The hardest part of marathon training is finding the time to marathon train. It depends who you are, but that excuse often works for me. Life is busy and there are plenty of reasons to be content with an easy 5-mile run before work each day, though do that for six months and you quickly realize that rather than progressing the fitness just continues to erode.

Looking for some new motivation to get me out the door this summer, I decided that it was time to do another fall marathon. Nike approached CITIUS MAG and asked whether anyone on our team was interested in running this year’s race. I decided it was finally time to do the Chicago Marathon. Having done three marathons before, I have learned that each one comes with a new curriculum of education. Experience is valuable and that’s why I am going to be leaning in on arguably the greatest distance runner in American history, Galen Rupp, to help guide my training.

In addition to having won two Olympic medals, Rupp also has a Chicago Marathon title to his name. Those are better accolades than mine, which is a 2:26 from the 2025 Houston Marathon. I’m hoping that with Galen in my corner to write workouts and give some regular advice that I can get that down.

This is the initial consultation. Galen comes in cold on my training history. (You can scroll all the way to the bottom of this post for my recent workouts.)

We work through a full marathon training philosophy and discuss: consistent mileage as the foundation of marathon training, the role of cross training, long run structure/distance, the two-week training block model, why I need to train my endurance more than my speed, the shoe rotation philosophy, Chicago's pancake flat profile requiring no specific course prep, nutrition and gut training starting now, age and recovery at 35 vs. 40, the mental work of logging each session's goals and reflecting after, and lastly the goal.

The following transcript has been edited for clarity. You can take this discussion on-the-go in podcast form by listening to the series on The CITIUS MAG Podcast via Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

Introduction

KYLE: I'll be running Chicago, Galen will be running Chicago, and as part of a partnership with Nike, I thought it would be fun if one of their athletes running the race would take the reins and coach me for the buildup. We'll record the advice and share it with the world. Galen, thanks for being part of the next two and a half months. Have you done much coaching before? Is this new territory?

GALEN: No, not a ton. About a year ago I spent time in Flagstaff as a volunteer assistant with the NAU cross country and track teams — working with Mike (Smith) and Jared (Cornfield) and the rest of the staff there. For me, it was really about learning how they operate and what workouts they give their athletes. I didn't want to come in saying "here's what you need to do." But I've always thought coaching is something I'd like to pursue when my career's done. So this will be fun.

KYLE: So this is a lot of pressure on me. I've got to make you look good. I was telling Chris and Mac about this and they said: if Galen's in, you need to stop going to happy hour.

GALEN: Don't screw it up for me.

KYLE: The basic premise: Galen doesn't know anything about what I've been doing since retiring. I'm an open book. And I'll put my excuses up front: two young kids, a full-time job with a commute, and I travel a lot for work and for CITIUS. Those excuses are baked in at the top. After that, I've got no excuse — because you're on my side.

GALEN: Well, I've got four kids, so I don't have a lot of sympathy for the kid thing. But I do understand the travel and the full-time job — my full-time job is running. That's a little different. So — tell me what you've been doing. Mileage the last couple of years, and what's your base and background going into this build?

KYLE: I retired in 2020. I was a miler, so aside from very occasional things since then, I've been in and out. The 2022 New York City Marathon — I trained pretty hard for it; it was really hot, I went out hard and died miserably. Ran 2:38, was borderline crawling through Central Park. Since then, I've always had 30 to 40 miles a week as a floor. I'll go through periods where I ramp to 50 or 60, but I've learned that if you're not doing workouts, your fitness just slowly gets worse. Just running easy five or six miles every day isn't enough.

GALEN: When you were running the mile, 90 miles was about your ceiling?

KYLE: I've had the odd 100-mile week, but 85 to 90 was more or less where I lived.

GALEN: Okay. Life is busier now — we were really spoiled as pros. Sleep, run, sleep, run. That's clearly not the situation you're in. When I'm building for a marathon, the biggest thing I look at is consistency over 12 to 16 weeks. Twenty weeks is even better. It's not about one or two big mileage weeks. It's about stacking week on week on week. That's where you actually build fitness. Two days ago when we were talking, this was all very new to me, but yeah — our mantra for the next nine weeks has to be consistency.

On Mileage

KYLE: Do you keep peak mileage flat across the whole block, or do you build in planned down weeks?

GALEN: I look at what I'm averaging across 12 to 16 weeks. That doesn't mean staying at peak mileage the whole time — there are definitely ebbs and flows. Sometimes those are forced, like a minor injury. You can't be scared to take a low week. That's especially true as I've gotten older — you have to stay on top of the little things and not be afraid to back off. But the challenge of the marathon is how well you can stay consistent on your mileage and your workouts across that full block. I also race within builds — I've got a half marathon in Northern Ireland in a couple of weeks and I'll rest for that. You can't be a slave to a number. Some weeks are higher, some lower. Your body actually responds better when you build, back off, build again. Higher peaks are possible when there are lower valleys.

KYLE: What's the highest you've ever done, and is there a sweet spot? Has there been a clear correlation between your biggest mileage blocks and your best marathons?

GALEN: It's not a one-to-one ratio. But if I'm averaging 105 to 110 for a 12-to-16-week block, that's usually when I run my best races. Within that, individual weeks might be 120, 130, 135 — and others might be 80 or 90. Balanced out over the full block, 105 to 110 tends to be the number. As far as straight outside running miles, my peak is around 120 for a single week. But I'm a huge believer in cross training — since high school. You've got to run enough to get your running legs under you. But at some point the cost-benefit tips: are those extra 10 to 20 miles per week really worth the injury risk? Your heart doesn't know if it's a running mile or a swimming mile or a biking mile. As long as you're getting the heart rate up — stair machines, bike, underwater treadmill — it counts. I've added cross training on top of those 115, 120 outside miles and counted it as equivalent easy running volume.

KYLE: I've built from 62 to 72 miles over the last five weeks. I want to settle in around the mid-70s. Should I throw in doubles, or is that going to be junk miles?

GALEN: If you could sleep and recover well enough to run 80 or 90, that would be ideal — but if mid-70s is what you can do, stay there and add cross training on top. Biking, swimming, whatever gets your heart rate up. For pure marathon endurance, your running legs will be fine if you're at 70 to 75 and getting in good long runs and good workouts. The priority ranking for marathon preparation is: long runs first, by far — that's the single most important thing. Then quality work at marathon pace and intervals. Then overall volume, which you can get however you need to get it. Trying to push mileage too high also risks getting hurt, and if you can't make the start line, nothing else matters.

Long Run

KYLE: Long run — I did 20 last week at 6:28 pace. First 20 I've done. Also did an 18 with 8 miles at 5:40 in the middle. Should I cap at 20, or should I be doing 24? And do you structure long runs as part of a workout, or is it more about time on feet?

GALEN: A little of both. I regularly do 24 to 25 miles in the middle of a big build. Twenty is kind of a minimum for me once I'm in shape. That said — when I ran my first marathon at the Olympic Trials, I never went beyond 20 miles in training. That was as far as I ever went. Alberto (Salazar) kept telling me: the last six miles just hurt, but it's a mental thing and you can handle it. I was nervous about it because I'd never done it in training — you're running a marathon for the first time and it's the farthest you've ever run. It ended up working out. But after that we started doing a lot more 25s. I've gone up to 30 in training, a couple times 35. After the 35, I remember thinking: I don't really know what the benefit of that was. At a certain point you stop thinking so much about the distance, and it becomes more mental than physical. But I don't think that's totally necessary.

KYLE: I would love to not have to do 35.

GALEN: You don't need to. On surface — I run on soft surfaces for the majority of it. Bark chip trails, grass fields, turf fields, a little crushed gravel loop at Nike campus. I'll also do long runs on the treadmill fairly often — 20, 25 miles. You have total control of pace, you never have to stop for a light, you can adjust grade. And it's softer than concrete. Within six weeks of the race we start adding in more concrete — you have to get used to the pounding gradually. On the workout side: I alternate weeks. One week it's just time on feet — however you feel, get the volume in, practice drinking on the run. The next week there's structure. One thing I like: if I'm going 25, I'll run the first 15 at honest effort — not hard, but not jogging. Call it 5:45 to 5:50 pace. The last 10, or the last 7, I start picking it up. The last five miles might be at marathon pace, the last couple a little faster. You get used to running on tired legs at goal pace, which is exactly what you're doing in a marathon. It's hard to replicate that without totally wrecking yourself, but a moderate long run with a hard close — you can do it and recover from it in an extra day or two.

KYLE: I operate on a seven-day cycle — I can't do long runs except on weekends. Do you still work on seven days, or does it slide?

GALEN: More or less seven. Mike's helped me understand that sometimes you just need an extra day and that's okay. The top of the pyramid is always: hit your workouts and your long runs. If you have to take more recovery days or run easier in between, do it. Running a bunch of slow miles isn't going to get you to 2:20-whatever. The workouts have to come first, and you have to be able to recover from them.

KYLE: One workout midweek and a long run Sunday seems right for me. Does that work?

GALEN: If you can fit two workouts in some weeks, great. Here's how I'd think about a 14-day block: hard long run on Sunday, three or four days easy, a moderate workout, then another workout toward the end of that 14 days, then the next long run. Something like — Sunday: long run; Wednesday or Thursday: something short and fast, hills and 200s or 300s; Saturday: threshold work or a double; next Sunday: another long run. The key rule: after a hard effort — whether that's a hard long run or a hard interval session — you have to come back with something easier. An A workout demands a C workout to follow. Don't get greedy and try to stack A workouts. You also need bridge workouts coming off a hard long run — I'll do something like 200s or 300s a few days after, not all-out, just fast enough to activate the legs. Then by Wednesday or Thursday of the following week, you're ready to hit it really hard again — mile repeats, 800s, K's.

Analyzing Kyle’s Recent Workouts

KYLE: Let me walk you through my workouts so far. I started from basically nothing at the end of May — hadn't broken a six-minute mile in months. Got on the track and started running 5:20 pace intervals. Five by K, five by 1200, ten 800s, five by mile. Slowly ramping up the volume I can do at 5:20-ish. My PB is 2:26 from Houston in 2025, and that was off a pretty mediocre buildup. I keep calling this Project 2:22 — which is 5:25 pace — and that seems like a fair next step. I've been extending the work: most recently three by three-mile at 5:21. Nine miles at close to goal pace. How am I doing?

GALEN: Great start. You're extending the distance, you're getting longer. Let me ask you: what workouts did you feel helped you the most? What do you enjoy doing in training?

KYLE: Here's the honest answer — I can fake the shorter stuff too well. I've run a lot of fast track intervals over the years and it shows up on paper, but I can feel that I'm tapping into mile fitness from years ago, not marathon fitness. I have to run 10-plus miles at goal pace with short rest, or no rest. If I take long rest, I can fake it and it's not converting.

GALEN: Yeah, I get that completely. Everybody wants to talk about double threshold right now as the buzzword. There's value in it. When I was running with Alberto, we almost never ran on timed rest — we did tempo runs, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 miles straight, or 20 miles at hard effort throughout. The rest was jogging, not timed. Then Mike and I started working together in 2019, and he told me: you train like a 1500 runner even in your marathon builds. Not wrong. The short answer is: there's probably a place for both. What I'd take from your workouts so far is that the threshold-type work — 10-plus miles at race pace with short rest — yes, there's definitely value in that. But you also have to do things that are significantly faster than race pace. You want marathon pace to feel easy.

The further your race pace is from your red line, the more relaxed you'll be on race day. And then the endurance side handles not dying at the end. For the speed work — don't abandon it. Running 200s, 300s, 400s still has a place. Even in marathon builds I'm still doing that stuff. It keeps your efficiency and power. Think of it this way: the best waste training you can do for your legs is sprinting. So a two-week block might look like: Sunday long run; Wednesday or Thursday, hills and 200s or 300s; Saturday, 10 or 12 miles of threshold work on short rest; next Sunday, another long run with some closing hard miles.

Super Shoes

KYLE: Footwear. You've seen the entire evolution of it. How do you leverage super shoes in training?

GALEN: I treat them almost like spikes. I run in them for hard workouts, but I don't use them for everything. When I was on the track before super shoes, I'd do half a workout in flats, then transition to spikes for the back half. Sometimes towards the end of a season, three quarters in spikes. The main reason for not wearing spikes — or super shoes — the whole time is injury prevention. An ounce of prevention. You stop a workout because something's sore — you miss two days, not two months.

The bulk of my running is in a Structure. Stability shoe, because I pronate. I think of different shoes as different arrows in a quiver. The training shoe lets you feel the ground, builds foot strength, and handles pounding. If I know I'm going to be on concrete with no access to soft surfaces — whether at home or traveling — I'll run in something with more cushioning, like a Vomero. You're bringing the soft surface to you. Super shoes: tremendous. I ran in the AlphaFly from the moment they came out. But if you run in them all the time, you need to actively strengthen your feet, and a lot of people skip that. Your heart rate running 6:00 pace in a Structure versus 6:00 pace in AlphaFlys is significantly different. The shoes work. But treat them like a tool. Don't use them for everything, or you lose that foot strength benefit that transfers back to when you do put them on.

Course Specific Work

KYLE: Chicago specifically. You've won it. Does course prep change much for a flat race like Chicago versus Boston?

GALEN: People make a little too much out of course prep in general. Boston is different — so much downhill and uphill, you genuinely have to train for that. I've put the treadmill at minus three percent and have literally stacked two-by-fours on the back to create a downhill incline. Your quads have to experience that or they're not ready for it. But Chicago is pancake flat. The biggest elevation change is an overpass about 800 meters from the finish. You don't need to do anything course-specific.

When I won Chicago in 2017, I jogged the last mile or two from the hotel a couple of days before the race — that's as much of a course preview as I've ever done for any marathon. For the LA Trials, everybody talked about the 180-degree turns and the turns around cones. If we're worrying about whether I cut that corner perfectly, we're in pretty good shape, because it means everything else is dialed in.

KYLE: Have you seen the Japanese turn? It’s where some runners do this little spin around a cone instead of a normal turn.

GALEN: I've never tried it.

KYLE: Galen, I'm going to teach you the Japanese turn.

GALEN: If I got to a point where the turn was the thing standing between me and a record, I'd say we're in a pretty good spot.

Key Indicator Workouts

KYLE: What's the must-do for every marathon cycle for you?

GALEN: Running hard for 20 miles straight. Right around marathon pace, mile one warm-up, then go. I'll do that two or three times in a build. That is probably the single best workout for a marathon. There's no better way to replicate being dead and still running race pace.

The other one I love: mile-on, mile-off for 22 to 25 miles. Offs at roughly 5:15 to 5:20, ons at 4:45 to 4:50 — alternating back and forth for the whole thing. That's a ball-buster but it's probably the most transferable workout to race day.

Races in the build are also extremely valuable. Half marathons, 15K, 20K — even if it doesn't go the way you want. There's no workout that can simulate a race. When I was on the track, sometimes getting my ass kicked in 800s helped me run a great mile. You look at the end game. If you can get one or two races in the build, that's better than any training substitute.

Fueling

KYLE: I have a pretty mediocre stomach. I cramp if I drink too much on long runs. A couple gels is about my ceiling. How do I get better?

GALEN: Training your gut is a very real thing. Start working it into your harder training sessions now — every hard workout. The science is clear: you can train your stomach to absorb more. People are talking about 100-plus grams of carbs an hour now, and there are real benefits: you push harder in training when the tank stays full, and you recover better after. I'll be honest — I was not good at this early in my career. I never drank anything under 20 miles. Now I look back and think: how were we all doing that? I was at a meeting with some trail and ultra athletes a while back and told them all I did for my first marathons was cut Powerade with water — went to 7-Eleven, bought a bottle, half water, half Powerade. But it's come a long way. Start fueling on runs now, build tolerance, and by Chicago your gut will be different than it is today.

We Are Old

KYLE: You're 40, I'm 35. Is age a factor for you? Is it an excuse yet?

GALEN: I definitely don't feel 20. My sense of humor might be 20, but my body is not. Recovery takes longer. I used to sprint all out and come back two days later completely fine. Now I have to be honest with myself and honest with Mike about needing an extra day. He's been great at reminding me: get the most out of the hard days. Everything else works around that.

What gets harder as you age is the speed work — the really intense 800s and intervals. Those are harder than they were at 20 or 25. But here's what I'd argue: it becomes more important as you age to keep sprinting, keep doing plyometrics, keep lifting hard, keep getting to those maximum ranges of motion. If you stop sprinting because you think "I'm running a marathon, I just need long slow stuff," you will lose that elasticity and power. On the flip side, my cardiovascular system at 40 is probably a lot better than it was at 20 — you've had 20 years of stacking miles and stimuli. So at a certain point it flips: the heart becomes your biggest asset, but the speed and power require more maintenance. Don't neglect the sprint work.

Galen Check-In

KYLE: How's your buildup going for Chicago? Coming off 2:08 in Boston — is this build going even better?

GALEN: Absolutely. My workouts are significantly better — the speed work, the moderate intervals, the 800s and Ks and miles, all faster than what I was doing before Boston. And I'm running more mileage. Before Boston, by design, I was capping at around 100 miles because we were rebuilding from surgeries and health issues. The priority was: if you can't hit these paces in workouts, you've got no chance in a marathon. Let's get the paces right first and keep mileage secondary. Now it's 110 to 120 outside miles plus cross training. When you can look at your training and say I ran 2:08 and my speed work is better and my volume is higher — logically that means I'm in a lot better shape heading into Chicago.

Project 2:22?

KYLE: Final parting thoughts — can you get me to 2:22? How do we feel about where I am?

GALEN: I feel good. You've got a solid base. From what you've described, the biggest gap is endurance — the speed is still there, maybe even too much, in that you can fake the short stuff. So we need to touch speed every now and then to keep it, but the endurance is the work. Keep mileage at 70 to 75, add cross training on top, prioritize the long runs, and run several of them hard. Psychologically, those long runs are going to do more for your confidence than any track workout you do.

A few things I want you to think about for each training session: go into every single run with two or three specific goals. What are you working on today — speed, power, endurance, mechanics, mental toughness? Write them down. And spend five to ten minutes afterward putting that session in the context of preparing you for a marathon. Good sessions and bad ones. When you die on a long run at mile 15 with 5 still to go, that's a mental workout. Practice working through it. Those doubts are going to show up in Chicago — the best preparation is facing them head-on in training, so when they show up on race day you can say: I've been here. I worked through this.

One last thing: I don't run with headphones that often. There's real value in being alone with your thoughts on long runs. You don't need distraction all the time. You need to learn to work through the hard moments in your head, because those moments are coming on race day.

KYLE: You know, it's been a while since I've been coached. I kind of like it. I was already motivated, but this is definitely upping it.

GALEN: Let's get you to low 2:20s. That's our public declaration. Don't screw it up for me.

KYLE: You can ask me for advice on the short stuff if you want. This could be two-way.

GALEN: Yeah, maybe I'll ask about the 1500. Although I can't fake it like you can anymore.

KYLE: Neither can I. I might pull something. All right, thanks, Galen. See you in October.

GALEN: Let's do it. All the best.

Kyle’s Recent Training – Shared With Galen

• May 25 — 5 x 1,000m @ 3:20 (5:22/mile pace)
• May 30 — 5K in 17:30 (5:38/mile pace)
• June 2 — 5 x 1,200m @ 3:58 (5:19/mile pace)
• June 9 — 10 x 800m @ 2:45 (5:32/mile pace)
• June 13 — 5 x 1 mile @ 5:17
• June 16 — 3 x 2 miles @ 5:20/mile
• June 19 — 8 x 1,000m @ 3:18 (5:19/mile pace)
• July 1 — 7 x 1,200m @ 3:59 (5:21/mile pace)
• July 5 — 15 miles easy
• July 7 — 2 x 3 miles @ 5:26/mile
• July 10 — 15 miles, with 6 miles alternating @ 5:53 average
• July 13 — 10 x 30-second hills + 10 x 300m @ 53 seconds (4:44/mile pace)
• July 17 — 10 x 1,000m @ 3:17 (5:17/mile pace)
• July 19 — 16 miles, with 4 x 2 miles @ 5:50/mile
• July 21 — 4 miles @ 5:26/mile, then 3 x 1 mile @ 5:18
• July 26 — 18 miles, with 8 miles @ 5:40/mile
• July 30 — 5 x (2K @ 5:26 pace // 1K @ 6:19 pace)
• Aug. 2 — 20 miles @ 6:28/mile
• Aug. 5 — 3 x 3 miles @ 5:21/mile
• Weekly mileage: A six-week progression from 62 miles to 72.

Keep up with all things track and field by following us across Instagram, X, Threads, and YouTube. Catch the latest episodes of the CITIUS MAG Podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. For more, subscribe to The Lap Count and CITIUS MAG Newsletter for the top running news delivered straight to your inbox.