New York City Marathon: your race week, day by day

Sunday 1 November, New York. Five boroughs, five bridges, 26.2 miles (42.2 km) from Staten Island to Central Park.

If you are reading this in race week, the hard part is done. Your fitness is built. Nothing you run between now and Sunday will make you fitter. What you do this week decides one thing: how fresh you are on the start line.

Here is the week, day by day.

The rule for the whole week: less running, same sharpness

Research on tapering points the same way again and again. Cut how much you run, but keep some running at race pace, and keep running on most of your usual days. A large review of taper studies found the best results when runners cut their volume by roughly 40 to 60 percent and kept the intensity (Bosquet and colleagues, 2007).

So race week is not a week off. It is a short week with a few quick minutes in it to keep your legs awake.

Tuesday: a short run with a little race pace

Run about half of a normal Tuesday. Inside it, put 2 or 3 blocks of 5 minutes at your marathon pace, with easy running in between.

The goal is not to test your fitness. It is to remind your legs what Sunday feels like. If marathon pace feels hard today, don't worry. Legs often feel flat early in a taper. That is normal and it passes.

Wednesday: easy, or rest

An easy 30 to 40 minutes, or a day off if that is what you usually do mid-week. Don't add anything because you feel restless. Restless is a good sign. It means you are recovering.

This is a good day to sort the boring things:

• Check your start time and your start area. You find them on your bib and in the official race app. Start times differ by wave, so don't guess.
• Plan how you get to Staten Island. Almost everyone takes the ferry or a bus early in the morning. Work back from your start time and leave room for queues.
• Lay out your race kit. Nothing new on Sunday: no new shoes, no new shorts, no new gel.

Thursday: easy, and start eating more carbs

Another easy run of 30 to 40 minutes, or rest.

From now on, eat a bit more carbohydrate and a bit less of everything else. Rice, pasta, bread, potatoes, oats. Sports nutrition guidance for races longer than 90 minutes suggests a high carbohydrate intake for the 36 to 48 hours before the start (Thomas and colleagues, 2016). In practice, that means Friday and Saturday matter most. Thursday is the warm-up.

You don't need to stuff yourself. Swap some of the vegetables and salad on your plate for more of the starchy food. Feeling a little heavier by Saturday is normal. That is stored fuel and water, not fat.

Friday: the expo, without the miles

If you pick up your bib at the expo, keep it short. Walking for hours through a big hall is real work for your legs. Get in, get your bib, get out.

Run nothing, or 20 minutes very easy. Sleep well tonight. Many runners sleep badly the night before a race. A good night on Friday takes the pressure off Saturday.

Saturday: a shakeout and an early night

A shakeout is a very short, easy run to loosen up. 15 to 20 minutes, easy, with 3 or 4 short pick-ups of 15 to 20 seconds. Then put your feet up.

Eat your last big meal at lunch or early in the evening. Choose food you know well. Then get everything ready for the morning: bib pinned on, gels in your pocket, old warm clothes for the start area. Clothes you leave behind at the start are collected and donated, so bring things you are happy to give away.

Sunday: how to run the course

New York is not a flat course. It has long bridges, a loud long straight, and a tough last stretch. Most bad races here are lost in the first 10 miles, not the last 10.

The first mile: the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge. You start by climbing the bridge from Staten Island into Brooklyn. Your watch will show a slow first mile. Let it. Pushing up the bridge to "make up time" is the first mistake of the day.

Brooklyn: hold back. The crowds in Brooklyn are loud and the road is wide. It is very easy to run faster than your plan here. Run your pace, not the crowd's.

The Queensboro Bridge, around mile 15. A long climb with no spectators on the bridge. It goes quiet, and it feels harder than it is. Ease off a little, keep your effort steady, and don't look at your pace.

First Avenue: the noise. You come off the bridge into a wall of sound on First Avenue. It is one of the best moments in running, and one of the most dangerous. Many runners speed up here and pay for it later. Enjoy it, and stay on your pace.

The Bronx and back. A short loop over two small bridges and back into Manhattan.

Fifth Avenue and Central Park, the last miles. Fifth Avenue climbs gently but for a long time, just when you are most tired. Then come the rolling hills of Central Park. If you held back in Brooklyn, this is where you pass people.

Drinks and gels. Take what you trained with, at the times you trained with. The race is not the day to try something new.

And after the finish line

The week after a marathon is part of your training too. Walk, sleep, eat, and give your legs time. Your first runs should be short and easy. Wait until your legs feel normal on the stairs before you run anything fast.

How kurro handles race week

You don't have to plan any of this yourself. When your goal race is in kurro, the plan tapers for you. Over the last three weeks your running drops step by step, and the race week is the lightest. Taper weeks usually keep one short session at race pace, just like Tuesday above. After the race, kurro gives you an easy recovery week before you build again.

Each session also says why it is there, so you know what Tuesday's short blocks are for.

Running a marathon next spring? Add your race and see your plan in two minutes at kurro.run.

Good luck on Sunday, New York.

This article is general training information, not medical advice. Feel pain that does not go away? Talk to a doctor or a physio before you race.