How do you maintain your fitness post-marathon?

Just finished the marathon and trying to stay focused and motivated into the summer? We partnered with SiS Ambassador, Tom Wake to help you maintain that post-marathon momentum...

Top tips for keeping up momentum post-marathon

Marathon? Tick. But what’s next? Once you’ve achieved the goal of running a marathon, it can be tricky to keep going with your training, especially if you need that external motivation. Ultra marathon runner and SiS Ambassador Tom Wake can relate…

First of all, don’t panic. If you’ve shown commitment and dedication to your training the first time around, you can do it again. It will be hard work, however with the right frame of mind and focus, you’ll be ready to go again after a reset.

It’s very easy to want to keep up your marathon training, week on week, month on month, building upon the miles each time, especially if your training has been going well, you’re injury free and have reached a peak in your fitness. The only way to move forward is to accept that you will lose some of this in order to stay fit and healthy. If your spring marathon has been postponed until autumn, there’s little point in attempting to maintain the same volume and intensity of training that you’re used to. It could lead to overtraining, injuries, tiredness and fatigue.

“The last thing you want is some enforced rest, so the key is to take your foot off the gas and maintain a healthy level of training.” Tom Wake

Re-evaluate your training schedule

Cutting back the volume and intensity will help you to recover from your hard training block so that you’re ready to go again and give it your all.

If you’ve mainly been running on the road, have a look at some alternative trail routes. See if you can come up with challenges like running to roads in your local area containing the letters of your name or instead of doing your regular tempo or speed session, have a play around with a fartlek session using local landmarks.

What other forms of training should you look at?

Cross-training is a great way to maintain fitness whilst also trying out different sports.

If you’re predominately a runner and have access to a bike, gym, or home exercise equipment, have a think about throwing some different sessions into your week. There are lots of different workouts that you could do to add variety to your training and prevent overuse injuries through the training of different muscle groups. You can also use cross-training as active recovery, for example, going for an easy cycle ride the day after a longer run.

Remember to stay consistent

The key is consistency. As long as you keep training consistently and reduce the intensity/volume, you’ll be able to maintain your fitness. Ensure that you get enough sleep, eat healthily and drink lots of water.

Tom also highlights that “post marathon, you can continue to use energy gels to support your training. Whether I’m in peak marathon training mode or not, I always ensure that I’m replenishing glycogen stores, vitamins and minerals that I lose during exercise. Check out the wide variety of SiS Go Gels and Hydration tabs.”

Who are SiS?

Now you know all about post-marathon fitness, we thought we’d briefly explain who SiS are. Standing for Science in Sport, SiS are a leading endurance nutrition brand. They combine world-class knowledge and scientific formulations to create optimal solutions to support you.

The final say

The key to all of this is to enjoy maintaining your running and fitness. Train for the love of what you do and don’t worry about pace or times, the pressure is off… for now.

To help you keep up the momentum, check out the full range of Science in Sport products online today.

Tom Wake

SiS Ambassador, trail, ultra-marathon runner and coach.