--- title: Marathon Man II: how to pace a marathon | daily.dev description: Using 2025 NYC Marathon split data, this analysis examines optimal pacing strategies for runners targeting a sub-3-hour finish. By focusing on runners... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/marathon-man-ii-how-to-pace-a-marathon-m1iuriwce twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Marathon Man II: how to pace a marathon | daily.dev og:description: Using 2025 NYC Marathon split data, this analysis examines optimal pacing strategies for runners targeting a sub-3-hour finish. By focusing on runners... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/marathon-man-ii-how-to-pace-a-marathon-m1iuriwce og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/M1IuriwCE.png og:image:alt: Marathon Man II: how to pace a marathon og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Marathon Man II: how to pace a marathon **[R-bloggers](https://daily.dev/sources/rbloggers)** · 14 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Using 2025 NYC Marathon split data, this analysis examines optimal pacing strategies for runners targeting a sub-3-hour finish. By focusing on runners finishing between 2:55 and 3:05, the author infers runner intent and compares outcomes. Key finding: most successful sub-3 runners go out slightly ahead of goal pace (more than 2 s/km faster) rather than negative splitting. Probability curves show that being ahead of pace at 5 km gives a 65% success rate, while being behind at 10 km drops it to 19%. The R code using ggplot2 and dplyr is provided in full. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Running Around: 2025 running dataviz in R](https://daily.dev/posts/running-around-2025-running-dataviz-in-r-xfptxv1t8) · R-bloggers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Pledging My Time VII](https://daily.dev/posts/pledging-my-time-vii-cg4f7w3qt) · R-bloggers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [Relentless Forward Progress](https://daily.dev/posts/relentless-forward-progress-gitxerkq3) · Fish Food for Thought · 5 upvotes · 1 comments - [Choose Your Fighter: data-driven selection of the best marathon](https://daily.dev/posts/choose-your-fighter-data-driven-selection-of-the-best-marathon-ixoqon1oo) · R-bloggers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#r](https://daily.dev/tags/r), [#data-analysis](https://daily.dev/tags/data-analysis), [#data-visualization](https://daily.dev/tags/data-visualization) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/marathon-man-ii-how-to-pace-a-marathon-m1iuriwce) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Marathon Man II: how to pace a marathon","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/marathon-man-ii-how-to-pace-a-marathon-m1iuriwce","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/marathon-man-ii-how-to-pace-a-marathon-m1iuriwce"},"datePublished":"2026-04-14T16:14:55.692Z","dateModified":"2026-04-14T16:15:24.143Z","description":"Using 2025 NYC Marathon split data, this analysis examines optimal pacing strategies for runners targeting a sub-3-hour finish. 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