The Hanson Marathon Method: Key Questions to Ponder Before You Begin
In an earlier post, I gave an overview of the Hanson’s Marathon Method, with a particular focus on important nuances I overlooked when I first tried the program.
In this and future posts, my hope is to share my marathon prep journey using the Hanson Method so that others might learn along with me as I experiment with it. A Google search will reveal many interesting reviews of this distinctive training approach. I’ve found that most of these are from the perspective of either advanced marathoners or those whose youthful vitality powers rapid recoveries from hard workouts. I don’t fit either profile. I write from the perspective of an older, not-as-fit-as-I-once-was, middle-of-the-pack runner. Can the Hanson Way be used effectively by average and aging runners like me? That’s what I hope to explore as I record my experience in preparing for my next marathon.
One of the most important steps you take using the Hanson Method happens before you lace up your shoes. There are three preliminary choices you must make that can be decisive if you get them wrong. Which race? Which Hanson program? And what’s your goal pace? Because the answers to these will drive the quality of your experience and also must flow from your personal context, in what follows, I’ll explain how my own context led me in unanticipated directions.
I originally intended that my Fall 2016 marathon would be the one at which I finally checked off one of the top items on my bucket list: qualifying for the Boston Marathon. But the road to that goal has been long and filled with surprises and periods of lost focus.
I was supposed to achieve that dream during my forties but vocational necessities led me to postpone that goal and commit less time to running. When moving to the Rochester, NY area six years ago, I made restoring physical fitness a top priority. I needed restoration because, without really noticing it, I’d become middle-age plump. When the scale tipped 203 pounds, I got serious. With a new edition of Daniels Running as our guide, my wife and I began the humbling task of getting back in shape.
We’d both run marathons in our early 40’s so it was shocking to huff and puff up the rolling NY hills and discover a three-mile continuous run was an impossibiilty. We started with a nutritional overhaul and thirty-minute runs in April 2011. By December, we were fit. I’d shedded 35 pounds, reaching my ideal weight of 168 pounds, and my half-marathon time trial suggested I would easily qualify for Boston at the 2012 Disney Marathon.
An IT band injury arose during my last long run, however, and just two weeks before the race, all bets were off. I tried to run, but limped to the halfway point before medical staff said enough was enough.
The doc said I could run again in two months. During the recovery period, I got on the bike and decided to train for my first triathlon. A sprint triathlon in Columbia, MD was a highpoint, checking one more item off my bucket list.
Unfortunately, that high turned out to be a peak. I ran a few mid-distance races, but just enough to keep me running. Other priorities arose, the bike gathered dust, the snow fell, and, three years later, I was reaching for those old jeans I’d swore would never fit again.
So my Fall 2016 marathon was supposed to be a new peak. The year began well. As planned, I worked back to the fitness level needed to finish a relaxing Louisiana Half-Marathon. The plan was to use that as my base, and then work hard through the winter and spring so that the Wineglass Marathon, one of the fastest courses in the U.S., would be the place where I’d earn my pass to Boston. But, once again, work priorities made workouts seem selfish, and, by the time the snow melted, the October 2nd Wineglass race was too near to make that goal realistic.
I share this case history to explain how I approached the first three decisions required by the Hanson Method.
The first decision is about schedule. Lacking the fitness to complete the distance, I needed the full eighteen weeks to build my endurance. Though registered for the Wineglass Marathon, I needed a month more to get ready. After researching fast courses within a reasonable driving distance, I decided to do my second Canadian race, the Hamilton (Ontario) Road2Hope Marathon. November 6th became my new race day.
The second decision followed easily from the first. Which version of the Hanson’s program to use? Even though I’ve run multiple marathons and several half-marathons, I chose the beginners’ plan. Why? Because the last time I got to the starting line of a marathon was 2012. I need to carefully build fitness. My minimum acceptable objective for this race is to cross the finish line. I’ll save the higher mileage advanced program for another cycle.
The third decision was harder. What would be my goal pace? Here my ego took charge. My BQ time is 3:40, so obviously that would determine my pace. And it did, for several weeks. But it wasn’t realistic. As I’ll explain downstream, all the extra weight I’d put on meant I’d lost more than two min/mile of 10K speed over the last five years.
It took a few weeks of speedwork and my first tempo run to force me to accept this reality. I could not maintain the necessary 5:13 min/km pace, but I could (with some difficulty) maintain 5:45. Suppressing the screams of my ego, I set 4:08:00 as the goal for this marathon. I’ll have to build my bridge to Boston over multiple cycles because my fitness level does not match my dreams yet.
I write this after having completed more than half of the Hanson program. With the benefit of hindsight, I’m able to see just how important these decisions to be patient and methodical have been in the quality of my experience so far. Perhaps the most important consequence is that, so far, I’ve been injury-free. I’ve avoided the overtraining symptoms I’ve experienced in the past. And my confidence has soared as I’ve seen my speed and endurance improve markedly.
But that’s getting of myself. In my next post, I’ll share what I learned during the base-building phase.
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