First Marathon - How possible is sub-3?
Male, 31, 67Kg, vo2max61(Garmin). Casual runner for the majority of my tweenties. Summer 2024 got surgery and when recovered got a garmin in May 2025.
First race - September 2025 - 10k - 47m (until this mark I ran because I liked it, this race had a click on me and running became challenge oriented - I wanted more)
October 2025 - HM - 1h40
January 2026 - HM - 1h29
March 2026 - HM - 1h22 last week
Since the start of the year I peaked 82km before taper for the March HM. I've had 5 or 6 runs around the 28k-32km - some all easy, some with blocks of different paces.
I'm now 3 weeks out of first marathon. Yesterday had my last long 32k (5k warmup + 2x(1k at 3:55, 1k at 5) + 3x(6k at 4:15 + 1k at 5)+3k cd) - I think my HR was fine along the training. Running at 4:15 - 4:25 has felt ok and somewhat relaxed, but my brain hasn't still figured it out because I think my reasoning/thinking/awareness is affected during running at this pace. I've had situations were I forgot to eat at the planned time.
3 weeks from now the course will be very flat, like half of the elevation of the March HM, but it is a coast zone in a city known for wind. Garmin says 2:54, strava 3:02, I feel like I have the engine to do this, but I also lack of experience, and I think I will find out somehard stuff on the day.
From your experience, how do you see the likelihood of achieving this goal?