Your plan in four answers
Leadville Trail Marathon has not announced its next date, so we have estimated June. Change the date below once you know it.
- Distances
- Marathon
- Terrain
- Hilly
Course
The Leadville Trail Marathon course
The summer opener of the Leadville series and a far more accessible way into racing at altitude than the 100. Roughly 26.4 miles of out-and-back dirt road and singletrack through the old mining district, climbing to Mosquito Pass at 13,185 feet, the highest continuous pass in the country, from a town that already sits above 10,000 feet.
Read the full course notes
Finishing times bear no relationship to road marathon times.
- Terrain
- Hilly
- Distances
- Marathon
- Weather on race day
- Mid-June at 10,000 feet is its own climate: a cold start, intense sun on the exposed climb, and the real possibility of snow, hail, or wind on the pass. Conditions at the top and at the start line are frequently unrelated.
What to train for
Vertical and hiking efficiency, with altitude as the constraint that makes both harder.
Treat the goal as time on feet with sustained climbing, not marathon pace work.
If you cannot train high, get long climbs in anyway and arrive early enough to acclimate.
Sample week
A sample Leadville Trail Marathon training week
A week from the middle of the build, about six weeks out. Your plan sets the real distances and paces from your own fitness and adjusts them every week as you train.
- Monday
- Rest, or 20 minutes of mobility
- Tuesday Key session
- Hill repeats: 10 × 90 s up a steady grade, jog back down
- Wednesday
- Easy run, 6–7 mi
- Thursday Key session
- Goal-pace run, 10 mi with 6 mi at race pace
- Friday
- Recovery run, 4 mi, or cross-train
- Saturday Key session
- Long run, 16–18 mi on hilly ground, steady effort on the climbs
- Sunday
- Easy run, 4 mi, then 6 relaxed strides
Taper
Tapering for the Leadville Trail Marathon
Start the taper two to three weeks before race day. Cut your weekly volume by about a third, then by half in race week, and keep a few short efforts at race pace so your legs stay sharp. The course is hilly, so keep one short hill session in the first taper week to keep the climbs familiar.
Also in Claude
Ask Claude for this plan
Add AthleteSpace to Claude once, then paste this prompt and put in your own numbers.
Build me a training plan for the Leadville Trail Marathon in June. I run [distance] a week, [days] days a week, easy pace [pace].
Leadville Trail Marathon training questions
How long should I train for the Leadville Trail Marathon?
Most runners give a marathon sixteen to twenty weeks of focused training on top of an existing base. The plan above counts back from your actual race date, so if you have less time than that it builds the best plan the remaining weeks allow rather than pretending you have longer.
Is the Leadville Trail Marathon course hilly?
Hilly. The summer opener of the Leadville series and a far more accessible way into racing at altitude than the 100.
What is the weather usually like at the Leadville Trail Marathon?
Mid-June at 10,000 feet is its own climate: a cold start, intense sun on the exposed climb, and the real possibility of snow, hail, or wind on the pass. Conditions at the top and at the start line are frequently unrelated.
When should I start tapering for the Leadville Trail Marathon?
Start the taper two to three weeks before race day. Cut your weekly volume by about a third, then by half in race week, and keep a few short efforts at race pace so your legs stay sharp. The course is hilly, so keep one short hill session in the first taper week to keep the climbs familiar.
Do I need an account to get a Leadville Trail Marathon training plan?
No. The plan above builds in your browser with no account, no email, and no card. Make a free account only if you want to keep it, log your runs against it, and have the coach keep adapting it as your training goes.