#239 Alex Carter: 2:22 debut in 2025 - 2:14 in 2026

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Alex Carter ran his first marathon in April 2025 at London, finishing in 2:22. Seventeen months later he ran 2:14:42 at Berlin, against an A goal of going under 2:15. In between were four more marathons, each one faster than the last, all while working a full-time sales job in London.

In this conversation Alex takes us back to the start: a youth runner in the UK who earned a place at Iona in New York, lost years to stress fractures, and spent a long stretch running for fun before the marathon progression began. We get into the training changes behind the jump, including 200K weeks, back-to-back long workouts, sleep, easy days that are actually easy, and a proper taper.

Before the interview, Kristian shares a shoe test, the start of his Valencia YouTube series, a training update and a thought on feeling like you are not training properly.

In this episode:

- Berlin: the race, the goal and how it unfolded

- Youth running, Iona and the stress fractures

- The 17 month progression from 2:22 to Berlin

- Fueling mistakes in the first marathon

- Sleep, easy pace and what changed

- Building from 120K to 200K weeks

- A typical week in the Berlin block

- Puma Project 3 and the Fast-R3

- Moving to New Zealand

Timestamps

00:00 Intro

00:17 New shoes and the Valencia YouTube series

03:39 Training update and a groin scare

06:48 Feeling like you are not training properly

08:32 Saysky

09:24 Welcome Alex and congrats on Berlin

10:52 Youth running, Iona and stress fractures

12:26 Dallas, London and the ballot present for his sister

14:49 Sales job and balancing work with training

27:41 Reaching 200K weeks

29:13 Slow progress before the 2:22 debut

33:04 First marathon and the fueling lessons

39:39 Biggest changes: sleep and easy pace

41:43 Mileage increase and back-to-back long days

45:28 Taper

52:59 Marathon by marathon progression

56:27 Fourth Brit in Berlin

1:01:07 A typical 200K week

1:06:38 Fast-R3 on race day

1:08:27 Puma Project 3

1:11:56 Moving to New Zealand

Follow Alex on Instagram: @alex_carter_96

Start your free Musicbed trial: https://fm.pxf.io/kristianwarwick

Full episodes + the Boston 2025 documentary: https://www.youtube.com/@Warwickruns

Follow my training journey on Instagram: @warwick.runs

Music from Musicbed: MB01XPYH8ZYENVAMB0133EV2TCQFZY