be helpful for you to do much of your training with a heart rate monitor in order to familiarise yourself with the pace and heart-rate zones for the five different levels of effort we’ve used in our London Marathon training schedules (easy, slow, steady

eyes over our half-marathon taper guide (non-subscriber preview) for advice on adapting your schedule, tweaking your diet and boosting your mental strength over the course of the next fortnight.Predict your paceType in your target time, and we

, jogging back down 6M steady 8M. Start easily, then put in bursts of 100-200m, jogging after each until you’ve recovered Rest or 5M easy Rest or jog up to 4M Half-marathon raceWeek 6 5M easy, off-road Hill session: 4 x 90 secs-2 mins hill climb, jogging

for a weekly mileage of 35-40, which will help improve your overall speed. During September and October adopt a half-marathon training routine, gradually increasing the distance of your weekend run and adding one longer mid-week run, but retaining one

affect the remainder of my training. Should I aim to run the first half slower, and the second half at marathon pace? Experimental PenguinA. I agree - running a flat-out 20-miler at this stage would be a risk. But by pacing the race as you suggest, you

Closing Soon... Standalone 10K (Hertfordshire, October 5) Runners keep flocking back to this value-for-money fixture, boasting a few gentle inclines, fast downhill finish and generous goody bag.Henley Half-Marathon (Oxfordshire, October 12

and prevention, and a whole section dedicated to schedules for 10K, half-marathon and marathon races, the Guide to Running is full of practical advice that really works. If you want to make the most of your running, this Guide could be all you need.Available from

. Sleaford 10K (Lincolnshire, May 20) Say Sleaford to seasoned road racers and they will instantly think "Half-marathon, February". But now they’ve got a new reason to leg it to Lincolnshire later in the year. The Sleaford Striders have devised a one-lap 10

Smythe, Sam Murphy and the PRO Team in BirminghamEntry to one of a selection of ASICS UK half-marathons in the build up to your marathonTravel to Paris and accommodation in an exclusive central Paris hotel the night before the race VIP post

smashed through it, bringing down the 3:45 mark in the process. He says the reason for his success is simple: he had a schedule, and he stuck to it.Like many people, Stuart had seen the marathon on television and had vaguely thought, ‘I should do that one