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How To Prepare For Your Next Half: 5 Tips From Olympian Grant Fisher

This Sunday, March 15th, 2x Olympic medalist Grant Fisher will make his debut in the half-marathon at the United Airlined NYC Half. Fisher is the current world record holder in the indoor 3000m and 5000m, and he's held multiple American records in outdoor track. Now, he gets to take a crack at the roads.

Amazfit had the chance to sit down with Grant and chat through his mental and physical shift towards longer distances, including Grant's advice for anyone looking to build mileage and prepare for their next race.

Why Is Grant Fisher Making The Switch To The Half Marathon?
Fisher, who is traditionally a 5000m and 10,000m runner on the track, sees his half debut as a great step towards the marathon. As he looks ahead towards the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, he's considering the marathon and 10k double, something that only a handful of world class athletes have attempted, including Galen Rupp.

"Track has been my life for the past decade. The roads are a totally different side of the sport that I've never experienced. And the pinnacle of the roads is the marathon distance. I'm not quite ready for the marathon just yet, so a half marathon is a nice little transition for me to dip my toes in the water," he explains.

Tip 1—Increase Mileage Slowly & Strategically
Even for an elite athlete like Grant, increasing mileage requires patience and gradually longer runs. Typically Grant will run 90-100 miles a week, and for his half he bumped this up to 110-115. The general rule of thumb is to increase mileage by 10% of your total weekly volume per week, but depending on how experienced you are as a runner, this can be adjusted.

"You're asking your body to adapt to a really hard stimulus. The last thing you want to do is get hurt and injured. So do things slowly, do it carefully. Listen to your body," says Grant. For Grant, cutting back on the shorter, more intense intervals he normally does on the track and replacing with longer interval sessions helped him build his aerobic capacity.

Tip 2—Understand The Power of Compound Interest
According to Grant, if you're looking to add mileage or add intensity or anything, you have to understand the power of compound interest. If you can get even 0.1% better each day, that makes a difference, because in a month, you'll see huge gains. Running is a sport that rewards patience, consistency, and progress over time.

"You have to make sure you're training hard enough to adapt, but giving yourself time in between to actually lock in those adaptations and be able to progress over time," Grant explains. This allows you to build mileage effectively, as noted above, and allows your body to recover.

Tip 3—Incorporate A Weekly Strength Routine
Strength training looks a little different for everyone based on individual strengths, weaknesses, and biomechanics. What's true for everyone, however, is that strength training can significantly improve your running capabilities and reduce the risk of injury.
"Running is a very high impact sport. People forget that all the time," says Grant. "When you're running, each time you land, it's five or six times your body weight that you're catching. When you think about a half marathon, how many steps you take, or the training required, if your mechanics are a little bit off, that's a lot of load to put on your body. The strength training makes sure that everything is moving linearly and powerfully and together."

What are Grant's top strength training exercises?

  • Calf loading & calf raises: "My calves always get really tight. I run in carbon-plated shoes a lot, which can make your calf a little weak and injury-prone. So, I'll do calf raises."
  • Back squat: "If you can't do a back squat, then just use dumbbells or a kettlebell. But I like to use a barbell and load up pretty heavy, get some really good muscle fiber recruitment. You know, that motion is very applicable to running. It's the same pushing off the ground with power."
  • Plyometrics & box jumps: "You're really loading your tendons, your joints, trying to get that elasticity, get that resilience, and make sure you don't get hurt."

Tip 4—More Focus on Longer Threshold Workouts
For Grant, one of the biggest adjustments from the track to the half marathon has been emphasizing longer threshold efforts. As a 5,000m and 10,000m specialist, he’s used to sharper, shorter intervals at faster-than-race pace. Half marathon training, however, demands sustained threshold efforts instead of frequent all-out sessions.
Benefits include:

  • Increased aerobic efficiency
  • Improved lactacte clearance
  • Teaching the body to stay strong deep into a longer race effort
  • Mental practice for holding discomfort longer

When we had a chance to catch up with Grant in Arizona, he did a 4x 2-mile threshold workout sustaining a half-marathon effort. You can watch the full workout here, which shows a controlled, but hard effort where he didn't dig too deep and tire himself out early on.


Tip 5—Sleep Is King: Always Prioritize Your Rest
When it comes to recovery, Grant keeps it simple. The more sleep, the better. None of the "fancy" recovery modalities from cryotherapy to sauna matter if you're not getting enough rest and cycling through the deep sleep and REM cycles your body requires.

"If I start sleeping poorly, I see my training go down. If I've been traveling a ton and I jump time zones or something, I see my sleep results are really poor on the watch. I see that when I wake up, my HRV is terrible. And when I run, I feel the consequences of that. So if you can get those things right, it makes a huge difference."

Grant keeps a close eye on his sleep and HRV on his Amazfit Balance 2, which allows him to monitor recovery tailor his training accordingly. He's noticed he carries more fatigue in half marathon training versus track training, because the workouts are more intense and the cumulative load is high. Therefore, sleep monitoring has become a crucial part of his half prep as he adjusts to new routines.

All Eyes On Race Week
From gradually increasing mileage to prioritizing strength training and high-quality sleep, Grant’s approach to the half marathon is built on patience, consistency, and smart adaptation. His transition from the track to the roads reflects not just a change in distance, but a thoughtful evolution in training. As he prepares for his debut at the United Airlines NYC Half, all eyes will be on how one of America’s top distance runners translates his world-class speed to 13.1 miles. We’ll be cheering him on and wishing him the best of luck as he takes this exciting next step toward his marathon ambitions.

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