Advanced Half Marathon – 3 Days per Week
Magic Training
About the plan
A 12-week plan for advanced runners who want to perform in the half marathon while training three days a week. There are three runs a week and all of them count: one interval session, one threshold workout and the long run. There is no filler run — the other four days are rest or the sport you already do (bike, swimming, rowing, strength). It follows the FIRST school's design, the same one behind the catalog's Furman Institute half marathon and marathon plans, applied for the first time to an advanced runner. Threshold is the axis of the plan: it starts at 5 km continuous, moves through split blocks of 3 and 4 km and reaches 10 km sustained. Two weeks bring long race-pace time trials (10 km and 12 km) to calibrate your sense of pace before race day. The long run goes from 10 to 15 miles (16 to 24 km). Weeks 4 and 8 are recovery weeks, week 11 is a sharpening week, and week 12 ends at the 13.1 miles (21 km). All paces come from your times in the Magic Calculator; adjust your reference time in your profile before starting so threshold, interval and race paces are calibrated.
The plan in numbers
- Duration
- 12 weeks
- Runs per week
- 3
- Weekly volume
- 24 mi → 33 mi
- Longest run
- 15 mi
Week 1 starts at 24 mi and volume builds to 33 mi in week 10, the heaviest of the plan.
A typical week has 3 runs, and the longest session reaches 15 mi (Long, week 10).
Over the final 2 weeks volume drops from 33 mi to 5.5 mi so you arrive at the race rested.
Race day (18 mi) falls on Sunday of week 12; the week holds 5.5 mi of running before it.
There are 3 tune-up races on the way to the goal race.
Key workouts
The quality sessions that come up most in this plan:
- Interval11 sessions across 11 weeks
- Long11 sessions across 11 weeks
- Threshold9 sessions across 9 weeks
- Repetition1 session across 1 week
Who it's for
Advanced level. To start safely you should already be running about 24 mi per week and be comfortable with a 9.9 mi session — that is what week 1 asks for.
Week 1 — workout preview
24 mi this week
7.6 mi
6.2 mi
9.9 mi
Week 10 — the heaviest of the plan
33 mi this week
8.3 mi
9.3 mi
15 mi
Plan Structure
12 weeks · 36 workouts · 48 rest days
See the full plan
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