Hi!

Are you a runner who seek to run faster now, making good time on a race day and wow your friends?

If you are not, you are in the wrong place. And if you are that kind of runner, no matter how talented or how less talented you are, now you made the right decision. So, please read this article to the end.

I’m the Japanese running master Ikegami. I ran half marathon 63:09 and coached hundreds Japanese amateur runners who made their personal best time and ran under 90 minutes for men and 97 minutes for women. Based on my experience as a runner and an athlete, I will tell you how to train for sub 90 half marathon.

Before I explain the 3 steps how to run half marathon under 90 minutes for men and 97 minutes for women, I will explain you the 5 factors you need to build for sub 90 minutes.

What I mean by basic endurance is resistance ability and recovery ability, in other words, how hard you can train without any injuries and how fast you can recover after workouts. One of the best coaches in the world named Renato Canova who is an Italian said ‘’Training starts with hitting shower because training has no meaning if you do not recover enough’’. Recovery is also important training.

However, recovery ability varies very much between people. Most people highly believe that the older you get, the slower you recover. It is not 100% wrong, but also only 30% right. After runners in their 40s and 50s did what I told them, many of them said ‘’Now, I can recover faster than when I was in my 20s’’.

I do not deny that the older you get, the slower you recover. However, you will not try to run

Marathon under 2:10 when you are 60 years old, right? Most goals for amateur runners including marathon sub 3 is achievable at the age of 60. And to achieve that goal, you do not need any special talents or gifts.

Basically, the higher your goal is, the harder you train. And in terms of training hard, you need to understand the following two training loads.

The first one is the external training load. The external training load is physically how hard you train. I give you an example, 10km in 40 minutes running is 10km in 40 minutes running no matter who does this. No matter you do it, Eliud Kipchoge does it or I do it. 10km in 40 minutes running is 10km in 40 minutes running for everybody. It’s impossible that your 10km in 40 minutes run is faster than my 10km in 40 minutes run. This is the external training load.

However, in terms of fatigue, there is the difference between you, Eliud Kipchoge and me. If I do 10km in 40 minutes running, I will get more tired than Eliud Kipchoge does. And if you are a 10km 40 minutes runner, you get much more tired than I do after the run. This is the internal training load.

In terms of the external training load, the higher your goal gets, the harder you need to train. However, the internal training load must be always the same once you know how to train properly.

And the internal training depends on your recovery ability. The faster you recover, the less the internal training load gets, even if the external training load is the same. Also, you have less chances to get injured if your recovery ability is high and your bones, tendons, muscles, ligaments are tough.

This is what I mean by basic endurance.

What I mean by the basic speed is how much your body is used to speed, in other words, how fast you can run in shorter distances. But of course, sprint is completely different. The distance should be enough long but still short. I always use 5000m to measure someone’s basic speed for half marathon and full marathon. The reason is very simple. If the distance shorter than 5000m, I see much less correlation with the time of half marathon or full marathon.

Of course, the faster you are able to run 1500m, the better for half marathon and full marathon. However, I see much less correlation and if it is a 400m race or shorter than a 400m race, I see no correlation with the time of full marathon and half marathon.

There are two reasons why I use 5000m.

First, if you run 5000m enough fast, it is already OK for speed. Now, you can focus on endurance and/or speed-endurance. Meaning, we can know exactly what you need to do for running half marathon under 90 minutes.

Second, the shorter the distance is, the less fatigue you get. I am not saying shorter distances are easier than longer distances. Of course, it is difficult to run 5000m under 14 minutes. It is much more difficult than running full marathon under 3 hours. However, you cannot deny that you are more tired or you need more time to recover when you run a full marathon race than when you run a 5000m race.

That means, it is easier to make 5x1km with 2 minutes recovery in 5000m race pace, than 21x1km with 2 minutes recovery in half marathon race pace. Especially if you live in somewhere hot place, like, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore or Philippine. If it is hot, it is better to do something short. Otherwise, it is difficult to repeat it. Improvements come from consistency. Consistent good workouts always beat one great workout.

Now the question is how fast you need to run in 5000m to run half marathon under 90 minutes or 97 minutes?

If you improve your speed-endurance as humanly as possible, you need only 10 seconds per kilometer. For example, if you want to run half marathon with 4:15/km pace, then you need to run 5000m at least 4:05/km pace. In my case, my 5000m personal best time is 14:20, 2:52/km and half marathon race pace is 2:59/km. So, there is only 7 seconds per kilometer difference.

However, normally amateur runners need more gaps because the training volume is much less than top runners and that’s why they lack endurance. So, I recommend you to have 15 seconds per kilometer, in other words, if you are able to run 5000m 20 minutes, you are fast enough to run half marathon under 90 minutes in terms of basic endurance. Another example is, of course, if you are able to run 5000m 21:15, you are fast enough to run half marathon 97 minutes in terms of basic endurance.

Of course, you can consider getting more endurance, but I don’t think it is realistic to run 600-800km a month consistently for amateur runners. If you can do that, do that. However, most of runners I coach who ran half marathon faster than 90 minutes train only 300km a month. Some run a bit less and some run a bit more.

On a race day, you run with full effort, all out, you give it all, right?

If not, run harder and in case you need me to yell at you or beat you to push you, please let me know. However, how fast you are able to run with full effort depends on how fast you are able to run without feeling hard basically.

Why you don’t need to run with full effort in training?

Again, consistency is the key. The easier a workout is, the easier you can repeat it. Another reason is, the less external load a workout has, the easier your body adapts to it. Remember, the race result is not what you did in training, but what you did in training and how well your body adapted to your training.

Again, here is coach Renato Canova’s word ‘’Your race result is not your training, but the answer to your training’’.

While if your training is easy, it is easier to adapt to it though, it is not enough to get faster. So, basically you want to repeat something moderate. It is not easy and not hard. This kind of intensity would be 5:00-4:40/km pace for sub 90 runners and 5:20-5:00/km for sub 97 minutes runners.

But the point is not running at those paces but running as fast as possible without feeling hard or breathing significantly harder, in other words, you run as fast as possible to the extent that you don’t hear your breathing. If you hear your breathing, it is already too fast! Or if you feel hard subjectively during that run, it is already too fast! And if you repeat it, naturally you can run faster with the same effort or feeling.

What do I mean by consistently?

It is 2-4 times a month, in other words, once every two weeks, once in 10 days or once a week. But if you prepare for a half marathon, I want you to do a long run once a week because for half marathoners, long runs are not very long, 20-30km is enough long for half marathoners. For marathoners, 30-45km are enough long.

The goal is running 20-30km with 5:00-4:40/km for runners who aim at sub 90 half marathon and 5:20-5:00/km for runners who aim at half marathon 97 minutes without suffering much. Exactly speaking, after a long run, if you are able to recover and train normally again with only 1-2 easy days, you already have enough basic endurance.

There are basic endurance and basic speed. And now, if you combine these two factors, that becomes speed-endurance. To build up speed-endurance, you need to run fast and long at the same time. But a workout in training should not be as hard as a race. Then it is very difficult to repeat it and your body adapts to it.

In terms of distance. 10km or more than 10km is enough and in terms of speed, faster than 90% of your race pace is OK. What I mean by the race pace is not your goal race pace, but your current personal best time pace. I believe that you train for your new personal best time. So, in terms of speed workouts, up to 105% of the race pace is acceptable. More than 105% is risky.

Here are some examples :

1 6-7x2km at 102-103% race pace with 2 minutes jogging recovery

2 20-25km run at 90% race pace

3 10-12km run at 95-100% race pace

Of course, there are more varieties. These workouts are called specific workouts because these workouts are so specific for half marathon. You can do 10km moderate runs or 5x1km at 5000m race pace with 2 minutes recovery jogging. These workouts are good, but not so specific for half marathon.

But never forget, before you go for these specific workouts, in other words, workouts for building up speed-endurance, you need to build up basic endurance and basic speed. Never rush. The most common mistake that amateur runners make is, overestimating specific workouts and underestimating basic workouts.

Now, I will tell you the 3 steps. The 3 steps are according to the 5 factors you need.

First step is building up basic endurance with increasing your mileage, frequency of running and the speed of moderate runs gradually. Frequency is also one of the most common factor people miss. Remember, more often you repeat it, the easier you can adapt it whatever it is.

The standard is running 5 times a week, 300km a month and your moderate runs are as fast as 5:00-4:40/km for sub 90 minutes and 5:20-5:00/km for 97 minutes.

And at the same time, you build up basic speed. To do this, I introduce you two types of workouts.

The first one is supplemental speed workouts, something like 10x100m or 5x200m or 1x1km in approximately at 3000-5000m race pace. This is not a main workout, so you add these workouts into your easy runs or moderate runs.

I will give you an example. You jog to a park for warming up, do 8km moderate run, right after that you add 5x200m with 1 minute recovery jogging and go back to your home for cooling down.

Also I want you to do a speed workout as a main workout once a week. The purpose is not for training hard but getting used to speed. So, it should not be very hard. Try to run fast and stay as much relaxed as possible at the same time.

Here are some examples.

1 20x200m at 1500m race pace with 200m jogging recovery

2 10-15x400m at 3000m-5000m race pace with 200m jogging recovery

3 15-25x1 minute fast and 1 minute jogging at 5000m-3000m subjective race effort.

Once, you get basic endurance and basic speed, approximately 70-80% of your work is done.

Second step is extend your long runs and extend your speed workouts.

You should not change whole structure. But extend only your long run up to 30km with the same pace, maximal once a week, not more than that.

And also you increase the volume of your speed workouts up to totally 10km gradually.

For example, you do now 15x400m with 200m jogging recovery at 5000m race pace, then the next step would be 10x600m with 200m jogging recovery at 5000m race pace, then the next step would be 10x800m with 200m jogging recovery at 10000m-8000m or something like that.

The third step is doing specific workouts which I already mentioned previously. And in the last 2 weeks before the race, you cut down all workouts to 50-70% volume with the same intensity. The most common mistake is decreasing volume and increasing intensity in a tapering period. The reason why you should not do this is that the purpose of tapering is recovering more than usual to prepare for a race well and giving your body more chances to adapt to the training stimulus you gave your body in the past.

Once you have done these 3 steps in 3-6 months, you are ready to break your record. Again, never be rush, you need always 3-6 months preparation to perform the best.

Lastly, if you want to learn more about training for long distance, click here to download my e-book ‘’The 3 factors you get faster dramatically without any injuries and overtraining'' because it will help you a lot.

Thank you for reading!!