Indianapolis Monumental Marathon Fueling Plan & Pace Chart

Indy Monumental Fueling Strategy

Indianapolis Monumental is built for one thing, which is running fast on tired legs. Somewhere between 180 and 300 feet of climbing across 26.2 miles depending on who measures it, an 8:00 a.m. November start, and a BQ rate near 19 percent. The course will not take anything from you with terrain. It takes things from you by feeling easy for fourteen miles and then asking for the bill at mile 19.

Start with the cold, because that is the variable most runners get wrong here. Four of the last five race mornings started below 45°F, and starts in the 30s are common. Cold blunts thirst, so you will not feel like drinking, and you will arrive at mile 18 down a liter without noticing. Cold also thickens gels. A gel that goes down in four seconds in August takes fifteen seconds in a 38°F headwind, and if you are wearing gloves you will fumble it. Open your first gel's tab before the gun, carry gels against your skin or in a waist belt rather than a singlet pocket, and fuel on a clock, not on feel.

Take your first gel by mile 2 or 3, while you are still winding through the Mile Square. Then hold 75 to 90 grams of carbohydrate per hour, which for most runners means a gel every 20 to 25 minutes with fluid at nearly every station. The flat profile is what makes that number achievable. Your effort barely changes for the first half, your gut is not being jostled by grade changes, and absorption is about as good as a marathon ever gives you. Use that.

Know the aid station layout, because Indy's is unusually dense and unusually specific. There are 19 stations on the marathon course, roughly one every 1.3 miles from mile 1.7 onward. Water is at all of them. Electrolyte drink is at every other one, starting with the first, which puts it at miles 1.7, 4.8, 7.3, 9.5, 11.8, 14.2, 16.5, 18.7, 21.9, and 24.9. Neversecond gels are handed out at three points only, near miles 10.5, 15.5, and 22. If you have not trained on Neversecond C30, which runs 30 grams of carbs and 200 milligrams of sodium at a 2:1 glucose-to-fructose ratio, carry your own and treat the course gels as a backup you will not need.

Miles 1 through 14 are where this race is won, and they are also where it is lost, because nothing about them hurts. You run north through Fall Creek Place, past the State Fairgrounds around miles 8 and 9, then up Washington Blvd through Meridian-Kessler. Mile 10 has the only lift in the first half and it is about nine feet. The Broad Ripple turn at the 13.1 mat comes fast. Runners hit halfway feeling fresh, having taken four gels instead of six, and conclude that they are having a great day. They are not having a great day yet. Front-load. Be at 90 to 100 grams of carbohydrate banked by the time you turn south at mile 14.

Miles 15 through 18 are the course's only sustained climbing, coming south on Meridian, west past the Governor's Residence, through Butler-Tarkington on Boulevard Pl, and out W 42nd St. It totals about 26 feet of net gain, with mile 16 the largest single climbing mile at roughly 16 feet. In absolute terms that is nothing. In context it is the first time all day your effort has to rise, and it lands exactly where glycogen starts running thin. Take the gel at the 15.5 station. Do not skip it because the grade looks trivial on paper.

Mile 19 drops about 30 feet off W 42nd down toward the White River, the single biggest elevation change on the course. It is free speed and it is also a quad trap. Let the descent give you three to five seconds a mile, not fifteen. What follows is the honest part of Indianapolis Monumental. Miles 19 through 22 run down N White River Pkwy and along Burdsal Pkwy through parkland, with thin crowds, no shelter, and the most wind-exposed ground on the course. Average race-day wind is around 9 mph, which is nothing in the city grid and meaningful out here. If you fueled on schedule through the flat first half, this stretch is just quiet. If you did not, this is where the day ends.

The last four miles go east on Fall Creek, then turn south onto Meridian for a straight run to the finish, with a small rise into mile 24 and a gentle net descent after that. Take your last gel at the mile 22 station or immediately after, which gives it 20 minutes to be useful. Anything after mile 24 is placebo. On a cold, still year the closing miles on Meridian are the fastest running you will do all day. On a windy year you will be pushing into it, and the buffer you built in the flat first half is the only thing that will hold your pace together.

One weather note in the other direction. Most years the problem at Indy is cold, but the historical range runs to 58°F for an afternoon high, and a mild year changes the math. Above roughly 60°F, shift 30 percent of your carbohydrate to liquid, chase every gel with a full cup of water, and add 300 to 500 milligrams of sodium per hour. The course gives you an aid station every 1.3 miles. On a warm year, use all of them.