Entering a half-marathon can lull you in to a false sense of security. It's half the distance of the full 26.2 miles, so surely you'll only do half the training and half the taper, right? But as experienced runners know, there's not too much

This week's question comes from a forum member whose event schedule is looking a bit crowded..."I'm doing the Edinburgh Marathon on 27 May. It's my first marathon, and the training is going OK, though I had two weeks off due to injury. I've got it in my head that I want to do the...

without getting fed up of endless bowls of pasta to mental strategies to get through the taper with sanity intact. Steal some tips for these crucial later stages of your spring marathon training. ASICS PRO Team sports psychologist Dr Victor Thompson tells

then won the event at the Pan-Am Games in July and competed in the World Championships in Athletics at the end of August. All these peaks were the result of what I call reloading and reducing, or a work-taper cycle that balances bolstering fitness and fine

weeks to recover, followed by a couple of weeks of normal training before tapering off again. During the two weeks of training you should not attempt anything which is long and hard; instead, work on shorter distances to improve your VO2max, such as fast

training, you should reach this long-run peak three weeks to a month before race day, then you can start to taper.If this extra mileage seems too much for you, stay with the standard 18- to 20-mile runs of a marathon plan. After all, the 50K is only around

with one or two other sports and watch your running performance improve too.TaperingWhat to do, eat and think in the weeks before race-day.Nutrition on the RunEnergy drinks, bananas, tuna sandwiches - what to eat and drink before, during and after a run

your fitness, and before the pre-race taper that lets you recharge for the big event. Let's assume you're in decent shape after increasing your training through the early winter. To thrive during your Monster Month, it's more important than ever to pay

You can recover whilst taperingI'm a medical type, but I'm not going to give you a responsible answer... a week before should be fine. You'll be tapering by then anyway. – Plodding HippoA week is a long time in hangover landA whole week to recover? Fill

, and we decided not to race after that but to carry on with the training to ensure a really good taper.On race day Christina went through halfway bang on target. Unfortunately she then started to suffer from tight quads - something she has never suffered