A friend told me to get a copy of Marius Bakken's 100 Day Marathon Plan. He had used it successfully in his first ever marathon. After reading this book, he immediately applied what he learned and successfully finished the marathon in a time better than what he expected.
I learned a lot from this book. I found the Italian and Kenyan training principles helpful. You can definitely see how that is applied in the training. The approach to long runs (making them run/walks) is different to what I have seen in other running programs.
Had it not been for my friend's experiences I would have been very hesitant to try out this approach. But after somebody close to me had done this with success I decided to give it a try myself. I did my marathon a week and a half back and I not only finished it, but also 23 minutes faster than what I had expected originally.
I am very proud of my achievements, but I know that the marathon running program played a big part in my success.
For anyone wanting to know why this program is so different, I think I can sum it up as follows:
Less focus on just mileage, more focus on higher intensity training sessions.
Long runs include a proportion of walking.
Starts off with 5k training, then 10k training, and so on, getting you ready for the marathon just in time.
I am not sure if it is easier than other marathon running programs out there. There are definitely a number of tough sessions in there. But I would definitely say that it seems to be more sophisticated than what I have seen online.
I am very happy with it and would recommend it to anyone who would like to run a marathon.
Addition by Dominique:
Hi there,
Thanks for your review.
I have done a review of this book as well. You can find it here:
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