Subject: RE: How much quicker are you at running events from your training runsFirst, you're comparing a training run time with a race time, over different terrain.  Not exactly a fair comparison.  
 
Now, as to what I saw the last time I ran a marathon, my longest run of 18 miles was done at a pace of high 8s.  I ran a marathon 3 weeks after that  (not an official taper in there, but hey ), and hit 7:22 pace or so.  I ran another marathon about a month after that one, and hit 7:20 pace.  My 5K time at that point was 19:55  (done about a week before that first listed marathon ). 
  
My "easy effort" runs were generally in the 8 min range, with some faster and some slower.  Medium effort/"tempo" runs were in the 7s.  I didn't do a lot of running at what ended up as my race pace, either.  Most of it was slower, even the harder runs.  |