How Fast Will You Run?

The time of 44:35 run recently in the Nike 10K made me wonder what time I should expect when joggling this year’s Chicago marathon.  After searching, I found this running pace calculator that is supposed to predict your future race times based on previous ones.

Click on it to try it out and see what your predicted times might be.

McMillan’s Running Calculator

The way that the calculator works is this. First, you pick the distance of a recent race. Then you enter your finish time. Finally, you hit the “Calculate” button and it spits out your predicted time for almost all distance races you can imagine.

Who is the Real Average Joggler?

Based on a 10K finish time of 44:35, I will run the marathon in 3:29:14.  Darn, that’s 9-14 minutes too slow.

But wait!  I did a bunch of other runs too.

I recently did a 5K in 21:20 which means I will run a 3:27:58 marathon.  Still 7-12 minutes too slow.

I also did a 10 miler in 1:16 translating into a 3:34:30 marathon.  Even worse.

How about my performances at the recent IJA Joggling Championships?

My 1600m time of 6:40 is a 3:45:09 marathon  (yuk!)
My 800m in 2:32 pencils out to a 3:09:45 marathon  –  I like that!
My 400m in 1:06 means a 3:00:54 marathon – Is it really possible?
*My 200m in 0:35 gives a 3:20:35 marathon  (*included a drop)

How fast?

So, what does all this tell me? I should expect a marathon time of anywhere between 3:00 and 3:45. But based on my latest times, it will be somewhere between 3:27 and 3:34.

Of course, none of this means much as it doesn’t take into account race day conditions (the Nike 10K was hot!), how you feel that day, or a bunch of other possible race time influencing factors.

But the bottom line is that if I want to joggle a 3:15 in this year’s Chicago marathon, I’ve still got some work to do.

If you tried out the calculator, what is the time it says you will do?  Leave a comment below and let us know.