Reaching the finish of your first 26.2 or running it faster: Pulsar builds every week from where you are, and every run says how far, how fast and why.
On a computer? Scan it with your iPhone camera.
A marathon is 26.2 miles, 42.2 kilometers. It’s less about speed than about getting your legs, your fueling and your head ready for hours of running, and that takes months, not weeks.
The long run is the most important session. It builds for months, steps back every fourth week, and tops out around 20 to 22 miles for most runners, or three and a half hours on your feet, whichever comes first. Past that point, a long run costs more recovery than it builds.
The key faster session is running at marathon pace, often inside the long run itself, so race pace feels familiar on tired legs. Tempo runs support it; intervals matter less than at any shorter distance.
For a first marathon, finishing comes first, and all your long runs are easy. Pulsar recommends at least 16 weeks for a newer runner, 14 for an intermediate one and 12 for an advanced one, and it tapers for the last three.
I trained for three marathons alone. Pulsar is the coach I wish I’d had.
Four things every Pulsar plan does for you, shown the way they look in the app.
How long can you run without stopping?
An honest answer sets the right starting point — there’s no wrong one.
Pulsar asks how long you can run without stopping, which days you can train and your latest race time, if you have one. Week 1 is built from those answers.
Aerobic Easy
Week 7 · Tuesday Upcoming
4.1 mi · ~45 min
Coach’s insightTap to ask
Keep your heart rate in Zone 1-2. You should be able to hold a conversation easily. If you’re breathing hard, slow down.
Target heart rate
Z1 RecoveryZ2 Aerobic123–148 bpm
Structure
Easymax 10:50 /mi
4.1 miRepeat ×4
Strides7:55 /mi
100 mWalk recovery
1 min Each run carries its distance, the pace to hold, the heart-rate zone to stay in and what it’s for, in plain words.
PULSAR Coach
Why is my easy pace so slow?
Because easy runs do a different job. They build your engine — heart, lungs, legs — without leaving you tired for Thursday’s 400s. If you can talk in full sentences, you’re right where you should be.
AI-generated guidance, not medical advice. Talk to a doctor about health concerns.
After every run, a short note on what it meant, with your numbers. Between runs, ask about pace, fueling or a missed week.
The voice coach, in your earbuds: “Slow down, 20 seconds fast.”
Voice cues in your earbuds when a tempo or interval drifts off pace, and the whole workout on Apple Watch, with or without your phone.
Two runners, two marathon plans, both built by the app. Switch between them to see how the weeks change with the starting point.
Built for a 2:15:00 half marathoner running about 19 miles a week, four days a week, aiming to finish. Miles per week as the app built them, race week without the 26.2-mile race; yours are built from your goal, your days and how you run today.
Built for a 2:02:10 half marathoner aiming at 4:15:00, four days a week, long run on Sunday. Miles per week as the app built them, race week without the 26.2-mile race; yours are built from your goal, your days and how you run today.
Four steps from here to the start line.
It’s free to download on iPhone. Your plan lives on the phone, and on Apple Watch if you wear one.
A race and its date, a distance, a time to beat, or running without stopping. Then how you run today.
Open today’s run and start it. Pulsar gives you the pace and the zone, and talks you through every segment.
The plan builds week by week, then eases off before race day so you arrive fresh, not tired.
Every session has a job. These are real workouts from the two plans above, laid out the way the app shows them.
Long run
Long Run
Week 14 · Sunday
18.4 mi · 210–232 min
Structure
Long runmax 11:25 /mi
18.4 miThe single most important session: 18.4 miles, all easy. For this runner, three and a half hours on their feet stops it there.
Long run
Race Practice Long Run
Week 13 · Sunday
18.3 mi · 202–223 min
Structure
Easymax 11:25 /mi
5.9 miTarget marathon pace9:45 /mi
1.9 miEasy floatmax 11:25 /mi
4.3 miTarget marathon pace9:45 /mi
1.9 miEasymax 11:25 /mi
4.3 miTwo stretches at marathon pace inside an 18-mile run, late in the plan, so race pace feels familiar on tired legs.
Long run
Fast-Finish Long Run
Week 5 · Sunday
11.9 mi · 134–148 min
Structure
Easymax 11:25 /mi
10.7 miFast finish — steady9:45 /mi
1.2 miAlmost eleven miles easy, then the last one steady. An early rehearsal for running well when you’re tired.
Tempo
Steady State
Week 9 · Wednesday
5.0 mi · 53–59 min
Structure
Warm upmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miThreshold9:30 /mi
2.5 miCool downmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miTwo and a half miles at tempo pace. It lifts the pace you can hold for a long time, which is what a marathon is.
Tempo
Progression Tempo
Week 13 · Wednesday
4.7 mi · 49–54 min
Structure
Warm upmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miMarathon pace9:45 /mi
1.1 miThreshold9:05 /mi
1.1 miCool downmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miA stretch at marathon pace that steps up to tempo pace. Marathon pace should start to feel like a gear you own.
Intervals
Long Reps
Week 14 · Wednesday
3.8 mi · 41–46 min
Structure
Warm upmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miRepeat ×2
5K pace8:10 /mi
900 mWalk recovery
3 min 25 secCool downmax 11:25 /mi
1.2 miTwo 900-meter repeats at 5K pace. Intervals matter least in a marathon plan, but a little speed keeps your stride from going flat.
Time trial
1-Mile Time Trial
Week 15 · Wednesday
2.6 mi · 26–29 min
Structure
Warm upmax 11:25 /mi
0.9 miRep pace7:55 /mi
1.0 miCool downmax 11:25 /mi
0.6 miOne mile at your best steady effort, a few weeks from the race. The result shows how far your fitness has come.
Easy run
Aerobic Easy
Week 9 · Friday
3.8 mi · 46–51 min
Structure
Easymax 11:25 /mi
3.5 miRepeat ×4
Strides8:10 /mi
100 mWalk recovery
1 minMost of your week: easy running, with four short pickups at the end to keep your legs quick.
It depends on where you start. If your date is too close, Pulsar says so before it builds the plan and suggests a target you can reach.
Can’t run nonstop yet
20 weeks or more
Run/walk first, then a long, patient build. With less time, Pulsar suggests a shorter race first.
Newer runner
16 weeks or more
Pulsar recommends at least sixteen weeks for a first marathon. Eighteen to twenty gives the long run room to grow.
Trained runner
12 to 14 weeks or more
Fourteen weeks for an intermediate runner, twelve for an advanced one with a solid base.
What matters around the runs: what to eat, how to pace the race, how to recover. The coach in the app answers the rest.
In a marathon, fueling is part of the plan, not an extra. Your body stores enough carbohydrate for roughly two hours of hard running, and the race takes longer than that for almost everyone.
Race morning: a familiar breakfast, about 300 to 500 calories, two to three hours before the start. Everything you eat and drink on the day should be something you’ve used on a long run. If your plan involves losing weight, talk to a registered dietitian rather than guessing.
Marathon training asks a lot of your muscles and joints, week after week. One or two short strength sessions help many runners hold their form late in long runs: squats, lunges, single-leg calf raises, hip bridges, side planks. Keep them short and light in the last three weeks. The research on strength training and injuries is mixed, so treat it as a useful extra.
Cross-training can add aerobic work without more pounding. A bike ride can stand in for an easy run in a heavy week. It can’t replace the long run: that is the session the marathon asks for.
Pacing is the biggest decision you make on marathon day. A few seconds a mile too fast early can cost minutes at the end.
Set your goal from your training. Pulsar predicts your marathon time from your runs, and your marathon-pace sessions tell you how the pace feels on tired legs. For a first marathon, the goal is the finish, and a steady effort from the start is the way there.
Late in a marathon, form is what keeps you moving efficiently when everything is tired. On your long runs, practice:
Check in with one cue every couple of miles. By race day, you’ll do it without thinking.
Marathon training is a long block of steady load. Recovery is how you get to the start line healthy:
Pain that is sharp, gets worse as you run or changes how you run means stop and see a doctor or a physical therapist. Pulsar’s coach isn’t a doctor, and it won’t tell you to run through it.
Do a full dress rehearsal on a long run a few weeks out: shoes, socks, clothes, breakfast and fuel. Race day is not the day for anything new.
The rules every plan keeps. They’re the same rules the coach explains when you ask why.
Mostly easy
About four-fifths of your running is easy enough to talk through, and Pulsar leans more careful than that on purpose. Easy running builds the engine; the hard sessions only work on top of it.
Every fourth week lighter
Three weeks of building, then a lighter week at about 80 percent so your legs catch up. The week after picks up where the build left off, not beyond it.
A little more each week
Weekly mileage grows by about 7.5 percent for newer runners and 10 percent for trained ones, with a cap on any single jump. Hard days never land back to back.
Paces from today’s fitness
Your paces are worked out from your recent race or how you run now, never from your goal, and they move week by week as the plan goes on.
Long runs have a time limit
In a marathon plan the long run stops at 20 to 22 miles for most runners, or at 3 hours 30 minutes on your feet, whichever comes first. For a slower runner the time comes first, and that’s intended.
Easier at the end
The last three weeks cut the miles by 40 to 60 percent, step by step, and keep the pace, so you start 26.2 miles fresh.
A marathon is 26.2 miles, or 42.195 kilometers.
At least 16 weeks if you’re newer to running, 14 for an intermediate runner and 12 for an advanced one. Eighteen to twenty weeks is comfortable for a first marathon. The two example plans on this page are 20 and 18 weeks.
Yes, with time. If you already run regularly, give yourself at least 16 weeks. If you can’t run nonstop yet, Pulsar needs at least 20 weeks, starting with run/walk, and suggests a shorter race first if your date is closer than that.
Around 20 to 22 miles for many runners, or three and a half hours, whichever comes first. In the first-marathon plan on this page, it’s 18.2 miles, because three and a half hours at that runner’s easy pace ends there. You don’t need to run 26.2 before race day.
Start taking carbohydrate about 45 minutes in and keep going every 30 to 45 minutes, using the gels or drinks you practiced with on your long runs. Many runners aim for 30 to 60 grams an hour. Drink to thirst.
Four is a sensible minimum for a first marathon; five or six helps you run faster. Pulsar builds plans on 2 to 7 days a week and lets you choose the days and your long-run day.
More weekly miles, a long run that reaches three hours or more, and regular marathon-pace work, some of it inside the long run. Tempo runs support it. That’s the shape of a Pulsar marathon plan with a time goal.
Many runners plan walk breaks, and research on run/walk in marathons hasn’t shown it costs much time. If you plan to walk, practice it on your long runs so it feels normal on the day.
Most runners take one to two weeks of rest or very easy running before training again, and a few more weeks before anything hard. Pulsar can build the next plan when you’re ready.