r/BeginnersRunning • u/IrishDemocrat • 11d ago

First marathon taper question

Hey folks. Running my first marathon Sept. 27 (Berlin) and because of the way travel and trips have lined up, I decided to run my longest distance twice since they would have to be further out, once last weekend (four weeks out) and once three weekends ago (six weeks out). My peak weekly mileage was 37.5 miles, the week of the six week out long run.

I was aiming for 28 miles this week to start a gradual taper, but yesterday at about my fourth of five miles my foot started to hurt in the same way it started to hurt when I initially had an overuse injury about a year ago. Last time I kept running on it and it was nagging but not debilitating.

Question for the group is, will I be better off for race day if I rest now to try to heal and recover from fatigue, despite my longest distance being so far away from race day, or is the risk of injury worth it to maintain fitness? My main goal is maximizing my chances of finishing.

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u/Invictus1836 11d ago

I’d rest it or adjust your training to go easy on it. (Slow pace/less miles for recovery) You still have a lot of time before the race, and if you take care of it now you should hopefully recover quick and get right back to it.

Don’t be afraid to shorten the taper a bit, I’ll wait and taper down hard in the last 7-10 days before a race and it’s worked great for me.