Ah, marathon season is upon us! Everywhere I look, from social media to the running paths, it seems like everyone is woking hard towards their big 2016 marathon goal. I’ll admit it, I’m jealous. I think most runners can agree that marathon training is a love/hate relationship. When you’re in it, all you want to do is complain about the mileage, and when you’re out of it, it looks so dreamy and rewarding.
I have two marathons under my belt, NYC in 2013 and Chicago in 2015. My main marathon goal both times was to do a sub-4 hour marathon. I had received a lot of advice about negative splits and how it’s the best way to achieve your race goal. A negative split means that you go faster throughout the race, making the second half of your race speedier than the first half. In theory that sounded great, but as I was getting race ready, my mindset was that no matter what, I was going to be tired for the second half so I might as well go for a quick pace during the first half to bank time for myself when I inevitably would be tired and therefore slow down in the second half.
During my first marathon, just as I expected, I was totally spent by the second half of the race, especially around mile 18. My pace slowed a bunch, my second half was about 9 minutes slower than my first half. Gulp. I finished the race in 4:07:59. Not a race time to be upset about by any means, but clearly my amateur approach of go out fast and hope for the best didn’t get me to my goal finish.
Two years later I took on the Chicago Marathon. Once again, in the back of my head I knew negative splits would be the way to a sub 4. I took that strategy more seriously on race day, keeping myself at a calm steady pace for the first half. Slowly but surely, my pace got a bit faster as the race continued. This time, the second half of my race was about 4 minutes faster than the first half, giving me my goal finish time of 3:55:33.
If you’re not sure if negative splits are a legit way to amp up your racing, take a look at the current records. Men and women’s marathon world records and all six marathon medalists at the Rio Olympics are negative splits.
Negative Split + Free Shoes
To support the quest for PRs and negative splits, Strava has partnered with New Balance with the Back Half Challenge. From October to December, if you run the second half of your marathon faster than the first, New Balance will give you a free pair of running shoes.
Despite negative splits being a recommended race strategy, Strava found that only 13% of marathons accomplish a negative split race. Strava created the Back Half Challenge to encourage runners to run their smartest and fastest full marathon this fall. Once you achieve your negative split race this fall, click here to submit for your free shoes.
Reading about negative splitting and race strategy only makes me more jealous I’m not out there training. If you’re currently training for a marathon, are you using the negative split method? If so, make sure you check out the Back Half Challenge and you could be walking away with a PR and free sneaks, can’t be that. Need some help? Check out Strava’s blog post on negative split training tips.
As for my race future, I might sign up for a 2017 marathon. Not only do I have that itch again to challenge myself, but being in a new city with exciting new training routes makes me want to go out and explore via 2-3 hour runs (clearly spoken by someone who is not currently training).
For my training friends, good luck this season and comment below with your top race strategy this fall!
