Race · Sunday 27 September 2026 · 42.195 km
Berlin
My own training · Race completed
3:17:35
A new marathon personal best and my second World Marathon Major. A tough race, and a finish I am proud of.
The target and the day
I published a target of 3:08 to 3:10 before Berlin. I finished in 3:17:35. It was a new PB, and it was outside the target. Both belong in the story.
Afterwards I described it as a tough race and a twelve-minute PB. The preparation mattered, but a training target is still a prediction. The finish is the result.
What this means for my coaching
I use the same approach with my own training: set a goal, review the evidence and keep the outcome visible. A PB is worth celebrating. Missing the target is worth reviewing.
This is my own racing experience. Callum and Tessa’s stories show the work with people I coach.
Read the client stories →
Three photographs from the build.
The checkpoint.
1:28:56 at Battersea. The half marathon set the target for Berlin.
The race note →The result.
3:17:35. A new marathon personal best, beside the 3:08–3:10 target I published before the race.
Target and result →The people in the picture.
With Emma outside the Reichstag after Berlin. The finish has more in it than a time.
More race photographs →The original plan, published before the race
Historical plan, preserved for comparison. The predictions and instructions below describe the build before 27 September, rather than a current training prescription.
The target
The floor is 3:15, which is 4:37 per km. If the day goes wrong, easing to 5:00 per km still finishes around 3:15. Walking costs far more than easing off.
Marathon best going in is 3:29. So the target is a nineteen minute personal best, and I would rather write that down in public than round it off afterwards.
Where the number came from
Two of my own runs, not a race predictor. The Battersea half in July came out at 1:28:56, and the standard conversion off a half puts that at 3:05 for a marathon. Then an 8 km at 4:32 per km in mid August ran with 21 beats of heart rate still in hand, which said the pace was aerobic rather than borrowed.
3:05 is what the conversion says. 3:08 to 3:10 is what I am actually going to run, because the conversion assumes marathon endurance I have not proved yet. My longest run before this block was 20 km.
How I intend to run it
One rule sits above all of this. Nothing quicker than 4:28 per km before 32 km, whatever it feels like at the time.
Fuelling is a gel every 30 minutes from 40 minutes in, six or seven of them, water at every station. The gels are not optional at 20 km when everything feels fine. That is exactly when the problem at 35 km gets built.
What could still change it
The target is confirmed or adjusted by one session, a 32 km on 6 September with the last 12 at race pace. If that holds, the number stands. If it drifts past 4:35 in the race-pace block, the race opens slower and 3:11 or 3:12 is the honest read.
It does not get raised in race week. Feeling fresh during a taper is the taper working, not new fitness arriving, and that is the most common way a good build turns into a bad race.
This is the same thing I do with the people I coach. The plan is a hypothesis, the sessions are the test, and the number moves when the data says so rather than when the mood does. That is the coaching →