In three short weeks our Boston bound marathoners will toe the starting line of the 112th Boston Marathon. What you do during the 3 weeks known as your taper are critical to your marathon experience. Why taper?
- Training provides the long term improvements necessary to successfully complete a marathon.
- Training leaves athletes a bit tired most of the time.
- The 3-week cycles provide some reduction in fatigue, but it is not enough to completely eliminate it and allow your body full physiological recovery.
- The goal of tapering is to balance continued training and resting to allow for the best possible marathon experience.
- The International Journal of Sports Medicine examined over 50 scientific studies on tapering and concluded that there is no doubt tapering works.
- Studies have found improvements in performance of up to 16% with most studies showing 3 – 5% improvement. At a 5% improvement, that means a 3:30 marathon can become a 3:19 marathon through proper tapering.
- A single workout, on the other hand will give you less than a 1% improvement in performance!
How Long Should You Taper?
How Should You Reduce Training to Improve Marathon Performance?
- Evidence indicates that the key to effective tapering is to substantially reduce mileage while maintaining intensity.
- Reducing mileage reduces the accumulated fatigue.
- High intensity effort maintains fitness level.
- Exactly how much to reduce training mileage depends on your current training mileage, age and health. Older runners tend to need a longer taper than younger runners.
Studies have shown as a general rule of thumb: - 3rd Week Premarathon: Taper 20 – 25%
2nd Week Premarathon: Taper 40%
Marathon Week (6 days before): Taper 60%. - Three weeks before is the most important time for a successful taper. Marathoners often do too much this week because the marathon still seems a long way off.
- It is much better physiologically and psychologically to allow your body to start to rebound this week, or you will find yourself feeling flat the last two weeks.
- Often marathoners also decrease training efforts. This can result in a small loss in fitness as well as a lack of psychological reinforcement.
- It is more effective to intersperse harder efforts within the recovery trend.
- For example, the Comet schedule has 3 x 1-mile intervals the 2nd week pre-marathon.
Marathon week itself is all easy recovery, with the exception of Tuesday or Wednesday where it is recommended you do a 6 – 7 mile run with 2 miles at marathon pace.
This is a dress rehearsal, even wear the same shoes and clothes you will wear for the marathon! - By this time, if you have tapered properly starting with the 3rd week, you should feel light on your feet, like you can fly…this will provide a great psychological boost!
Carbo-loading and Hydration During the Taper
- It is vitally important that your muscles and liver be stocked with glycogen at the starting line.
- Marathoners used to deplete glycogen stores for 3 days (sometimes even completing a long run up to 20-miles the week before), then carbo-load the 3 days prior to the marathon.
- This is no longer recommended since carbohydrate depletion can suppress the immune system (this is why many marathoners get a cold the week after a marathon – glycogen stores have been depleted) and the long run will leave you sore and tired.
- What works just as well is to eat a normal diet until the last 3 days and taper your training program.
- Then the last 3 days, eat a high carbohydrate diet and do a short, slow run these days.
Your body will store glycogen to almost the same level as if you did the whole depletion and loading program. - Also, make sure you are well-hydrated in the days leading up to the marathon so that you don’t arrive at the starting line suffering from accumulated effects of dehydration.
Source:
Pfitzinger, P., and S. Douglas. 2001. Advanced Marathoning. Champaign, IL:Human Kinetics.
