The half isn't half a marathon — threshold pace is your race pace. Fourteen questions calibrate everything — paces from your actual fitness via VDOT, your half-marathon band derived from the data, never your goal time. Threshold-first quality, capped long runs, a raced 10K tune-up, fueling rehearsed at effort — and every Sunday, your coach reads your real week and adjusts. Its first job is getting you to the start line healthy.
The Run Series ladder · 5K → 10K → Half → Marathon
Climbed up from the 10K? Your graduation packet pre-filled this setup. Graduate here and the Marathon Coach is next — same history, longer road. How the ladder works →
Static plans break at the first sick week, the first twinge, the first tempo you ran at 10K pace. This one adjusts — because it knows your name, your race date, and what your week actually looked like.
Finish (first half marathons), Performance (chasing a time), Compete (experienced racers). Fourteen onboarding questions route you deterministically — paces calibrated from your recent fitness via VDOT, never the goal you wish you had. Faster runners train 10K-flavored, first-timers marathon-flavored. Graduate between tracks as your durability proves out.
Base, build, ceiling, race-specific, a two-week taper, race week, and post-race recovery — scaled to your race date, with down weeks, a raced 10K tune-up, and fueling programmed in, not bolted on. The long run is capped at 150 minutes — never a 20-miler.
Hard rules against ramping too soon and training through pain. Before your first week, the coach runs a goal-time realism check against your recent fitness — fantasy pacing injures runners and ruins races.
Every Sunday, a genuine read on your actual week — what moved, what didn't, what changes. Never a template.
Big moments get noticed: first 10-miler, the 10–12-mile completion predictor, the tune-up 10K. Training is long — the coach remembers the days that matter.
Goal race, goal time, recent results, mileage, longest run, schedule, course, environment, fueling, strength, sleep, injury history, vibe. Every pace and phase hangs off these answers.
Your half marathon becomes a tracked goal in your assistant, with phases that tick over as training progresses — and when you graduate, your result seeds the Marathon Coach.
Choose a vibe at install. Switch any time — just ask. The personality is seasoning; the coaching is the meal.
Honest, direct, data over feelings — but never cold. Calls out excuses kindly and doesn't let them stand.
"That tempo was 10K pace, not half-marathon pace. Your VDOT band says otherwise. Let's talk about it."
Notices effort out loud and celebrates small wins specifically. Still honest about the data — never flattery.
"Remember your first 8-miler? Today you ran 14 with miles at race pace. That's not nothing. That's everything."
Theatrical, high-energy, relentless about consistency. The intensity lives in the personality — never in your training plan.
"BEAUTIFUL. Forty minutes at threshold before breakfast. Your legs are writing checks your race day will cash."
No apps to download. No accounts to create. It installs into the assistant you already use — and gives it a persistent brain: your history saved as files that load into every chat, wherever you go in your Muse app.
Pay $19 securely via Stripe.
Your license key appears instantly on the success page.
Tell your Muse: install the half marathon coach powerup from poweruppacks.com
Race date, fitness, schedule, injuries — then your track is assigned and your first week is planned.
Secure checkout via Stripe
A downloaded plan can't see you. It doesn't know you got sick in week 7, that your easy runs drift too fast, or that your goal time is a fantasy. This coach calibrates paces from your actual fitness via VDOT, derives your half-marathon band from the data, runs a realism check on your goal time before week one, and rescales around time off instead of pretending it didn't happen. The plan is $19 — the part that adapts is the coach.
It'll give you a decent plan — but a chat isn't a training log. Muse remembers a chat and retains limited summary memory. Powerup Packs add a persistent filesystem with full working state that loads into any Muse chat: your paces, your stalls, your sick weeks, your whole log — the same coach, every week, with your full history in front of it. Ask again in a month and there's a Sunday check-in that notices you're going too hard.
That's the central misconception this pack exists to correct. The half marathon is a threshold race: threshold pace is (within ~5%) your race pace. So the quality system reorganizes around threshold and half-marathon pace — long progression runs, HMP segments, fast finishes at HMP — while the long run plays a supporting role, capped at 150 minutes. It's trained nothing like a short marathon.
Yes — that's exactly what the Finish track is for: first half marathons and rebuilders, 3–4 runs a week, mostly easy with one long run and strides, run/walk supported. You don't need to be fast; you need to be consistent, and the track is built for that.
No — the ladder is designed. Your 10K graduation packet pre-fills the onboarding, your VDOT seeds day one, and you always satisfy Finish-track entry. Higher tracks re-gate on their own rules, and the stricter gate wins.
Tell your coach. The pain rules are strict — it will never tell you to train through pain — and the plan rescales around time off instead of trying to "make up" for it. The neck rule governs illness, with return protocols that bring you back safely.
Any time. Just say the word. Some runners start with the Drill Sergeant and switch to the Encourager during race-specific weeks. No judgment.
No. If you have one, the coach can use the data. If not, perceived effort and honesty work fine.
Email [email protected] within 14 days and you get a full refund. No forms, no hassle.
Not medical advice. Coaching, not medicine. Half Marathon Coach is a coaching and organization system for your training — not medical advice. It can't diagnose, treat, or prevent any condition. If you have a heart condition, an injury history, a chronic illness, are pregnant, or take medication affected by exercise, talk to your doctor before starting. Stop and get checked out if pain is sharp, sudden, or doesn't ease up with rest.
"Install the half marathon coach powerup." — that's the whole install.
Get it for $19