Marathon 3.5 months before Ironman?

3.5 monts is plenty of time - especially given your marathon experience since you know how long it takes you to recover.  I think marathon training is good base training for an IM and gives a good interim milestone on the road to your IM.

As with all things training, you'll always find opinions to support or renounce your training ideas/plans.  :-)

~Mike

It's all about staying fit and having fun.

Sure you can do it but it will negatively effect your IM.

I wouldn't do it. Takes to long to taper and recover add in you'll have a big hole in time when you should be doing a lot of cycling and won't be able too.

Unless you take an unusually long amount of time to recover from a marathon I say do it.  Before IMLou this year I set a marathon PR exactly 5 months before IM (a little longer than your time frame).  I bounced back pretty quickly and didn't really miss a beat.

 Next year I'm running Boston in April then doing IMLou again in August.  I like running races so I don't really want to give that up.  Also like you said it gives me motivation to keep going through the winter months. 

It depends on how quickly you recover and how hard you press and how many miles a month you regularly run.  If you routinely log 40+ miles a week and have done so for years and your long run is usually 15+ miles every week, then a marathon is not such a epic undertaking.  But if you barely manged to get in 20 miles per week and you 'long run' is normally 8 - 10 miles, then a marathon is gonna take a much great toll on your body.

So, like all things triathlong, one size does NOT fit all.  :-)

~Mike

Normally I tell people that IM training and marathons do not mix well together.

However, given your past race times, including a 3:13 marathon PR, you may have a chance to qualify for Kona at IMCDA (if you train right).  If you are thinking of racing to qualify then I would not run a marathon at 17 weeks out.

If you have no intention of trying to qualify then given your past history a marathon would not be a problem for you.

WE INTERUPT THIS THREAD FOR MOMENTARY HIJACK....

devotchkatata - 2008-10-17 3:53 PM Thanks for the input everyone! Some good pros and cons and good discussion. I haven't made up my mind, but I am leaning towards opting out of the marathon based on this thread and some other advice that I got. While qualifying might be a stretch, I do want to kick butt at the Ironman! I think I would probably be able to manage the training and recovery IF everything went well. Although as some of you pointed out I would have to make tradeoffs between long runs and bike rides during the base building.. However, the risk of injury is something that scares me even more. I couldn't run my normal volume for 2 months after my last marathon because of the hamstring injury during the race and although not extremely likely, if something like this happened again it would certainly undermine my Ironman training. Instead I am going to run a solid half marathon and join a cycling team this winter so that I get as fast on the bike as I am on the run!!! Then, it's just the matter of surviving 2.4 miles in the water... Good luck in all the marathons and Ironmans and other races to all of you!

Glad I could help!!  Oh wait....I said you should do it.  Uh....never mind.

:-)

~Mike

Amy, you should have to caveat your advice with "I'm not mortal....I train twice a day, 7 days a week and I've biked 5,000 so far this year."   :-)

~Mike

Unless you incorporate some biking in with your marathon training. One of the things I love about Ironman training is that much of my run training is spent on the bike. As a triathlete, why would you ever focus just on running? I think 3 1/2 months is plenty of time to fully recover from a marathon.

Keep in mind that I am just a swimmer turned triathlete, not a runner. In 2007 I spent the winter training for a May marathon (my first marathon) and building a big swim base. I did some spinning classes once or twice a week to keep my biking legs and started biking outside after the marathon. I did my first marathon that May, first Oly in June, first HIM in July and first IM in Sept of 2007. I had no trouble recovering and actually did my current PR for my Oly 2 weeks after IMWI that year.

My thought is if you always keep your IM base and train for IM distance races then focusing on a marathon 3 1/2 months out from an IM should never be a problem. I just did a marathon Sunday as a long run for my IM coming up in 2 weeks. (I did run a bit harder than planned and BQ's ) 

I'm just a swimmer turned triathlete though.

X2 - I agree with the hot chick!! SHE ROCKS!!!