Is the Hansons Marathon Method Too Hard? How to Tell, and What to Change

How the Hansons plan builds

The classic Beginner plan runs 18 weeks on six days a week. It starts at about 12 miles a week and reaches roughly 55 at its peak.¹ Its hard days are what Hansons calls SOS: speed, strength and stamina.²

The long run tops out at 16 miles for most runners. Luke Humphrey, who coaches with Hansons and wrote the book with Kevin and Keith Hanson, keeps a long run to about 25 to 30 percent of the week and about three hours, because a longer run takes days to recover from and costs the training around it.³

Humphrey is clear that the 16 miler alone will not get the job done. The plan works as a whole week, and runners who skimp on the rest of it, or add 20 milers on top, miss the point.⁴

What runners report

The reports we read are on running forums and runners' own blogs. In these reports the trouble comes from starting above your running, or from running the hard days too hard.

• A runner (February 2014) who had run 20 to 30 miles a week jumped onto the Advanced plan. Weeks in, they felt lightheaded and worn out after a 15 miler, and stepped their mileage back that week. They said they had come in without the base the plan assumes.⁵
• A runner (July 2014) went from 24 miles one week to 39 the next in week 6, and wanted to call that week's post "the one that almost did me in".⁶
• A runner (December 2014 to January 2015 thread) said their training partner overdid the speed and strength workouts and was injured about four weeks before the race.⁷
• Others did well on it. Two runners (June 2013) ran 3:48 and 3:42, each a little under their goal, and one planned to use the same plan again.⁸

How a coach tells whether your plan is too hard

A coach never judges a plan on its own. They read it against the running you do now. These checks catch most plans that start above the runner:

1. The peak against your last four weeks. The Beginner plan climbs to about 55 miles a week on six days. If you run three days a week now, the plan asks for twice the days and far more miles. More in the base building guide.
2. Which plan you picked. A runner who chose the Advanced plan on ambition rather than on the miles they run now starts weeks ahead of themselves.
3. The paces on hard days. Humphrey says runners who run their workouts and easy days too hard, too often, are the ones who burn out early.⁹ Hold the paces the plan gives you, not faster.
4. When the tiredness comes. Humphrey says that feeling burnt out with more than eight weeks to go means you are pushing too hard.⁹
5. Whether workouts hold. Tired legs with workouts that still go to plan are the fatigue the method builds. Workouts that keep slipping are a sign you have gone past it.⁴

What to change in the Hansons plan

Hansons' own coaches show how far the plan can bend:

• Slow down to the paces you were given. Humphrey says a runner who was going too fast and slows to the prescribed paces is making a correction, not failing.⁴
• Spread the workouts out. When fatigue runs ahead of the plan, Humphrey suggests moving the hard days further apart, such as Tuesday, Friday and Sunday, and putting sleep and food first.⁴
• Trade a workout for something lighter. Corey Kubatzky, a coach at Luke Humphrey Running, ranks the choices for a sore or sick day: the full workout, the same workout by effort, the same miles at easier paces, easy miles only, a shorter easy run, cross training, then rest. Pick the one closest to the top that will not make things worse.¹⁰
• Use a plan with more room. Humphrey's coaching group also offers versions of the classic plans on a nine day cycle with a day off, so there are more easy days between the hard ones.²

What if it feels too easy?

The early weeks are meant to feel easy, and the 16 mile long run can look short next to plans that run 20. Humphrey says the long run is only one part of the plan, and that being fresh in the last six to eight weeks means you are not training hard enough.⁹ If the whole plan sits well below what you already run, it did not start from you. A coach starts you close to the running you already do, and builds from there.