What's Next?

Training for a long race goes better if you run with a group that shares your goal and a coach who has helped hundreds runners reach theirs before. You set the goal, and we provide the group support and coaching advice for carrying out our proven plan. This round of training, number 27, targets the Eugene Marathon (on May 7th).

The Eugene Running Company has sponsored this training group since its launch. More than 500 runners have joined us, and their finish rate in marathons is 99-plus percent.

The team usually meets at the Running Company on Sunday mornings at 8:00. The fee for our four months of marathon training is $100.

We welcome runners of all abilities and experience levels. However, we strongly recommend that marathoners have run at least six miles before this training begins.

To reserve a spot on Joe’s Team, contact the coach: joesrunteam@gmail.com. You run with half-marathoners, who are training for Cottage Grove and Eugene at shorter distances. The calendar for winter and spring 2017:

January 8 – 7 miles to start Eugene Marathon training

January 15 – 8 miles  

January 22 – 9 miles

January 29 – 10 miles

February 5 – 11 miles

February 12 – 6 miles

February 19 – 13 miles

February 26 – 7 miles

March 5 – 15 miles (Joe is away)

March 12 – 8 miles

March 19 – 17 miles

March 26 – 9 miles

April 2 – 19 miles

April 9 – 10 miles

April 15 – 21 miles (on Saturday; from Hayward Field)

April 23 – 10 miles

April 30 – one hour

May 7 – Eugene Marathon at 7:00 a.m.

October 9th Marathons

Our marathoners did themselves -- and all of us -- proud on Sunday. Five of them ran marathons in three different states and British Columbia. All finished.

Moving from east to west, Jean Cordova ran 5:19:49 (12:12 pace) and Tatiana Cordova 6:05:51 (13:58s) in the Chicago Marathon. No pair travels better than this mother-daughter team.



At the Twin Cities Marathon, Rashi Arora ran 3:53:03 (8:53s). She lives in that area but synched her training with ours.



At the Portland Marathon, Bill Bezuk ran 4:11:58 (9:37s). This came just a few months after knee surgery.



And at the Victoria Marathon, Leah Kirkland ran 3:40:16 (8:24s). This qualified her for the 2018 Boston Marathon.

October 9th Preview

October 9th, the date you circled a long time ago, and have trained for and thought about ever since, is now here. Safe travels and smooth runs to Rashi in Twin Cities, Bill in Portland, Jean and Tatiana in Chicago, and Leah in Victoria. We're all eager to hear how your races went.

WEEK 22 LESSON: YOUR NEXT

Question: How soon can I run my next marathon after finishing this one

Answer: How does six months later sound? You could run another one much sooner (as soon as a month later, according to the usual recovery timetable). But two marathons per year is a reasonable limit, which is why I schedule only two annual rounds of training for our team. This leaves half the year free to do something other than train for and recover from marathons. Spring and fall are the best times to run this distance because our weather is most reliably cool and dry then. Though we target races in those seasons, it also means doing most of the training in wet Oregon winters and warm summers. If you want to run races in those seasons, keep them shorter.