The BYD Singapore International Marathon is on 4–6 December 2026. If you’re following a standard 16–18 week training plan, you’re either entering taper right now or approaching it within the next week. Your long runs are done. Your mileage is coming down. And if you’re anything like most marathon runners, you’re also feeling a strange combination of anxiety, phantom aches, restless legs, and the nagging suspicion that you’ve somehow lost all your fitness in four days.
You haven’t. That’s taper — and it’s one of the most psychologically challenging phases of marathon training precisely because it doesn’t feel like enough.
This guide covers what happens to your body during taper, where chiropractic fits in, and — just as importantly — what you should not do in the final three weeks before race day.
What Actually Happens During Taper
Taper is the deliberate reduction of training volume — typically 20–40% per week over the final two to three weeks — designed to let your body absorb the fitness gains from months of training and arrive at the start line fully recovered.
During this phase, a series of beneficial adaptations occur:
- Muscle glycogen stores replenish to above-baseline levels
- Micro-damage to muscle fibres from training repairs completely
- Inflammation in tendons and joints settles
- The nervous system, which has been under sustained load for months, recovers its responsiveness
- Blood volume increases slightly, improving oxygen delivery
None of this is visible or felt from the inside — which is why taper feels so wrong. The fatigue you’ve been running through lifts, and in its absence you feel every small ache and stiffness that was masked by training. This phenomenon is well-documented among endurance athletes and is sometimes called “taper madness.” It is normal, it is temporary, and it does not mean you are injured or undertrained.
The Taper Symptoms That Send Runners to Google at Midnight
Some of the most common taper complaints we hear at Family Health Chiropractic Clinic from runners in the weeks before the marathon:
“My knee has started hurting and I haven’t changed anything.” Niggling pains that were suppressed by endorphins and the momentum of training often surface when volume drops. In most cases they are not new injuries — they are existing tightnesses that are now more noticeable.
“My legs feel heavy and flat, not fresh.” This is normal in the first week of taper. The body shifts from breaking down to rebuilding, and that transition can briefly feel like fatigue. Most runners feel genuinely fresh by race week.
“I feel twitchy and can’t sleep.” Your body is calibrated for a high activity load. When that load drops suddenly, sleep and mood are often affected for a week or two. This settles.
“I think I’ve lost all my fitness.” You haven’t. Research consistently shows that aerobic fitness is retained for two to three weeks with minimal training. You are not detrained. You are resting.
Should You See a Chiropractor During Taper?
Yes — with timing and intent in mind.
The taper period is actually one of the better times to see a chiropractor, for two reasons. First, your training load is lower, which means your body can integrate an adjustment and any associated tissue response without the interference of heavy workouts on top of it. Second, a pre-race spinal and joint assessment gives you specific, useful information: whether there are any restrictions in your lumbar spine, pelvis, or lower extremities that might affect your running mechanics or load distribution over 42 kilometres.
At Family Health Chiropractic Clinic, Dr Kelvin Ng and Dr Ashley Liew use ArthroStim instrument-assisted adjusting — a low-force, precision technique that delivers controlled impulses to specific spinal and peripheral joints. It is particularly well-suited to the taper period because it does not create the post-adjustment muscle soreness that occasionally follows high-velocity manual manipulation. Runners are typically comfortable training the following day, making it safe to schedule a session two to three weeks out from race day.
What a pre-race chiropractic assessment typically looks at:
- Lumbar spine mechanics — restricted segments in the lower back affect how load is absorbed and transferred through the pelvis and legs over long distances
- Sacroiliac joint function — the SI joint is a key transfer point between the spine and lower limbs; subtle restrictions here are common in high-mileage runners and can contribute to asymmetrical loading
- Hip mobility — hip flexor tightness and reduced hip extension are among the most common biomechanical findings in distance runners, and both affect stride mechanics
- Knee and ankle joint mobility — reduced dorsiflexion at the ankle, in particular, has strong associations with IT band syndrome, runner’s knee, and plantar fasciitis
The Window: When to Book
If you are planning a chiropractic session before the marathon, the two to three week window before race day (i.e., mid-to-late November) is ideal. This gives your body enough time to respond to any adjustments made, without risking any transient soreness close to race day.
What we generally advise against: booking a first-ever chiropractic session in the final five to seven days before the marathon. If your body has never been adjusted before, there is a small chance of a temporary increase in muscle soreness or fatigue as it adapts — not harmful, but not what you want three days out from a race. If you’re an existing patient, race-week sessions are fine because your body already knows how to respond.
What to Do in the Final 3 Weeks
Keep moving. Taper does not mean stopping. Your shorter runs and reduced mileage are critical for maintaining neuromuscular sharpness. Do not replace your scheduled easy runs with total rest — the goal is recovery, not detraining.
Address niggles now, not the week of the race. If your IT band has been bothering you, or you’ve had a recurring lower back stiffness after long runs, the taper period is the right time to get it assessed. Waiting until race week to deal with it puts you in a reactive position with no buffer time.
Sleep more. This is the single most effective recovery tool available to you and costs nothing. Target eight to nine hours per night through the taper. If you are sleeping poorly, review your caffeine intake — many runners maintain high coffee consumption through training, and tapering that alongside mileage can help.
Don’t try anything new. No new shoes. No new nutrition strategy you haven’t tested on a long run. No aggressive stretching routine you found online. The taper period is not the time to experiment — it is the time to refine what you already know works.
Manage your carbohydrate intake strategically. In the final two to three days before the marathon, most runners benefit from increasing carbohydrate intake to maximise glycogen loading. This is well-established sports nutrition practice. Work out the quantities in advance based on your body weight, and don’t rely on guessing on the day.
Practise race-day logistics. Drive or commute the route to the start line. Confirm your gear, your nutrition strategy, your wake-up time. Reducing logistical unknowns reduces pre-race anxiety, which in turn supports better sleep.
What to Avoid in the Final 3 Weeks
A surprise long run to reassure yourself. This is probably the most common taper mistake. Feeling flat in week one of taper and adding a long run to “check that your fitness is still there” will delay your recovery and leave you less fresh on race day, not more confident.
Aggressive foam rolling or deep tissue massage in the final week. Heavy soft tissue work in the five to seven days before a marathon can create muscle soreness that interferes with race performance. Light compression, easy stretching, and gentle rolling are fine — deep, aggressive work is not.
Drastically changing your diet. Some runners drastically increase carbohydrates two weeks out and end up with GI issues during the race. Carbohydrate loading is most effective in the final two to three days, not a fortnight beforehand. Introducing unfamiliar foods close to race day is also a risk.
Over-researching symptoms. Taper is the period when runners are most likely to convince themselves they have a stress fracture based on a mildly tender shin. If a symptom is not affecting your walking or daily activity, is not swollen, and is not getting worse, it is almost certainly not a new serious injury. If you are genuinely unsure, a quick clinical assessment is far more useful than a late-night Google search.
If You’re Managing an Existing Injury
If you have been carrying an injury through your training — a recurring IT band flare, a grumbling hip, lower back stiffness that appears on long runs — the taper period is genuinely your last good window to address it before race day.
We work with runners managing IT band syndrome, patellofemoral pain, sacroiliac joint dysfunction, and lumbar disc irritation in the lead-up to major races. The approach is always the same: clear assessment, honest prognosis, and a plan that protects your race-day goal while giving the injury what it needs. We will not tell you to scratch unless the injury genuinely warrants it — but we will tell you what the risks are so you can make an informed decision.
Race Week Itself
In the final seven days before the marathon, the priority is preservation, not improvement. Nothing you do in the final week will meaningfully increase your fitness. Everything you do has the potential to interfere with your readiness.
- Keep runs short (20–30 minutes), easy, and include a few short strides to maintain leg turnover
- Eat familiar foods. Stick to what your gut knows.
- Lay your race kit out two days before the race — bib, timing chip, shoes, nutrition, warm-up layers
- Set two alarms. The BYD Singapore International Marathon has a very early start (from 4:30am for the full marathon)
- Arrive at the start line feeling slightly underdone — that is exactly where you want to be
After the Race
Post-marathon recovery deserves as much planning as the race itself. The general rule is three to five days of no running, with light movement (walking, easy cycling, swimming) in the first week, before gradually returning to easy jogging in week two. The longer the race, the longer the recovery runway your body needs — and a full marathon warrants a more conservative return than a half.
See Us Before Race Day
Dr Kelvin Ng and Dr Ashley Liew are available throughout November for pre-marathon assessments. Our clinic is at 111 Somerset Road, #08-03 TripleOne Somerset, Singapore 238164 — two minutes from Somerset MRT (Exit A).
If you have a specific niggle you’d like assessed, or simply want a pre-race spinal and biomechanical check, book an appointment here or WhatsApp us at +65 8198 8248.
Good luck on race day. You’ve done the work. Trust the taper.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I get a chiropractic adjustment the week of the marathon?
If you are an existing patient whose body is familiar with chiropractic adjusting, a session in race week is generally fine. If it would be your first-ever adjustment, we recommend waiting until after the race — not because an adjustment is risky, but because first-time responses vary and you don’t want unexpected muscle soreness two days before race day. The two-to-three week window before the marathon is the ideal time for new patients.
I’ve been getting a niggle in my knee during my long runs. Should I run the marathon?
It depends entirely on the nature of the niggle. A dull, intermittent ache that has been present for weeks without worsening is different from a sharp, one-sided pain that is affecting your gait. The taper period is the right time to get it properly assessed rather than making a decision based on guesswork. We can give you a clear picture of what the structure is, how serious the load is, and what the risk of running 42 kilometres on it actually looks like.
Will a chiropractic adjustment make me run faster?
Not directly. What chiropractic assessment and adjusting can do is optimise the mechanics of how your spine, pelvis, and lower limbs work together — reducing energy leaks from restricted joints, improving symmetry of load distribution, and ensuring your nervous system is communicating efficiently with your muscles. Whether that translates to a faster time depends on many factors, but most runners report feeling more fluid and less restricted after a course of adjustments during training.
My lower back always stiffens up after my long runs. Is that normal?
It is common, but not something to normalise. Recurring post-run lumbar stiffness usually indicates a combination of reduced spinal mobility, tight hip flexors, and core endurance that runs out before your legs do — meaning your lower back absorbs more load than it should in the later stages of a run. This is addressable, and addressing it before a marathon is far better than managing it during one.
How soon after the marathon can I get a chiropractic adjustment?
Most runners benefit from waiting three to five days post-marathon before an adjustment, to allow the initial acute soreness and inflammation to settle. A post-race assessment in the first to second week after the marathon is ideal — it gives us a clear picture of how your body held up over the distance and what needs attention before you begin your next training block.