I don’t remember how I came across Master the Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide for Women, by Ali Nolan, but it piqued my interest right away.
Despite the fact that women make up an increasingly large share of marathon runners – in some cases making up a clear majority in the younger age groups – the world of marathon training still tends to be male dominated.
The most common training guides for advanced runners are Pete Pfitzinger and Jack Daniels, and beginners are often pointed towards Hal Higdon. Although I’ve read Grete Waitz' Run Your First Marathon and think it’s a great resource for beginners, I never see it as recommended reading.
I recently read Better Faster Farther, by Maggie Mertens – which is another good read. And she makes the argument that women in running have often been trained exactly like men, to their detriment. So the idea of a training guide by and for women sounded intriguing.
I read through Master the Marathon, and overall I think it’s a great resource for novice to intermediate runners. It’s also likely a great read and resource for all women runners, even if the advanced training plan may not be advanced enough for you.
I’m adding it to my list of the best books about marathon training, and I’ll leave a few reflections below.
This Book Is Clearly By and For Women
I’ll admit it, as a man I often take for granted the way that men are centered in society. When reading about running, for example, much of the advice comes from men and many of the stories are about men. Even if gendered pronouns aren’t used, it’s easy for me to see myself in the hypothetical runner being trained.
While reading this book, it’s very clear that the author was very intentional about centering women.
The forward is written by Des Linden, and most (all?) of the experts referenced in the book are women. The pictures of runners doing the warm-ups and exercises are all women. She sometimes uses “women” in place of “runners,” and there are plenty of little anecdotes and jokes that imply that the reader is a woman.
As a man reading the book, it causes a little cognitive dissonance. But that’s ok, because the book isn’t for me.
I mention this because the kinds of things that make me stop and pause to think, “Is this book for me?” are likely the little things that will also make the book feel natural and welcoming to all of the women runners out there who may not have felt included by the other running books they’ve read.
There’s a Balanced Approach to Nutrition
Diet can be a strange topic for runners. I’ve seen a few intense conversations, and they often tend to lean one way or the other – either pay strict attention to what you eat, lest you gain wait or completely ignore your diet because weight doesn’t matter.
Nolan includes a whole chapter on diet and food, and its refreshingly balanced. On the one hand, she warns against the dangers of under fueling and using marathon training specifically as a tool to lose weight. And she makes it clear that while you can eat “clean,” you don’t need to be obsessive about avoiding “bad” foods.
One of my pet peeves is when runners complain that they can’t keep on weight, and that they need ideas for “clean” food they can snack on. If your diet is so healthy you can’t keep on the weight … just eat a damn french fry.
But I digress. At the same time, Nolan acknowledges that weight is a component of performance. This is coupled with the idea that body composition – increasing lean muscle mass and decreasing fat – is the real key to performance gains – as opposed to simply losing weight.
While it’s true that a lighter runner is a swifter runner, that works only if your body is in balance and has enough muscle to carry it forward […] When you feel like being lighter fits into that plan, I invite you to think about it as balancing your composition – not losing pounds.
It’s a refreshingly balanced and nuanced take.
She Takes the Long View
From the get go, Nolan takes the long view of how to prepare for a marathon. In the beginning of the book, she offers this advice:
- An intermediate or advanced runner should plan for a race that is at least six months away
- A casual runner should plan for a race that is about a year away
- And someone who is completely new to running should plan for a race that is about sixteen months away
She sets the tone early on that this is a long term commitment, and getting into shape for a marathon requires months of consistent work. This isn’t a book that aims to take the New Year’s Resolution runner from couch to marathon in time for an April race.
The book pre-base and base training plans to get you prepared for the actual marathon training. For some runners, they may seem frustratingly slow and conservative. But for the true beginners, they are definitely the place to start.
Today, I regularly run 60 or 70 miles per week. But when I was getting started, I stuck with a simple schedule of 3 miles a day, 3 times a week, for a month. I often felt like I could do more, but I credit building that base before I slowly began to increase my mileage as the key to the fact that I’ve been running for five years without any major issues.
I looked back at Hal Higdon's Marathon and, although he suggests that beginners start with a more gentle introduction before attempting his plans, he doesn’t offer any specific guidance. Nolan’s inclusion of the pre-base plans are an important tool for the true beginners who are running for the first time.
At the same time, the lengths to which she addresses beginner runners is an early nod to the fact that the book is well suited for novice and intermediate runners – and it’s not designed to push women to the peak of their potential.
The Plans Are On Par With Higdon in Terms of Difficulty
The core of any good marathon training book is the actual training plan. That’s what often gets ripped out into a PDF that people look for … as they ignore all of the other important parts of the book.
Don’t be that person. Read the whole book.
But when you do get to the training plans, you’ll find they’re kind of on par with Hal Higdon plans in terms of difficult. There are three tiers – beginner, intermediate, and advanced.
The beginner plan calls for running 4 days a week, with some optional cross training. The weekday runs are a little longer than Higdon and there’s a little less tilt towards the long run. Which is a good thing for balance and one of the common critiques of Higdon.
The intermediate plan increases to 5 days a week and adds in a weekly workout. However, mileage still peaks around 30-40 miles. With the advanced plan, you’ll still run 5 days a week, but you’ll be running 40+ miles most weeks.
These plans seem perfectly adequate for getting someone through their first marathon and progressing towards something like a 4:00 to 4:30 marathon. But if someone is looking to get to the mid-3:00’s or lower – for example, to BQ – then I don’t think these are the plans to get you there.
The book is still worth a read, though.
Two Women’s Topics Seem Conspicuously Absent
Although the book is great in a lot of ways, there were a few topics that seemed conspicuously absent to me.
First, there’s no mention of pregnancy at all. I know some women run right through their pregnancy without issue and/or bounce back quickly after giving birth. But I’ve also seen women ask for advice – especially on the bouncing back piece. As a man, I wouldn’t even know how to answer that question – other than standard advice about coming back after an extended break.
Second, there’s nothing about aging and the hormonal changes that come with that. This is another topic that I’ve seen a few women ask about online. More broadly, there’s not even a mention about running as a master’s athlete. Looking back on the book, it kind of feels like a training guide for young women – in their 20’s and 30’s.
In any other training book, I’d chalk this up to the author not paying attention to that audience. But in a book written by and for women, it kind of strikes me as a bit odd that neither of these topics would be addressed at all.
The Bottom Line on Master the Marathon
If you’re a woman who’s either thinking of getting into running or early in your running journey – this is the book for you. It’s full of sound advice for runners, and it’s likely a better guide than another beginner’s book like Hal Higdon.
Even if you’re more advanced in your running journey, I think the book is worth a read. The women who are looking to qualify for Boston will likely find the training plans a bit light. But that doesn’t mean the book doesn’t have a few nuggets of wisdom for you.
I’m adding Master the Marathon to my list of the best books about marathon training. If you have any opinions on the book, I’d love to hear them below.