Adam Pearce – 3:41:39 to 3:16:11 to 3:13:26 London marathon

Adam and I worked together to bring his 14-year old marathon PB down from 3:41:39 to 3:16:11 in the 2024 London marathon.

From there we focused on training with a half marathon plan to reduce his PB of 1:28:52 from 2012. The marathon time projected 1:32:51, and Adam worked hard in the heat to bring this all the way down to 1:27:10 PB by October.

Next up, Adam had a charity place for London 2025, and was determined to push on, with sub 3 hours a real possibility.

Unfortunately, he sprained his ankle very early on after catching a kerb awkwardly. Adam handled this really impressively, giving it rest followed by lots of low-level activity in the coming weeks to strengthen it. Over this time, I set Adam bike sessions using the equipment he had, which although he understandably didn’t enjoy as much, nevertheless were stuck to brilliantly.

Due to Adam’s diligence with all of this work, his recovery was as good as we could have hoped for, and within 4 weeks, he was able to run again pain-free, albeit for short distances. Undeterred, Adam pressed on, following the plan with alternating run days and ranges of distance, and 6 weeks later, he was able to run a 20 mile PB by over 2 minutes.

Despite the hottest London marathon in years, Adam still ran a PB on race day, finishing nearly 3 minutes faster than the previous year in 3:13:26. It wasn’t the time we initially hoped for, but with a miraculous turn around and only 9 weeks from returning to run until the taper began, I couldn’t be more impressed by Adam’s attitude and tenacity.