Abstract
The present study investigated pre-race preparation of a large sample of recreational runners competing in different race distances (e.g., shorter than half-marathon, half-marathon, marathon and ultra-marathon). An online questionnaire was used and a total of 3,835 participants completed the survey. Of those participants, 2,864 (75%) met the inclusion criteria and 1,628 (57%) women and 1,236 (43%) men remained after data clearance. Participants were categorized according to race distance in half-marathon (HM), and marathon/ultra-marathon (M/UM). Marathon and ultra-marathon data were pooled since the marathon distance is included in an ultra-marathon. The most important findings were (i) marathon and ultra-marathon runners were more likely to seek advice from a professional trainer, and (ii) spring was most commonly reported across all subgroups as the planned season for racing, (iii) training volume increased with increasing race distance, and (iv) male runners invested more time in training compared to female runners. In summary, runners competing in different race distances prepare differently for their planned race.Clinical Trial Registration: www.ClinicalTrials.gov, identifier ISRCTN73074080. Retrospectively registered 12th June 2015.
Highlights
Road based running races are held over different distances from 5 km to ultra-marathon distances of 100 km and longer (Deaner and Mitchell, 2011; Deaner et al, 2016; Knechtle et al, 2018b)
A total of 947 half-marathons were completed by the M/UM subgroup
M/UM runners reported a faster half marathon best time (102 min) on average compared to the HM subgroup
Summary
Road based running races are held over different distances from 5 km to ultra-marathon distances of 100 km and longer (Deaner and Mitchell, 2011; Deaner et al, 2016; Knechtle et al, 2018b). Different studies have investigated the pre-race preparation for different race distances such as half-marathon (Damsted et al, 2019), marathon (Gordon et al, 2017) and ultramarathon (Tokudome et al, 2004), but no study has investigated different distances, from shorter than half-marathon, to marathon and ultra-marathon in one analysis. Regarding pre-race preparation, different/various areas of intervention like training (McKelvie et al, 1985), personality (Nikolaidis et al, 2018), motivation (Nikolaidis et al, 2019), environmental conditions (Martin, 2007), and nutrition (Burke et al, 2007) have to be considered. The present study is the first to investigate training, preparing and racing behavior of recreational runners performed on a large sample of recreational runners competing in different race distances (e.g., shorter than half-marathon, half-marathon, marathon, and ultra-marathon). We hypothesized that runners of different race distances would prepare differently for their specific race distance
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