The pacing strategy debate has been around as long as people have been running 26.2 miles. Go out hard and hang on? Stay conservative until the final 10K? Try to negative split like the pros? Everyone’s got a theory.
Now, a new study out of Spain brings something rare to the conversation: actual evidence from a huge data set.
Researchers analyzed more than 146,000 finishers from the Trinidad Alfonso EDP Valencia Marathon between 2014 and 2023. And not just elites: runners from all levels, ages, and backgrounds.
They looked at how each person paced the race across nine 5K segments (plus the final 2.2K stretch), and grouped the results by sex, age group, and finishing time.
Then they asked the question: What kind of pacing leads to the best performance?
The answer was remarkably clear.
Runners who kept their pacing consistent, meaning their second half split was within 10% of their first, finished, on average, 27 to 34 minutes faster than those who didn’t.
A Pace Plan That Actually Works
The majority of runners, about 75%, landed in the even pacing category. And the percentage has grown in recent years, climbing above 77% in 2022 and 2023. Unsurprisingly, those were also the years with the fastest average finish times and the lowest percentage of runners hitting the wall.
What’s more telling is where runners fell apart.
The dreaded “wall” between kilometers 30 and 35 (miles 18–22) was the most common crash zone.
And the best predictor of hitting that wall? Overdoing it earlier, specifically between 10K and 20K. That early surge almost always came back to bite. Meanwhile, those who kept things steady from 15K through 30K were far less likely to unravel.
If you’ve ever run a marathon and felt amazing at mile 9, then mysteriously miserable at mile 20, this might sound familiar.
And when runners hit the wall, they really hit it. The study found that slowing down significantly at 30K cost an average of 36 minutes. Even at 35K, it added nearly 28 minutes.
By the time you feel the wheels coming off, it’s usually too late to save the race.
Women Pacing Smarter, But Still Fatiguing Late
One of the more nuanced findings in the data is that women were more likely than men to pace evenly (77.6% vs. 74.3%) and showed less variation in their splits. But they also had a higher rate of hitting the wall, particularly at those late-race checkpoints.
That might seem contradictory, but it could reflect physiological factors like glycogen availability, or simply that even pacing can’t override fatigue if effort levels are still too high relative to fitness.
The data also showed that runners under 23 and over 55 were more likely to pace unevenly and hit the wall.
Inexperience on one end, age-related fatigue on the other. Both groups also showed more speed variability across segments, suggesting that knowing your pace, and trusting it, may be a learned skill as much as a physical one.
Interestingly, the best-performing runners didn’t rely on a last-minute kick. In fact, it was slower runners and those with uneven pacing who were most likely to have an “end spurt” in the final 2K. For most of them, that burst of speed didn’t indicate a strong finish—it just highlighted that things had gone sideways earlier in the race.
Are Super Shoes Helping People Pace Better?
The study didn’t collect footwear data, but the rise in even pacing and faster times from 2021 onward lines up with the surge in carbon-plated “super shoes.”
These models have been shown to improve running economy and reduce muscular fatigue. While they can’t fix bad pacing, they may be helping more runners hold steady later into the race.
It’s worth noting that the elite runners in the study—those finishing under 2:10—didn’t pace all that differently than strong amateurs. Runners finishing in under 3:00 (men) or 3:15 (women) had nearly identical pacing profiles.
What they did have in common was low variability and an ability to avoid slowing down through the middle of the race. They didn’t necessarily finish with a kick. They just never faded.
Which might be the most important lesson here: good marathons are less about heroics and more about restraint. Holding back in the early miles, running smart through the middle, and avoiding that massive crash in the final 10K—that’s what separates great races from ones you’d rather forget.
Pacing is often framed as an execution problem, something you either nail or botch on the day. But this study shows it’s more than that. It’s a skill. It can be trained. And if you get it right, it’s one of the few things that can buy you an entire half hour without adding a single extra workout.
So if you’re training for a fall marathon and wondering what to focus on once your long runs get longer, here’s one answer: don’t just train for distance or speed. Train for consistency. Practice holding your target pace on tired legs. Practice ignoring the crowd early and holding form late. Because pace discipline, as it turns out, is still the best performance enhancer we’ve got.
