Magic Mile
Why the Magic Mile?
After working with over 300,000 runners over 40 years, I’ve compiled hundreds of performances and established a prediction formula based on a one-mile trial. In other words, every two weeks or so, you can run a measured mile (at a good, hard pace) and use the time to predict what you could run at longer distances.
This assumes that:
The calculation uses the formula below.
- Add 33 seconds to your magic mile for your pace for a 5K
- Multiply your magic mile time by 1.15 for your 10K pace
- Multiply your magic mile time by 1.175 for your 10 Mile pace
- Multiply your magic mile time by 1.2 for your half-marathon pace
- Multiply your magic mile time by 1.3 for your marathon pace
Here’s how to do the one-mile time trial:
- Warm up with a slow one-mile run
- Do a few acceleration gliders.
- Pace yourself as even as possible on each quarter mile.
- Run about as hard as you could run for one mile–but no puking! (finish feeling that you couldn’t have run more than a football field at the same pace)
- Keep walking after the time trial for 5 minutes, and jog a slow 1-6 miles, as needed for the mileage for that day.
Recommended Run-Walk-Run Strategies
Pace/mi Run Walk
7:00 6 min 30 sec (or run a mile/walk 40 seconds)
7:30 5 min 30 sec
8:00 4 min 30 sec (or 2/15)
8:30 3 min 30 sec (or 2/20)
9:00 2 min 30 sec or 80/20
9:30-10:45 90/30 or 60/20 or 45/15 or 60/30 or 40/20
10:45-12:15 60/30 or 40/20 or 30/15 or 30/30 or 20/20
12:15-14:30 30/30 or 20/20 or 15/15
14:30-15:45 15/30
15:45-17:00 10/30
17:00-18:30 8/30 or 5/25 or 10/30
18:30-20:00 5/30 or 5/25 or 4/30
Pace/km Run Walk
4:30/km 5 min 30 sec
5 min/km 4 min 30 sec
5:30/km 2 min 30 sec
6 min/km 90 sec 30 sec
6:30/km 75 sec 30 sec
7 min/km 60 sec 30 sec
8 min/km 30 sec 30 sec
9 min/km 20 sec 30 sec
10 min/km 15 sec 30 sec
11 min/km 10 sec 30 sec
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