SmartPace Bands

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 "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.