When I trained for my first marathon, Bournemouth 2018, I was a little disgruntled at the pace of my long runs. A wise head, or whom I assumed was knowledgeable in this field, explained all my long runs should be at least a minute per mile slower than my pace on race day.

The logic was the occasion would lift my spirits and I’d be able to complete the marathon in a time much quicker than my long run shuffle.

Turns out they were talking bollocks. I tanked after about 16 miles and went back into shuffle mode, combined with some long spells of walking. The final 4 miles you could see Bournemouth Pier in the distance, and I was convinced with each step I took the Pier was moving further away from me.

I did complete the marathon, in a time of 4:44:20, a slower pace than I had been doing in training and a harsh lesson in whom to take advice from.

In hindsight it was obvious. Why would I suddenly be able to run at a pace I hadn’t practiced once in training? What a terrible tip!

Whether you are training for a 5k or a marathon, if you have a time in mind, and a pace you want to achieve, be sure to practice that in the build up to your event.

For example, let’s assume we have a runner who wants to run 5K in under 30 minutes. Their race is 8 weeks away. Now would be the time to start training at that pace, so come race day it feels comfortable to begin with.

Now you want to be sensible and start off with a shorter distance and break down the session into intervals. As the weeks progress and you get closer to the race day, the sessions you do at goal pace become more challenging.

This way your endurance at that speed is improving and you’ll gain more confidence along the way. So once a week include an interval session at goal pace. Across an 8 week cycle (8 weeks is very short by the way), your interval sessions might look something like this.

12 x 200 meters
8 x 400 metres
3 x 1km
2 x 800m/3 x 400m/4 x 200m
10 x 400m
4 x 1km
6 x 5 mins
5 x 1km

As you can see the first session only covers 2.4km and done in small reps. As the weeks progress the distance covered increases, as do the length of the reps.

By week 8, you’re covering 5km at goal pace, which is a good sign that come race day you can achieve that goal.

Progress is never linear. So don’t be too upset if some weeks your pace drops. There might be a number of factors behind that, such as poor sleep, niggles or the weather. Keep the faith, work hard in these sessions, and you should see the progress.

Based on the sessions above you’d have run around 30km at your goal pace when race day arrives. With my runners I also include some sessions quicker than goal pace as well, to help improve their times even more.

If you have a specific time you want to run, then follow this advice and start training at your goal pace today.