Sixteen weeks to race day
Sixteen weeks from a solid base to the start line of a half-day race: trail, ski, swimrun or obstacle. The outing grows to four hours, then a three-week taper, then a checklist for race week.
This is the programme that ends on a start line. It takes the shape of the twelve-week base and points it at one race: a half-day one, meaning four to six hours out, in whichever discipline you have entered. The outing grows to four hours, one Saturday a week becomes race-specific, and the last three weeks are a taper with a checklist.
Start it sixteen weeks before race day, counting back from the race date. You should be able to do week twelve of the base programme: a 4×4 interval session, two strength days, and a two-and-a-half-hour outing. If you cannot, do four more weeks of base first and start this programme twelve weeks out, skipping weeks one to four; it works, with a lower peak.
If you have not entered yet, the chapter on your first Nordic race explains how to choose, and the races and challenges list shows what is on and when entries open. Enter before you start week one. A date on the calendar is what gets the Sunday outing done in week nine.
Sixteen weeks of this is real training with real strain. Anyone with a heart condition, a medical condition, or an injury that has not fully healed should check with a doctor before starting it, and the interval day in particular.
The shape of a week
Same rules as base: one hard day in three, every fourth week down, about ten per cent more volume between build weeks. Six sessions a week from week nine, when an easy Friday appears.
Tuesday: intervals. The full Norwegian 4×4 from the intervals chapter, in the race discipline where you can: on a hill for trail, on skis or roller skis for ski, running for swimrun and obstacle. Down weeks are three by four.
Wednesday: strength. Forty minutes from the strength chapter, steady. For obstacle racing this day grows a hanging and climbing part; for the rest it stays as it is.
Thursday: easy. Sixty minutes in the race discipline or on foot. Full sentences.
Friday: rest, then easy. Rest until week nine; then thirty minutes easy, which is a walk if you want it to be.
Saturday: race-specific. Steady effort, in the race discipline, with its particular demands: climbs and descents for trail, technique for ski, swims and transitions for swimrun, carries and obstacles for obstacle racing. The table below gives the swaps. The carrying chapter is the base of the Saturday session for every discipline, because every half-day race asks you to carry yourself, a pack, or both.
Sunday: the outing. Easy, in the race discipline, growing from 90 minutes to four hours. From week five, eat and drink on it the way you will on race day. From week nine, carry the kit you will race in. Week thirteen is the dress rehearsal: full kit, race food, the longest day of the programme.
The programme
Minutes are the whole session including warm-up and cool-down. Easy: full sentences. Steady: short sentences. Hard: a few words.
| Week | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Sat | Sun | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 45 min | Rest | Race-specific 45 min, steady | Outing 90 min, easy | 265 min |
| 2 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 50 min | Rest | Race-specific 50 min, steady | Outing 105 min, easy | 290 min |
| 3 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 55 min | Rest | Race-specific 60 min, steady | Outing 120 min, easy | 320 min |
| 4 (down) | Rest | Intervals 40 min, hard (3 × 4 min) | Strength 30 min, steady | Easy 40 min | Rest | Race-specific 40 min, steady | Outing 75 min, easy | 225 min |
| 5 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 55 min | Rest | Race-specific 60 min, steady | Outing 135 min, easy, eat and drink | 335 min |
| 6 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Rest | Race-specific 70 min, steady | Outing 150 min, easy, eat and drink | 365 min |
| 7 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Rest | Race-specific 80 min, steady | Outing 165 min, easy, eat and drink | 390 min |
| 8 (down) | Rest | Intervals 40 min, hard (3 × 4 min) | Strength 30 min, steady | Easy 45 min | Rest | Race-specific 50 min, steady | Outing 105 min, easy | 270 min |
| 9 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Easy 30 min | Race-specific 90 min, steady | Outing 180 min, easy, race kit | 445 min |
| 10 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Easy 30 min | Race-specific 90 min, steady | Outing 195 min, easy, race kit | 460 min |
| 11 | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Easy 30 min | Race-specific 90 min, steady | Outing 210 min, easy, race kit | 475 min |
| 12 (down) | Rest | Intervals 40 min, hard (3 × 4 min) | Strength 30 min, steady | Easy 45 min | Rest | Race-specific 60 min, steady | Outing 135 min, easy | 310 min |
| 13 (peak) | Rest | Intervals 45 min, hard (4 × 4 min) | Strength 40 min, steady | Easy 60 min | Easy 30 min | Race-specific 60 min, steady | Dress rehearsal 240 min, easy, full kit and race food | 475 min |
| 14 (taper) | Rest | Intervals 40 min, hard (3 × 4 min) | Strength 30 min, steady | Easy 45 min | Rest | Race-specific 45 min, steady | Outing 150 min, easy | 310 min |
| 15 (taper) | Rest | Intervals 30 min, hard (2 × 4 min) | Mobility 20 min, easy | Easy 30 min | Rest | Race-specific 30 min, steady | Outing 90 min, easy | 200 min |
| 16 (race) | Rest | Easy 25 min with 4 × 1 min steady pick-ups | Walk 20 min, easy | Rest | Easy 15 min, shake out, then travel | Rest, register, lay out kit | Race | 60 min + race |
The World Health Organization’s guidance of at least 150 minutes of moderate activity a week is the floor; by week eleven you are at three times it, and the taper brings you back down towards it on purpose. If your race is on a Saturday, shift the whole programme one day earlier from week nine so the long day stays on the day before race day, and the rest day stays the day after.
Discipline swaps
Keep Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as they are. Swap Saturday and Sunday as below.
| Race | Saturday, race-specific | Sunday, outing | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trail | Hill repeats with a light pack: climb steady, descend easy, 6 to 10 times; poles if the race allows them | Run-hike on the hilliest ground you can reach, walking the climbs from week nine as you will in the race | Practise eating on the move from week five; try the race’s own food if the organiser publishes it |
| Cross-country ski | Technique and double-poling on skis or roller skis; without snow, hill bounding with poles | Long ski, or a run-hike with poles when there is no snow; on snow from week nine without exception | Wax and glide are kit, not fitness: test them on the week thirteen rehearsal, not on race morning |
| Swimrun | Swim 45 to 60 min in the wetsuit with pull buoy and paddles, then 20 min run in wet kit; practise the transitions | Run with swims in open water, with a partner, in full race kit from week nine; the swims get longer as the water warms | Never swim alone in open water; the cold-shock response is real. Cold water is covered in its own chapter |
| Obstacle | Strength circuit outside: carries, hangs, wall climbs, crawls, 45 to 90 min steady | Long run with carries and hangs at every playground, rock and fallen tree on the route | Grip goes first in a long obstacle race; add dead hangs to Wednesday from week five |
The taper
Weeks fourteen to sixteen cut the volume by about a third, then to roughly half, then to almost nothing, while keeping a little intensity so your legs remember what fast feels like. You will feel heavy in week fourteen, restless in week fifteen and convinced you have lost fitness in week sixteen. None of that is true. The work is done, and the taper is where it lands.
Do not add sessions because you feel good. Do not do a last long outing to check. Do not try new shoes, new food or a new rucksack. The one useful thing to do with the spare time is sleep.
Race week checklist
- Monday: read the organiser’s race information once more. Note cut-offs, mandatory kit, start time, how to get to the start and where the bag drop is.
- Tuesday: the easy session with pick-ups. Lay every piece of kit out on the floor and look at it. Replace nothing; mend anything that needs it.
- Wednesday: a short walk. Pack the race bag and the drop bag. Pin or attach the number if you have it. Charge anything that needs charging.
- Thursday: rest. Eat normally, a little more carbohydrate than usual, nothing new. Go to bed early; the night before a race is rarely a good one, so this is the sleep that counts.
- Friday: a 15-minute shake-out, then travel. Arrive with time to spare; the chapter on your first Nordic race covers the travel and the day itself.
- Saturday: register, walk the start area, check the weather for the morning and set out tomorrow’s clothes in the order you will put them on. A short walk, no more.
- Race day: eat what you ate before the week thirteen rehearsal, three hours before the start. Start slower than feels right. Eat and drink on the schedule you practised. Finish.
How to adjust
Fewer days. With five days, drop Friday throughout. With four, drop Friday and Thursday and add 15 minutes to the Sunday outing. Keep the Saturday race-specific session whatever else goes; it is the only one that teaches the race.
A missed week. In weeks one to twelve: repeat the week before it and lose a build week, which means the peak outing is a little shorter. Do not shorten the taper to make it up. Two weeks missed in the build: skip ahead to the down week of that block, then continue; your peak will be lower, and the race is still finishable at a steadier pace. A missed week in the taper changes nothing: rest is rest.
Illness. Head cold: easy sessions only, no intervals, shorter outing. Fever, chest or feeling properly ill: stop, wait for two normal days, then one easy week. If that happens in weeks thirteen to sixteen, race anyway if you are well by race week, at a gentler pace than planned; the fitness is in the bank. If you are still unwell in race week, do not start. There is always another race, and the events list has plenty.
Injury. Anything that gets worse as a session goes on stops that session. Three days off, then try an easy day. If it is still there, see a physio before the next hard day; the earlier you go, the more of the programme you keep.
After the race
Take a full easy week: walks, a sauna if there is one, a swim if there is a lake. Then go back to weeks nine to twelve of the base programme and decide what the next start line is. The people who keep doing this for decades are the ones who treat the race as the middle of the year, not the end of it.
Questions
What counts as a half-day race?
Anything you expect to be out for four to six hours: a 40 to 50 km trail race, a 40 to 60 km ski race, a short swimrun of 20 to 25 km, or a long obstacle course. The programme peaks at a four-hour outing, which is enough to finish a race of that length at a steady effort without having done the whole distance in training.
Should I do the full race distance in training?
No. The longest outing is four hours, three weeks before race day, and it is done easy. Doing the whole distance in training costs more recovery than it gives confidence, and the taper is what brings the last part. If the race is at the short end of half a day, four hours is more than the race; that is fine.
What is a taper and why three weeks?
The taper cuts the volume while keeping a little intensity, so you arrive rested but not stale. Three weeks is the conservative choice for a first long race: the first week drops a third, the second drops to about half, and race week is short easy sessions with a few pick-ups. You will feel restless. That is the point.
What if my race is a different discipline from the one I train?
Swap the Saturday session and the Sunday outing for the race discipline using the table in the chapter, and keep the intervals, strength and easy days as they are. A runner training for a ski race needs skis on Saturday and Sunday from week one, not from week twelve; the engine transfers, the technique does not.
Can I race on the base programme alone?
For a short race, yes: anyone who has finished the twelve-week base can finish a 10 km trail or a 20 km ski race. For anything over three hours, do this programme. The difference is not fitness so much as the long outings, the food practice and the kit rehearsal, none of which you want to do for the first time on race day.