The key to a successful marathon is a good pace plan. Seasoned marathoners have a good sense of what their pace should be, of what kind of minutes per mile speed they need to maintain to reach their goal.

It's not uncommon to see runners with wristband printouts listing what their goal time should be at each mile. Personally, I like to do the time calculation mentally - it gives me a nice distraction along the way.

1976 Boston Marathon Champion Jack Fultz, who coaches the Dana Farber Marathon team, says those mile time wristbands - at least ones that break down the mile times by dividing the goal time by 26.2 - don't always work in Boston.

"The hills, and the positioning of the hills on the course make it difficult to repeat the same speed mile after mile. You don't want runners feeling pressure to go too fast on the downhills to compensate for the speed they lose on the uphills."

Fultz says a better idea is to figure out a goal pace and "sit on it as long as you can.  Don't change that pace to compensate for time you might lose at the start or on hills."  By sitting on that pace, you may find you have enough left in the tank late in the race to get the time back then.

If you're a first time marathoner, how do you figure out how fast to run?  Use your long run pace as a gauge...  and remember this bit of advice from Jack Fultz.  In the first ten miles of the race, "if it doesn't feel too slow, you're going too fast."