Goal time · Marathon
A 6:00:00 marathon works out to 13:44 per mile, or 8:32 per kilometer. Below are the mile splits for a slightly faster second half, the halfway time to aim for, and the training paces that go with this goal.
The numbers
This plan starts about 1% slower than goal pace and finishes about 1% faster, so the second half is slightly quicker than the first. The elapsed column is what your watch should read as you pass each marker.
| Mile | Pace for That Mile | Elapsed Time |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 13:53 | 13:53 |
| 2 | 13:53 | 27:46 |
| 3 | 13:52 | 41:38 |
| 4 | 13:51 | 55:29 |
| 5 | 13:50 | 1:09:19 |
| 6 | 13:50 | 1:23:09 |
| 7 | 13:49 | 1:36:58 |
| 8 | 13:48 | 1:50:46 |
| 9 | 13:47 | 2:04:33 |
| 10 | 13:47 | 2:18:20 |
| 11 | 13:46 | 2:32:05 |
| 12 | 13:45 | 2:45:50 |
| 13 | 13:44 | 2:59:35 |
| Halfway (13.1) | 13:44 | 3:01:05 |
| 14 | 13:44 | 3:13:18 |
| 15 | 13:43 | 3:27:01 |
| 16 | 13:42 | 3:40:43 |
| 17 | 13:41 | 3:54:24 |
| 18 | 13:41 | 4:08:05 |
| 19 | 13:40 | 4:21:45 |
| 20 | 13:39 | 4:35:24 |
| 21 | 13:38 | 4:49:02 |
| 22 | 13:38 | 5:02:39 |
| 23 | 13:37 | 5:16:16 |
| 24 | 13:36 | 5:29:52 |
| 25 | 13:35 | 5:43:27 |
| 26 | 13:34 | 5:57:02 |
| Finish (26.2) | 13:34 | 6:00:00 |
Measured against the latest published results of 214 marathons on RunSesh.
One edition per race, from RunSignup races with published results. Fields include walkers and charity entrants, so this describes these races, not every runner in the country.
These are the paces for a runner who can already race a 6:00:00 marathon, worked out with Daniels and Gilbert's VDOT formulas, the method behind the training tables in Daniels' Running Formula. If your most recent race is slower, train at the paces on the page for that time. This goal sits below the fitness range those tables cover, so treat these paces as a rough guide.
Most of your weekly miles, including the long run.
A steady run of about 20 minutes, or longer repeats with short rests.
Repeats of 3 to 5 minutes, with easy jogs between.
Smyth's 2018 analysis of 1.7 million recreational marathoners, published in the Journal of Sports Analytics, found that starting too quickly can result in poorer finish times. That research shapes why this plan reserves a touch more effort for the second half. On race day, treat the halfway marker as your primary reference point: arrive there feeling controlled, and you'll have the pacing cushion the back half of the course demands.
Daniels and Gilbert's formulas treat a 1:20:22 10K as the same performance as a 6:00 marathon, giving you a fitness benchmark grounded in a shorter distance you may have already raced.
The RRCA pace chart is direct: "don't begin with a future goal time. To do so increases risk of injury and/or overtraining." Ground your paces in a race you've already finished.
USATF certification measures courses along the "Shortest Possible Route," setting the official distance as a floor. Pobiruchin et al. (2017) recorded sport watches averaging 42.33 km against the official 42.195 km, a difference of 135 meters. That gap amounts to 69 seconds at this pace, about 2.6 seconds per mile, so a watch could show a faster average than 13:44 while you're exactly on goal.
Daniels and Gilbert's formulas treat a 2:57:03 half marathon as equivalent to a 6:00 marathon. Comparing a half marathon you've finished recently against that mark tells you how well your current aerobic fitness supports the full-distance goal, rather than projecting from where you hope to be.
Ely et al. (2007) tracked performance across seven marathons and found that as WBGT, a heat-stress index combining temperature, humidity, sun, and wind, climbed from 5 to 25 degrees Celsius, pace slowed, with finishers from 25th to 300th place losing more time than faster runners. El Helou et al. (2012) found that once air temperature exceeded each performance level's optimum, speeds dropped and withdrawals increased.
