Success stories:

have to tell you that your email made my day. That you took the time to see how I did really means a lot. I will absolutely use the site again and recommend it highly to my running friends. It was a great accomplishment for me, and I had my pace band on the whole way!
- M.N.,
A thousand thanks for your congratulations....and for the pace bands! They were, indeed, a great help to me. At the half marathon mark I realized I had more to give and opened it up, but until then, I followed the band to the letter AND helped guide a friend of mine for the first half. She also finished a few minutes ahead of her goal time!
- W.J.,
I've used them in my several marathons and 1/2 marathons and they always help bring me in under my goal time. Best product on the market - hands down.
- J.F., AL
At mile 9 I was feeling a bit draggy and looked at my garmin and my pace band and thought--this is doable. You kept me going all the way to the 50 yard line in the Husker stadium. Thank you for your good work.
- T.G., Lincoln, NE
As someone with an engineering background, I find the combination of the pace bands along with my Garmin GPS (310XT model with heart rate monitor and cadence sensor) a good way to "tune" my performance.
- J.P., DENVER, CO
YES the pace bands were invaluable. I thought it was funny that the band I wore had 3:16:59 and that was my exact time across the finish. There were a couple time on the final miles that I started to stress because I could feel my self slowing but I would look down and think "whew they were planning on this" and it helped me relax and finish strong.
- D.P. , Kansas City, MO
Only $7.50
for a set
of 3 bands

SmartPace Bands

When every second counts, account for every second.

A good pace band should tell you what the plan is for each mile. Most give you "even splits" where your first mile pace is the same as your last and where a downhill is the same as a brutal 200 foot climb.

So, while the course looks like this: ,

your pace band still looks like this: .

You are left to wonder "Where can I make up the time?" and attemping long division on the run as you recalculate your pace.

You have trained too hard to leave this key detail to chance. Our SMART Pace Bands will help you plan for the hills and anticipate The Wall? If it takes an extra 30 seconds to get up Heartbreak Hill at mile 21, you need to plan to run 10 seconds faster for 3 miles before you get to Newton.

Our SMART Pace Bands combine a pacing strategy and adjustments specific to your course to provide a minute-by-minute game plan for race day. You can read more about our changes below.

We can customize SmartPace Bands for Marathon Pace Teams or promotional handouts. Contact us for bulk rates.


Click below to read more about ~>

Pace Strategies
Course Adjustments
Using a pace band

Our pacing strategies

We've yet to run an "even pace" marathon, where we keep to our goal pace for every mile. It's fine if you can do it, but for most, hitting goal pace at the end of the race is not always realistic. A good pacing strategy helps you build a cushion to plan for the wall.

Studies show warming up the first few miles helps save energy for later in the race. Your body is less efficient when cold, so running goal pace early eats up more fuel than running goal pace later - energy you will need to keep from hitting the wall. Local marathons have adopted this as their offical pacing strategy (read more on their pace strategy here, or visit Coach Eladio Valdez from The Runners Edge.

You can use an even pace, our SmartPacing "warm up" strategy, or a modified version in our pace bands, or you can tell us your own.

Here is a quick re-cap of how our Pace Strategies work. You can use our Smart Pace Calculator to see how they look applied to your goal.

Warm Up Mile 1 is 60 secs. slower than goal pace. The 2nd mile is 30 secs. slower, and the Mile 3 is at goal pace. You are warmed up by now, and we pick up the pace to 10 secs. under goal pace to earn back time from our "warm up" and start to build a cushion. Keep at this cruising speed through Mile 20, and now ease up, slowing down 5 more seconds each mile, having 25 extra seconds for Mile 26.

Modified Warm Up For faster paces (and those wanting a bit less time to make up later). Warm up 30 sec. slower the 1st Mile, 10 secs. slow for Mile 2, goal pace for Mile 3. Cruise at 5 secs. under for Mile 4, and then at 10 secs. under until Mile 13. From 13-20, ease back to 5 secs. faster than goal, and ease up 5 secs/mile through the end.

Even Pace Whatever your goal pace is, keep at it for 26 miles.

We adjust each band to fit your course

For each course, we carefully review the elevation and make adjustments for the terrain. We will consider how big the hils are, how steep, whether a mile is all up, all down or a mixture, are the hills early or late. It is a mix of art and science.

Typically, we suggest 5-10 seconds for a 50-75ft climb over a mile, and 10-30 seconds for 100-150 feet. We start with the uphills, and then find where to make time back up, starting with obvious downhills.

We have a large catalog of courses we already reviewed, and will add any new course for your order!

A word of caution: elevation charts are not equal. Some are unreliable - misplacing hill or distorting their size. Our suggested changes are only as good as the charts.

We will send you an email link to allow you to check out our proposed changes. We are happy to make any adjustments.

How to use a Pace Band to Race Smarter

Our SMART Pace Bands have 3 columns - MILE: the current mile; PACE: the planned pace/total time for that mile and CHRONO: the total elapsed time when you hit that mile.

If you are using a GPS or Nike+, the key data points to watch are the LAP PACE, the TOTAL TIME, and the LAP TIME.

The PACE column will tell you your plan for that mile. If you have a Garmin or other pace watch, try to keep your LAP PACE near this speed (slower on the ups and faster on the downs). You should hit the next mile marker, with your LAP TIME being the same as this pace. If the mile is rolling hills, take it easy going up and push it on the downs - run an even effort - don't worry about keeping the entire mile the same pace.

Each mile, we suggest checking the CHRONO on the Pace Band vs. your watch TOTAL TIME. Keeping within 15-20 seconds is ideal (better fast than slow).

Don't get greedy, though. Unless you are sure of your training, it is usually a bad idea to "bank" some extra time early on. Chances are you are using precious energy you will need later, and risk losing far more than you gain. Pick a strategy in advance and trust yourself. You should feel so good in the first half that you could "run all day," but that doesn't mean you should speed up.