Running Plan Review Hal Higdon Ultramarathon: 50K

Does it build you up smartly?

A long build works best when it changes as it goes. Early weeks lay down easy mileage, the middle weeks bring harder work of new kinds, the final weeks look like the race, and a taper lets the fatigue clear. Plans built in stages like this tend to beat plans that hold one load all the way through.

Higdon gets the shape of the build right. Mileage and the long run grow across 26 weeks toward the biggest weekends of the plan, and the last 2 weeks ease off before the race. Along the way, 7 lighter weeks are spread from week 9 to week 25. Those easier weeks matter more than they feel like they do: a lighter week every few weeks is when the training of the weeks before turns into fitness.

But the work itself never changes. From the first Saturday to the last, the only harder running is that steady run at goal pace. It gets longer, but it's the same kind of run in week 24 as in week 1. And every session is a single line on the page, a distance or a time and the word for its effort. Nothing says what the run is for or how it should feel at the end.

Does it protect you from injury?

Partly. The plan rests you well, but it builds in jumps.

The resting is good. Monday and Friday are off every week, and the lighter weeks come regularly. The book adds a chapter on pool running, a way to keep your fitness when your legs need a break from the road. Whatever plan you follow, take a lingering ache seriously before the big weeks: an ache that hangs on from run to run appears to raise the risk of a full injury that stops you running.

The jumps are the problem. Many running injuries start suddenly, and sharp rises in weekly running raise the risk. The early weeks climb in a few steep steps, but two jumps stand out, and both come late.

The first comes out of the strangest stretch of the plan. In week 18 you run 26 miles, a full marathon's distance, as a training run 8 weeks before the race. Week 19 is nearly empty, a 3-mile run and two 1-hour runs, and that rest is right. Then week 20 brings a 10-mile Wednesday, an hour at goal pace and a 3-hour Sunday, far more than the three weeks before it. After an easy week, your heart and lungs feel ready, but tendons and bone rebuild on a slower clock, and they're the ones that pay for a jump like that.

The second comes in week 24. Two hours at goal pace on Saturday and 5 hours on Sunday make it the heaviest week of the plan, with the race just 2 weeks away.

Two more things are missing. None of the goal-pace runs has a warm-up on the schedule. And strength is left to you. The book talks about it, but no sessions appear on the schedule, and what to do in them is yours to work out. That's a real gap, because strength training substantially lowers the risk of sport injuries.

What happens when you miss a day?

This schedule trusts you, and for a disciplined runner that goes a long way.

There's room to move. With Monday and Friday off every week, there's always an open day to shift a run into, and the book is relaxed about it. You can swap days, and a single missed day is fine, as long as it doesn't become two in a row. Because the weekends hold almost all of the training, it's easy to guess which runs to protect when a week gets squeezed.

But guessing is all you have. The book never ranks the runs, so the cut order is yours to work out. A lost week comes with no instructions at all, and you decide alone whether to repeat it or move on. Effort is judged by feel too, with no heart rate range for each run. A runner who reads their body well will manage. A runner who tends to push through will find little on the page to stop them.

Will it get you ready for race day?

Yes. This is where the plan is strongest.

A 50K is decided by how long your legs hold up, and long runs that grow over the weeks are essential for races of marathon length, let alone longer ones. This plan delivers them. You run 20 miles 3 times between weeks 11 and 15, a 26-mile run in week 18, and long runs of 3, 4 and then 5 hours after that.

Measuring the long runs in hours works well for an ultra. A slower runner covers less ground in 5 hours than a faster one, yet both spend the same 5 hours on their feet. That time on your feet is what race day asks for. The back-to-back weekends late in the plan, like 2 hours on Saturday and 3 on Sunday in week 23, teach you to keep running on legs that remember yesterday.

The goal-pace running grows toward the race too, from 5 miles in week 1 to 2 hours in week 24, so the rhythm you'll race at is familiar long before the start. Then the last 2 weeks drop well below the peak, and a taper of one to three weeks typically sharpens race performance.

Are the workouts varied enough?

In one way. Most of the running is easy, which is right, but the harder running comes in only one kind.

The easy share is well judged. About 87 percent of the running is easy, and those easy miles are the base everything else rests on. The week has a good spread of run types too: short easy runs, longer Wednesday runs, goal-pace Saturdays, long Sundays and back-to-back weekends.

But the goal-pace run is the plan's only harder session, and it isn't very hard. For most recreational runners, even marathon pace sits below threshold, and race-pace running gets its extra benefit mainly when race pace lands near a threshold. So these runs build durability and rhythm, not much speed or efficiency.

Nothing on the schedule makes your stride quicker or your legs stronger on a climb. There are no strides, though short, fast strides tend to make runners more efficient at the same pace. There are no hills, though many 50Ks are run on trails that climb and descend. For a first 50K, holding up matters more than speed, so this costs less than it would in a 10K plan. But a few minutes of strides or hills a week would help, and the plan leaves them out.