Running training plans
Free running plans for 5K, 10K, half marathon and marathon, at three levels and five lengths. Every one generated by the same engine, so the cutback cadence, the capped long run and the taper are identical across the catalogue.
Thirty-two free plans, week by week, across four race distances, three levels and lengths from 8 to 20 weeks. Choose the distance below, then the level, then the number of weeks you actually have.
What makes this a catalogue rather than a pile: every plan here comes out of one engine — the same one that runs inside the Runsy app — so the cutback cadence, the progression limit and the taper are the same rules in a 5K beginner block and a 20-week advanced marathon build. Plans typed out one distance at a time cannot make that claim, and it is why their 8-week and 16-week versions so often disagree with each other.
What the catalogue covers
Counted from what is actually published, not planned.
Three choices, in this order
01
Distance first
The race you are training for sets everything downstream — how long the long run gets, how many weeks the build needs, where the taper starts. Pick it below.
02
Then level, honestly
Level is a real input here, not a heading. It changes runs per week (3, 4 or 5) and it changes the peak: the 12-week 10K plan peaks at 25 km for a beginner, 35 km at intermediate and 39 km at advanced.
03
Then the weeks you have
Not the weeks you wish you had. A shorter plan is not the same plan compressed — it arrives at a lower peak rather than taking a bigger weekly step, because the progression limit is never waived to hit a number.
Choose your distance
- 5K training plansFree 5K training plans for every level and every timeline. Cutback weeks, a real taper, and a long run capped where recovery cost outgrows the benefit.8–12 wks
- 10K training plansA complete free 10K training plan on the page — all 8 weeks, every session. Plus the peak week and longest run for every level and length, so you can pick the right one before you start.8–12 wks
- Half marathon training plansFree half marathon training plans for every level and every timeline. Cutback weeks, a real taper, and a long run capped where recovery cost outgrows the benefit.10–16 wks
- Marathon training plansFree marathon training plans for every level and every timeline. Cutback weeks, a real taper, and a long run capped where recovery cost outgrows the benefit.12–20 wks
The four rules every plan on this site follows
These are not editorial preferences restated on each page. They are constraints in the generator, which is why you can check them against any plan in the catalogue and get the same answer.
A cutback week roughly every fourth week. In the 12-week 10K beginner plan the long run runs 7, 8, 9 km and then drops to 6 km in week 4 before climbing again. Adaptation happens during the easier week; a plan with no cutback is a plan that assumes you never get tired.
Progression capped at 20%. No long run climbs more than a fifth above the previous progressive week. Where a short plan cannot reach the usual peak inside that limit, it lands on a lower peak instead — the 8-week 10K beginner plan peaks at a 10 km long run, the 12-week version at 14 km.
The long run is capped below race distance where recovery costs more than it returns. The 16-week beginner marathon plan tops out at a 29 km long run, not 42 km. The 20-week advanced marathon plan tops out at 35 km. You do not run the marathon before the marathon.
A taper that actually comes down. In the 12-week half marathon beginner plan the long run goes 19 km, then 12, then 8, then race day. Race week carries almost nothing. This is the part runners most often cut and the part with the clearest evidence behind it.
The question no static plan answers
Every plan in this catalogue, and every plan on every rival site, assumes you complete it. That assumption is where most training blocks actually break: not week 1, but the week you get a cold, travel, or tweak a calf and come back to a schedule that has moved on without you.
It is worth being specific about how unaddressed this is. The single most-linked beginner plan on the internet — the one that ranks first for the biggest plan keyword in this category — contains, across its entire page, none of the words miss, missed, injury, sick, skip, cutback, adjust or behind. That is not an oversight in the writing. A static table cannot answer the question, because answering it means changing the remaining weeks.
So use these pages the way they are meant to be used: print the table, follow it, and know in advance that the first missed week is a recalculation, not a failure. If a week goes missing, do not attempt to make it up — rejoin the plan at the current week and, if you missed more than one, step back to the previous cutback week and continue from there.
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