as painful. But chances are it’s gonna be as painful and take longer for you to get to the finish line, so just plan on racing whoever’s there,” said Cragg, who won the 2013 Edmonton Half in 1:04:38.

Runners often begin their final stages of strategy with 10K or 5K to go. In some instances, it can be the decisive move; in others, it can be a precursor to an all-out haul.

“With the last 10K to go, it’s like, there’s no plan. You just race!” said Davila. “Keep your eyes open; keep working hard. So I guess that’s a plan. But you can kind of feel that when you’re out there—what’s comfortable and what’s not.”

Added Goucher, “It’s really the last 10K that’s tough. I don’t care how good a shape you’re in, it’s just that your body’s broken down everything, and that’s when it really starts.”

Cragg puts it simply: “The main thing is, I want to try and make my last six [miles] my fastest six.”

With a half-dozen New Zealand national titles under her belt, including a 2:25:21 at the 2010 London Marathon, two-time Olympian Smith boils down the

About the final miles of a marathon, Kim Smith says, “That’s just more
of a survival, the last 5K. Just do the
last 5K as fast as you can.’

last SK with a laugh: “That’s just more of asurvival, the last 5K. Just do the last 5K as fast as you can.”

And that very last mile? Cragg opines, “The last mile? I don’t know—the last mile will just be running on emotions,” he said prior to his marathon debut at the 2011 Boston. “I’m pretty sure being an Irishman in Boston will help a lot over the last mile. I’m banking on it. ’m hoping there’s a lot of Irish dregs out there for support,” he said with a laugh.

The plan

“T was usually a runner who tried to lie low in the beginning and run hard in the middle point of the race, at around the 75 percent mark of the race—17, 18 miles—that’s when I liked to start to run hard and go for it because most people don’t really want to go hard then,” noted Rodgers. “In 1978 [in Boston], I did that. I was with three or four other runners, and they let me go, so I gained a huge lead over the [Newton] hills and cruised it. Unfortunately, Jeff Wells ran like hell the last couple of miles and came back on me, and I started to get cramps and won by two seconds! He didn’t know the course, and that was huge. But now there are so many [good] runners out there, it’s more complex and there will be more people with you longer.”

In the closing miles, whether running solo or within a group, some steadfastly stick with their strategy no matter what, and some adjust accordingly. There seems to come a point when most elites decide to either hold true to this stage of their plan or to abandon it and take a risk.

Regardless of whether he’s running alone or with a few competitors toward

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the end, Hall’s focus becomes tunnel vision. “It’s just all out,” he said. “I don’t really think about anything during that point in the race. I just run as hard as I can all the way to the finish.”

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<@ Rob de Castella notes, “You can prepare as well as you can, but the main thing is to finish strongly”

Conversely, de Castella would adjust when necessary, especially if he was aware of a competitor who possessed greater ability in some aspect of the race. But the Aussie would also incorporate an additional element in his arsenal, which earned him major victories at Fukuoka, Boston, Rotterdam, and the World Championships, among others.

“T never had a fixed, rigid plan as such. Everything is different. You can prepare as well as you can, but the main thing is to finish strongly,” de Castella explained. “I knew that I didn’t have the leg speed of some of the 5K and 10K runners, so that last SK was where I had to really focus on picking up the pace. And if I was with someone, then I would really take charge and dominate that last SK in a way that I knew I could maintain all the way to the finish.

“Every race is different,” he continued, “and that’s the art—responding to the different circumstances. There is a degree of science to running, but there is also a degree of art to it as well, and that’s what you have to rely on in the closing stages and just respond to the circumstances and try to be creative with your tactics. I don’t think you should have a fixed and rigid plan because nothing ever goes as planned. You can have one, but as soon as the gun goes off, you throw it out the window and you plan on what happens.”

Goucher, whose top performances include third place at the 2008 New York City Marathon (2:25:53) and the 2009 Boston Marathon (2:32:25), looks inward for her decision making, although it was something at which she had to work.

“That kind of comes down to confidence in yourself. I’m not afraid to be with people [at the end] because I’ve learned that all you have to do is win by a tenth of a second! It took a long career to learn that,” she said. “When I was younger, I had to break away and I had to win by a lot. And now I’ve learned as long as I cross that line first—I literally can get out-kicked in the last 100—it doesn’t matter how much you win by, it’s just that you win.

“T have a race strategy for this race,” Goucher added about Boston, ‘“‘and a couple of key points where I might do something. But for the most part, I’m just

going to be sitting with everybody else and just responding and staying as relaxed as possible until those points come where I need to really pay attention.”

Davila, who cut seven minutes off her debut marathon time with a 2:37:50 at the 2008 Olympic Trials, does stay with her original plan—to a point.

“T usually have a pretty good plan of what I’m doing, and I’m able to just kind of ignore everybody else and settle into that plan,” she said. “And when you get into the later parts of the race, I sort of abandon that.”

Even for Russell, who has two top-four finishes at the U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials and a 27th place as the only American finisher at the 2008 Olympic Games, the closing miles remain somewhat a mystery.

“T can’t say yet I’ve gotten to run a marathon where I’ve just felt really great at the end, but my coach has kind of been drilling into my head that the race really doesn’t start until mile 17 or so, so hopefully I’ll be running a little more comfortable and be able to pick it up and respond if somebody’s making a pass by you,” she said. “But I’m not probably the type to make a violent five-minutepace move—I think that would take a little bit too much out of me. I think ’m more of a probably consistent all-the-way marathoner.”

With a second-place time of 2:25:55 at the 2012 Olympic Marathon Trials and 2:22:38 at the 2011 Boston Marathon and a pair of top-five finishes at Chicago, Davila also points to confidence toward the end as a key to her moves.

“The last part—maybe the last 1OK when the race is really the race—if you did your job right in the first part, you should be able to say, ‘All right, now we’re starting the race. Now I want to really push,’” she said.

Added de Castella, “The last 5K is really where it all happens. That’s where you’ve really got to be focused. You concentrate. And be strong and finish really well.”

Postrace reward

After several hard months of marathon training and the stress of competing in the race, personal rewards vary from athlete to athlete. It can be a delicious piece of forbidden candy or a long week off. And often the mental image of that reward is floating around in the back of the runner’s mind throughout the entire process.

“Something I try to cut back on is my coffee intake in the afternoons,” Cragg said, “and I’m dying for a late-afternoon cappuccino with a croissant. I take my coffee in the morning, but I’ve been trying to cut back in the afternoon. But there’s nothing like a late-afternoon coffee. That’s what I’m excited about.”

When Cragg was reminded about the historical connection between the Irish and hot tea, he responded with a chuckle, “I’ve been in America for [over] 10 years, and the tea’s not that great here.”

As he once famously blurted out on the air after his first Boston win in 1975, Rodgers often turned to a local watering hole—the now-defunct Eliot Lounge— for his postrace celebration, which included a concoction called a Blue Whale.

“T went to the Eliot Lounge and had some bizarre drink Tommy Leonard made for me in *75, with my family and friends. That’s what I always did. My mom and dad would be there, and my brother, Charlie,” he recalled.

“[Now] I like a gin and tonic and be with the people I care about the most. I’m not a big go-out-and-dance-and-party-type of person. I did in ’75,” he laughed. “T was a lot younger then. But you celebrate. It’s a powerful high.”

Alvaro Mejia of Colombia, who won the 1971 Boston Marathon (2:18:45), also had a simple postmarathon pleasure.

“A beer. A couple of beers. More than a couple of beers,” he said with a laugh, “because you work so hard to get there and you relax. It is good. Not just for the race but for the preparation for the race. When I won Boston, I was doing 150 miles a week. You deserve it.”

Smith planned a more grandiose reward after her 2011 Boston Marathon. “I’m going on vacation in Aruba. I’Il be relaxing.”

After he won the 1986 Boston Marathon, de Castella returned home to Australia and treated himself to one simple gift.

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4 For his postrace reward, Bill Rodgers “went to the Eliot Lounge and had some bizarre drink Tommy Leonard made for me … with my family and friends. That’s what | always did. My mom and dad would be there, and my brother, Charlie”

“IT went home and bought a black Porsche,” he said. “Other than that, it was really just about focusing on the next event. Once you’ve had one good run or one bad run, you put it behind you and focus on the recovery process and build up for the next marathon. That’s the profession of being an elite athlete. I’d take it easy to recover, but I didn’t have a break. I would always be training.”

Russell has a specific regional perk in mind while in Boston, where she has many ties.

“You feel that no matter how it goes, you’ve put in the hard work and you deserve something. Being from Boston, and being away for a couple of years, every time I come back, I always think about this one restaurant. My plan is to take a shower and go to Kelly’s on Route 1,” she said. Kelly’s Roast Beef proclaims it’s the “creator of the original roast beef sandwich.” It’s the place where Russell happily found herself after the 2008 Trials. “That’s my favorite. That’s my reward. That’s what I did after the Olympic Trials. They were saying, ‘Oh, there’s a party for all the people that made the Olympic team.’ And I said, ‘I’m going to Kelly’s.’”

After the 2011 Boston, Russell also planned to turn to family as an oasis from running.

“I’m heading down to North Carolina; that’s where my family’s from. Quin [her son] and I will go because he’s never been there with me,” she said. “You know, if it goes well or if it goes poorly you’ re still not going to be running much. So it’s just a nice time to take a break and be able to catch up with family. I’ll go see my dad and my grandmother and aunts and uncles.”

Family is also on Goucher’s mind as a reward, since she readily admits that she doesn’t much eliminate confections—often used as a runner’s reward—during her training.

“T, like, eat everything that I want [anyway], so if it’s a sundae I want, I’ll eat it,” she said with a laugh of her training period. “So that’s not really my thing. But I do usually take a break to go visit family.”

Davila agreed. “I take two weeks off from running. And I kind of overindulge in stuff I don’t necessarily have in training, so that’s always fun. But I think it’s more about relaxing—get away from the Internet, TV, and all that stuff, and relax. I don’t think about running. I don’t see what’s going on in the track world. I just get away for a while.”

After each of his marathons, the religious Hall rewards his body and his soul with desserts and his favorite scriptures.

“Yeah, I usually take about two weeks off—completely off—and enjoy some sweets and junk foods that I don’t usually have. And I try not to think much about running,” he said. “And there are some great psalms [that I read], singing God’s

praise and thankfulness. There are so many.” DYE