Ironman | Endurance Nation | Triathlon Coaching, Ironman Training, Half Ironman, Beginner Triathlon

The Ultimate Winter Training Guide for Triathletes

Posted by admin On September - 18 - 2011

Every year we watch thousands of athletes compete on the Ironman and 70.3 race circuit — after all as coaches we travel to most of the major events on the race calendar. Race day is special not just for what happens, but because it’s the culmination of months of training and focus.

While race day is all about execution, all the training leading up to this point determines the nature of your race. Speed isn’t something magical that shows up, it’s earned. And no part of your training is more speed focused than what you do in the winter.

You Will Plan A Full Season

The first thing you should do is sit down and create a roadmap for your full season. This will be your overall guide to building fitness and allowing you to peak for your A race of the year. Using the Endurance Nation approach to seasonal fitness, you will incorporate time for building your fast in the OutSeason and follow that up with ample time to add far in the Race Prep phase. Here are two articles that look at the season planning process in more detail: A Season Map and Season Planning Case Studies.

You Will Select Appropriate Activities

The hardest part of the wintertime siren song of volume is the true variety of options. Outside of the usual triathlon disciplines, you can ski, skate, hike, ride cross or MTB. You can look outside of aerobic work and find yoga, crossfit, core strength, weight training and much more. Before you know it, you could easily be singing up for the same amount of training time you did in the winter!

Instead, you’ll drop the swim workouts unless you average slower than 2:00 per 100 yds in the pool. You won’t lose that much swim fitness and it only takes a few weeks get it back (here’s another article where you can learn about our no-swimming policy for the winter).

If you want some diversity in your winter training cycle, you can pick one or two outside activities to complement the work you are doing to build your fitness. An example would be skate or crosscountry skiing that you did once during the week and once on the weekends. We vastly prefer you picking one additional activity to replace swimming, something that you pursue in-depth, as opposed to filling your calendar with too much.

You Will Skip “Base” Work, Focusing on Fast Instead

Your competition will break out the fixed gear bike. Could be there’s a big marathon that everyone in your hood will want to do…like Disney. Whatever the endurance challenge might be, let your them do it. The more time your age group competition spends in Zone 1 means less time they’ll actually be building speed or getting faster. They don’t know any better, because they are doing exactly what the elites and pros do — pile on the miles.

The unspoken challenge of a volume-oriented approach is being able to do enough miles in zone one. If you take a look at the average pro triathlete training schedule, they are riding 15 to 25 hours a week at that level. Then you add running and swimming to the mix. Sure the volume works; the only problem is you can’t have a full-time job, family, or other responsibilities if you want to get the full benefits because you simply can’t do enough training — and recovery from it — for it to work. In other words, one five-hour ride a week simply won’t cut it.

Focus on Training ROI

As a savvy age-group triathlete, there are many other things weighing on your mind outside of trying to log more hours than anyone else you know. The winter is an excellent time to focus on excellence in everything you do outside of your regular in-season training: you have work, social and family commitments that can use your attention. You do this now to earn the right to take time in the summer for your training and racing.

Instead of just piling on hours, you will focus on improving the critical metrics of threshold power (bike) and pace (run). This means hard interval training in both sports, three sessions each a week, with workouts limited to about an hour. That’s right, a baseline of about six total hours of training.

This gives you plenty of time to recover from each workout, and to dominate in the other areas of your life that matter. After three to four months of this focused training, your bike and run fitness will be at season peak levels. You’ll be ready for a short break and then it’s time to turn your attention to adding some volume on top of this newly created speed.

Conclusion

A lot of what you’ve read here runs contrary to traditional triathlon training. Don’t let that deter you; we have put over 3,000 triathletes through the OutSeason since 2007, and the data and testimonials don’t lie. So before you fall inline with your training partners, remember that the only “foundation” you need in the winter is speed related.

After all, as an Ironman or 70.3 triathlete, the actual race-specific training of the final twelve weeks is more than enough time to ramp up your endurance. It’s time to break with tradition and find some new fitness…good luck!

Want To Learn More?

Please take the Endurance Nation FREE five-part “Rethinking the OutSeason” Email Seminar. We’ll cover these topics above in much greater detail while also teaching you the basics of training with power, pace, annual scheduling, and much more. Join the more than 5,000 athletes who have benefitted from the EN approach to winter training!

Popularity: 7% [?]

OutSeason

Endurance Nation’s Triathlon Fundamentals

Posted by admin On August - 25 - 2011

It’s Time to Go Back to Tri School — You Ready???

photo credit: mueritz

We initially were going to title this post something like: “Everything I’ve Learned About Triathlon Has Come From Coaching Over 5,000 Athletes, Not From A Random Book” But that wasn’t as catchy and we’re pretty sure no one would read it!The reality is, there’s what you learn from books and then there’s what you learn when you apply that book stuff to your own training (25 IM finishes, including Kona, between us) and the training of thousands of real-world, age grouper long course triathletes. There’s what you learn when you coach 15 people at a time…then there’s what you learn when you guide 500+ athletes per year to Ironman finishlines around the world.

So put down that TriRag with all the sexy models, bling components, and the latest and greatest way to lose 20lbs while training to qualify for Kona in just 12 weeks. Do your best to quell the urge to pull out your wallet and spend your way to triathlon success.

Just because you have a full-time job doesn’t mean that you need to spend 10% of your annual salary in order to be competitive. In fact, as you’ll see below, there are plenty of things the average person can do to improve their fitness, strength and ability to race that don’t involve tons of money or time.

1. Work Is Speed Entering the Body (aka Go Fast to Get Fast)

As a triathlete, you move your body down the road, either by running or cycling. Your body has mass and by moving it at a certain speed/velocity you are performing work.

You and I weigh the same and we run the same three mile course. I average 8:00 miles and you average 9:00 miles. I’ve moved the mass of my body (the same as yours!) over the same distance in less time. I’ve done more work than you. Lets call it 300 units to your 200 units.

All things being equal (conditions, our fatigue level, etc) the reason why I can do 300 to your 200 units is because I’ve forced my body to adapt itself to be able to support a workload of 300 units. Your body will only adapt itself to the workload that you expose it to, nothing more. Doing more work forces your body to adapt. So how do you develop the ability to go from running 3 miles at 9:00/mile pace to running at 8:00/mile pace like me? You need to do more work.

The most time-efficient way to do this is to spend more time running at / under / near 8:00/mile pace: half-mile repeats, mile repeats, pick ups, etc. Hard work plus recovery will make you stronger, eventually enabling you to reach your 8:00/mile pace goal.

A well thought out and proven training program will prescribe work that’s appropriate for your level of fitness, turning the dial up and up, and then backing off a bit just when you need it.

Most importantly, work is measurable. You can measure watts on a bike, or pace on a run. You can quantify the % of level effort you are able to sustain, and then improve upon it on a regular basis. Leave the thoughts of just adding volume or training for 25+ hours a week for your single friends or those TriRag profiled athletes. As an age grouper with a job, a family and other responsibilities, doing more “work” in your training is the most direct way to see improvement.

To put it another way, if your primary definition of “more work” is “more volume,” turning up the dial so that a 12hr week becomes 14hrs becomes 18hrs becomes 20hrs…becomes what? Where does it stop? When you’re divorced, unemployed and homeless?!

We’ve learned, through experience, that our primary tool to impart greater and greater training stress to our athletes is to manage the intensity of the workouts first, volume a very, very distant second.

Weekly training volume for the average grouper is largely fixed by life, family, job, life and life. However, the intensity at which you do workouts within that fixed volume is infinitely flexible. This is why intensity, not volume, is the primary dial our age group athletes use to adjust training stress within each training week.

2. Fast Before Far (aka Volume is Easily Added)

Since 2007 we have been teaching our “fast before far” approach, where we use the winter months to improve our athlete’s speed and strength at threshold. We can afford to do this higher intensity training because in the winter there are no volume demands on our training schedule and there are plenty of opportunities to recover from the hard training.

The net is that our Endurance Nation OutSeason plan has between six and eight hours of weekly training — total! — across four or five months of the year.

So in the winter, roughly October/November through February/March, we drop the volume dramatically, turn up the intensity…dramatically…making our athletes much, much faster. The average Endurance Nation athlete improves his/her Ironman or Half Ironman race pace on the bike by 1.5 to 2 miles per hour, and over a minute per mile faster on the run…often making them 30 minutes faster than last years version of themselves, long before they have even started to ride longer than 90 minutes.

Once the weather turns and we can add volume without burning the athlete out on a trainer, we drop the intensity and add more miles. Spring is our favorite time of the year, when we unleash the Team on their training partners and hear the stories about dropping the pack, putting the hurt on, and leaving lots of folks scratching their heads.

Triathlon training culture and old-school coaching books continue to sell the need for many long, aerobic miles before speed can be properly added. The result is snow-bound, age group athletes doing 4-5hr trainer rides, and 12-15hr training weeks in February, months and months before their goal race. Not only is it an inefficient way to train, the mental cost to the athlete is off the charts. Since we all live in a world where 5-7hrs per week in the winter — when it’s cold, dark, and months and months from goal race — is simply more appropriate, our training approach shifts to low volume/high intensity because it’s simply the best, most time efficient way for real world age groupers to train.

3. Volume is Race-Specific

Just because volume isn’t the means by which we build your fitness over the season doesn’t make it any less important inside Endurance Nation. In fact, we provide multiple options for our Team to put in some epic training: our annual Tour of California Cycling Camp, various Triathlon Rally events on IM courses, member-run camps across the country, and even members-only plans for big bike and big triathlon-specific training weeks.

Each of these different opportunities shares a single common thread: they are all focused opportunities ranging from three to seven days in duration. They are structured to have an impact on your actual race performance, with the timing of the Texas Rally, for example, set to approximately 4 weeks prior to the event.

We’ve found that these relatively short volume pops are a much more time-efficient way to dramatically boost endurance — assuming, of course, that you have the time to do them. Rather than requiring them to nickle and dime their families for multiple 5-6hr training days every week for months and months, we work with our athletes to put a Big Bike or Big Tri Week/Weekend “X” days out from their race.

With your Fast already built, it’s easy to add Far to the equation because volume isn’t actually that hard. If you and I were planning on a 2.5-hour ride, but I rolled up and said let’s go 3.5-hours, it ain’t no big thing. You wouldn’t tell me that you have to train more before you could ride another hour with me…you’d simply go get another energy bar. Done.

It’s not the individual dose of volume that can be damaging, rather it’s the cumulative effect of repeat days, weeks and months of such training that can cause serious issues such as injury and over-training.

For the average age-group triathlete, the weekly volume of training required to complete an Ironman or 70.3 is at or above the basic level of time they can sustain.

By leveraging intensity early in the year and then dialing the focus over to volume as race day approaches, Endurance Nation takes a season of massive training hours and boils it down to a four- to eight-week focused exercise.

Remember, the reason why the Endurance Nation athlete doesn’t do months and months of 5-6hrs long rides, 3hr long runs, 2hr brick runs, isn’t swimming 3x week in January for a race in September, or spending 2hrs/wk in the gym is because Rich and Patrick have learned better through their own training (aka School of Hard Knocks) and through coaching thousands of age groupers just like you. We have done the 3-hour tempo runs, the back-to-back to back 120 mile cycling days for weeks on end, the 25-hour training weeks until implosion.

We’ve learned what works and what doesn’t–through our own extensive training, racing, and coaching experience–so you don’t have to experiment and, frankly, make the same mistakes we did.

4. Race Day is about Execution not Fitness

Conversations in the triathlon space are dominated by discussions on how to train and what $$$$ aero widget to buy. How far/long/hard/often should I bang my head against the wall each week and which $150 bottle is going to save me 15 seconds on race day?

We’ll say it again because it bears repeating: we’ve raced over 25 Ironmans between us. We’ve brought thousands across finishlines in the last decade. TeamEN has 20-45 athletes at every US Ironman. Either Rich or Patrick has been AT every one of those races to support the Team, for years. In short: we’ve made, managed, or observed more rolls of the Ironman racing dice than probably any two coaches on the planet.

Our Number One Observation is that race day is about execution, not fitness. Regardless of how they got there, how they trained, etc, 95% of Ironman athletes at the starting line are very, very fit.

What separates people at the finishline the most is how they drive that fitness vehicle on race day. The race course is littered with the bodies of very fit guys and gals…who just don’t know how to race.

Therefore, we view proper race execution as free speed and about half of our members-only resources are dedicated to teaching everyone on the team how to race with the collective experience of 1000’s of Ironman finishes — an extensive Ironman How-To, webinars in swim, bike, run and nutrition execution, power and run pacing calculators, threads to collect sneaky speed tips on bike set up, gearing, and much more.

It’s important to remember that there are many different ways to get stronger and faster as a triathlete. Endurance Nation’s approach focuses exclusively on the age-group athlete who has real-world constraints and commitments, but the lessons we have learned above can help anyone looking to seek improvement. And who knows, your family might just enjoy being on the sidelines watching you execute the perfect race!

To learn more about Endurance Nation, our triathlon coaching and triathlon training plans, please visit us online at www.EnduranceNation.us.

Popularity: 14% [?]

Beginner, How To, race execution, Training

Ironman Lake Placid 2011 Race Report

Posted by admin On July - 28 - 2011

Starting Lap Two of the Marathon

Lake Placid is officially done, and I can say that I am officially “back” from my accident of last year. The details are below, but the executive summary is as follows. A 9:56:38 finishing time, for my first effort below 10 hours. A 1:07:48 non-wetsuit swim, a 5:18:36 bike and a 3:22:43 run…all of this combined to give me a 5 minute PR for the course, 5th in the 35-39 Age Group and my fourth trip to Kona. Life is officially good.

The Details

We arrived on Tuesday to a quiet — yet hot — Lake Placid. Our place was right in the center of town, yet quiet, and it was awesome. I did the usual light swim/bike/run stuff and then spent Wednesday at Santa’s Workshop with the family. Thursday I rode the descent out of town to test the race set up and felt pretty good. That night was also the Fuelbelt Racing Team dinner, and it was great to see so many new faces including some of the elite men.

Friday saw me sleep a whopping 5 hours, so I got up and went to swim a loop with some EN peeps. I dialed in a 29-minute loop in my wetsuit, and felt good. It was also our Four Keys talk, which had more than 100 folks tuning in for some pre-race info. That was followed by beach time and the Kid’s Fun Run…I went home, packed my T1/T2 bags and hit the Team EN dinner. I knew it was going to be big when one of the guys from the 4Keys talk asked me if I was going to a wedding. Around 100 folks hanging out, meeting for the first time, sharing stories, having a few drinks, introducing their families — these team dinners are just awesome.

By the time I get home I realize I haven’t stopped moving since 7am. I put on my compression socks, get a beer and go into chill mode. I sleep a bit better for Saturday, get up and eat a massive breakfast. Do a short run and then check all my stuff in. Realize my bike is at the other end of the oval from the exit, but it’s all good. I head home, take two naps, watch a kung fu movie and try to sleep.

Race Morning

I wake up more tired than I’d like, but it’s all good. Have my first real cup of coffee in like 6 months, so that wakes me up. Pound breakfast and get my stuff together…Vinu and I head to transition to pump tires and get our stuff ready. We hear Mike Reilly say no wetsuits if you want to get to Kona, so it’s back home to the pad to get skin suits and chill for a bit.

I thankfully had a swimskin donated by a teammate (thanks Cary!) and slapped that on, said goodbye to Maura and Emma (Megs was sleeping!) and then to the swim start.

I got into the water to warm up at like 6:45 and quickly realized the swim skin thing wasn’t going to be “easy”. Every time I stopped to tread water it was really work, and going from vertical to moving forward took a lot of work. I got myself seeded, like 15′ off the end of the pier, about 4-5 folks back and waited.

The Swim: 1:07:47

The gun goes off and I start swimming towards the line. I get their pretty quickly, but I also realize that this mingling of non-wetsuit and wetsuit people is really, really not safe for those without. The entire first loop I take maybe 6 complete, clean strokes without hitting people. The rest of the time I am focused on just keeping my head above water.

Every time I am hit or bumped, my legs go right to the bottom and it’s a struggle to get back up. I am seriously scared for the first half mile, and resign myself to just trying to get back to the beach. I don’t even look at the clock, but I hear it’s 1:33 as I am back in the water again. Excited for a contact free 2nd loop, I am sad to see it’s still crowded. More pummeling, etc. I finally find space in the last half mile, and get some good swimming in.

I exit again without looking at the clock and run hard to transition. Kinda worried that no one else seems to be in a rush. I bust through transition get my bike and mount quickly for a total 4:30 time. I could have gone faster but left my helmet buckled in the bag…oops! Exiting the area I see the clock says 1:22 over the bike mount line and have a minor heart attack…before I realize that’s for the pros who had a 10′ start.

The Bike — 5:18:36

At a 1:12 ride time, I figured I had my slowest possible swim within the framework of my race goals, so I knew the bike had to be really solid. My top goal was a 5:15 bike time, but in light of the non-wetsuit swim and my actual placing with a 1:07 swim I figured sub-5:20 would have to be good enough.

I got out of town pretty quickly and settled in on the bike climb past the ski jumps. Lots of folks pass me and I am sitting on good watts. By the time we get to the top of the descent, I have already passed 200 folks and it’s getting quieter.

I have a very easy descent, no brakes (48+ mph), and then get down to business on the flats. There are people all out in front of me which makes for a fun, quick way to move up the ranks. By the time I get to Ausable Forks things are really thinning out so I figure things are looking good. All this way I have peed three times already, so fluids are good.

I ride the hills of the next 22 miles pretty steadily, really focusing on keeping my watts up over the hills. Lots of spikes there because I don’t want to lose momentum. By the time I get to special needs at half way, I can only see a few guys in front of me…when I stop another 8 pass me so I clearly was leading a small group.

Back out on loop two and it was second verse same as the first. Another great descent, albeit a bit windier. Really no one out here, so I focused on keeping the watts up and staying stoopid aero. The wind had picked up to Ausable Forks, reducing the fun factor of the flats, but I kept pushing. Just before I got to AF, I saw a group of 15 guys head back out — that’s the group I want for the run!!! I am pumped and get to work. In the back of my head I think I haven’t peed in a few hours, but I push it away.

By the time I get to town I have passed almost every one of that group and feel pretty good. I took my shoes off a bit early for T2, but still rode the bike in just fine.

Here is the full bike data for all you geeks out there:

Entire workout (218 watts):

Duration: 5:20:09 (5:20:23)

Work: 4190 kJ

TSS: 271.2 (intensity factor 0.714)

Norm Power: 232

VI: 1.06

My goal TSS was between 270 and 280, so I nailed that. I wanted a VI of 1.04, but couldn’t maintain the effort and remain as relaxed as I needed to be. Otherwise it looks just like my race sim file! My peak hour was the second hour on the bike as I played catch up to the 10 hour folks; this was done at .743 IF. I slowed a bit in lap two, but my effort was pretty consistent: Lap 1 Intensity Factor was .719, my IF for lap two was .71. Even though my overall watts trailed off a bit, I was able to ride harder for the final climb, beating my lap one time up the slopes by 30 seconds.

After getting changed I can finally go pee in the trough…but it kinda hurts. It doesn’t occur to me that this is bad, I just get to work by running out. This will come back to me shortly.

The Run — 3:22:43

My goal was a 3:15 run based on my fitness. It’s certainly faster than Endurance Nation protocols say I can run, but I know this course and have had solid fitness. My plan is to take the run out at 7:05s and fade to 7:40s over the course of the day. When M tells me it’s 73 degrees, I dial that back by about 10 seconds.

I ran a too fast first mile while I waited for the satellites to find my Garmin, but once it was on I was good. I focused on finding folks and passed close to 30 folks in the first five miles. The return trip to town was a bit slower, but I took it easy on this hills.

The biggest bummer was the hot, hot drinks and sponges on the course. A few aid stations even didn’t have ice, and it make the not-so-easy to drink Perform even less so. Lots of burping for me after every aid station.

At special needs I knew I needed more salt as the sun was relentless (Even though it was only 77 degrees), so I got a bunch in and felt instantly better. At the second turn around in town, my first 12 miles was at 7:14 pace (includes climbs into town), so that meant 7:44s on the way back out. I was fine with that.

Out on the second loop, things began to slow down a bit. I was able to stay on target until Mile 19, when my tummy started to fight back. I took 7 walking breaks during mile 19 to try and get my tummy right. When it finally came around at the base of the ski jump hill, my left leg totally cramped up — calf, quad, adductor, oh my! I power walked the next 4.5 minute at 13:30 pace and ate ice. By the time I got to the top again I could run but only in the upper 8s. I somehow made it up to the top of the climbs and willed myself to finish when I saw a bunch of doodes hunting me down.

The second loop ending up being 8:09/mile average pace, largely due to those two major walking periods and some residual fatigue from the rest of my day. This means I left about five minutes of time out there putting me around a potential 3:18 run time which I would’ve loved to have seen.

No matter, though, as I hear on my way in that I have 7 minutes to go sub-10…and I am pumped. Around the oval, past a screaming M and Megan (and a sleeping Emma!) I cross the line in 9:56:XX right into the arms of the volunteers.

Mission Accomplished (& The Aftermath)

I quickly realize something ain’t right and they take me into the tent. A quick trip to the scale reveals I lost 10 pounds over the day. I earn 2 IVs, some ice, and 4 sodas. 90 minutes later I feel great and am home cheering for Team EN folks on the road. I am told I am fifth in my AG and I am psyched. I rallied that night to go to the pub and hang with EN peeps…so many folks had solid days it was great to hear all the stories. Kudos to you all!

The next day I get to claim a Kona slot and then stand on the podium next to some amazing athletes. Very humbling and truly the pinnacle of my triathlon experience. Hard to believe that a year ago to the day, I was taking some of my first outdoor rides having gotten the clearance from the hip doctor. Those days in the wheelchair seem so far away right now, but they continue to define me as a person and as an athlete. I don’t recall who said it, but it’s true — We all fall down, it’s just how we get back up that really matters.

Future Changes

Looking back on the day, there are a couple of things I would have done differently:

#1 — Hydration Plan for the Bike. I think if you plan on going full tilt all day, you can’t “make up” for any fueling issues. While I had a food plan, I didn’t have a water plan and I got plain lazy out there on the bike. I paid for that on the run dearly, and will be sure to have that dialed in for next time.

#2 — Steadier Early Run Pacing. A look back at my early miles shows a 7:14 avg pace for 12 miles but very little actually around 7:14. I will need to be more precise with my pacing if I am going to be able to run to my potential.

#3 — Swum Inside the Lines. Not that there was less contact, but I have a tendency to drift right. Not good on a counter-clockwise swim and I lost some time there.

Popularity: 10% [?]

IMUSA

Fatigue, FTP, & Your Final Weeks

Posted by admin On July - 5 - 2011

It sure looks fast…now how will you ride it?
photo credit: Alex Kehr

There are two very important questions that you, as an Ironman athlete, have to be ready to answer about your bike fitness heading into the final eight weeks of your Ironman or Half Ironman training cycle. First you have to know what your Functional Threshold Power (link?) is, or at least the Heart Rate equivalent. Second, you have to be able to give a resounding “YES!” answer as to whether or not you have done all of your bike workouts, especially the longer sessions.

In other words, successful race prep is about knowing your limits (your power/HR numbers) and about having confidence in your strengths. If you fudge either of these factors on your way to Race Day, your overall performance will suffer and you won’t be able to race to your potential.

The closer you get to the Big Day, however, the harder these two questions become to answer. Cumulative fatigue mounts, and your ability to generate or even sustain threshold effort on the bike becomes severely compromised. This can lead you to question your fitness and overall preparedness, and perhaps even to make some rash decisions.

An Example Situation

I have this “friend” who is training for Ironman Lake Placid 2011. His name is Patrick, and he’s a coach with Endurance Nation. Really nice guy…and here’s his FTP dilemma. It’s a story repeated across athletes and seasons; maybe it’s even happened to you.

Back in February, his FTP tested out at 342 on the indoor trainer, putting his estimated outdoor watts pretty close to 360.

When he got outside on his road bike in April, he spent four weeks chasing that estimated outdoor FTP before he acknowledged that the single test he took must have been an outlier. He dials his FTP back down to 342.

At the end of May, Patrick busts out his Tri Bike and notices right away that he can’t generate the same high numbers in the aero position, so he dials the watts down to 330.

And now with just three weeks to go, with some epic long rides and lots of long runs on his legs, Patrick is having trouble even hitting 330…it’s more like 320.

Is Patrick in trouble? Has he been getting less and less fit all year long? Has his entire season been a waste since that one test in February? The answer is no, across the board, and here’s why Patrick remains confident heading into his biggest race of the season.

Volume vs Intensity Inside EN

Volume gets a bad rap inside Endurance Nation, at least on the surface. We prefer to use intensity to create training stress, as it’s a much more time-effective method. As such, our OutSeason training includes lots of intervals and, commensurately, lots of rest. This is why back in February, Patrick and many other EN athletes were posting life best numbers.

As the weather turns and we move outdoors, the nature of our regular rides changes significantly. While the intervals remain an important component, the overall volume of almost every session is lengthened. Instead of doing 90 minutes of interval work on the bike across four total hours of riding, EN athletes will do that same 90 minutes across six or even eight hours on the bike.

This ratio continues to decrease the closer you get to your big race, as the long rides for an Ironman can mean a week of cycling nine hours. And that doesn’t take into account if you have added a Big Bike Weekend or Week into your season, like Patrick did back in May when he put in over 600 miles in nine days.

FTP Down but Race Fitness Up

At the end of the day, how we train is a function of the principle of specificity. In the Winter months, with no long race on the calendar, we can do a great deal of high intensity training to improve the upper limits of our bike and run fitness. As we move into the season and approach our Half or Ironman event, the mileage increases to prepare us for the rigors of the day.

While Patrick’s FTP appears to be on a downward trend, the simple truth is that he has been manipulating Training Stress by adding more time at a lower, race specific intensity. This is in stark contrast to the Winter training with it’s 8-, 12-, and 20-minute interval repeats.

Here is a good example of how this situation plays out. On Wednesday, Patrick can’t hit his current FTP of 330 during the mid-week interval session, turning in intervals in the 90% to 92% range (instead of the preferred 95-100% range). On Saturday he ride 150 miles at 74.5% of his FTP, — significantly higher that he had estimated. So while the high-end fitness isn’t necessarily there, it’s easy to see how the Winter strength has transformed into race-specific endurance.

Zen and the Art of Training for the Final Eight Weeks

While our Triathlon Training Plans include interval sessions and at least one bike and run fitness test, your top priorities lie elsewhere. With the shift to Race Prep training in the last twelve weeks / three months of your plan, your focus should also move from a quantitative obsession with bike and run threshold numbers.

You top goal for the final eight weeks is to remain healthy — so recover well and get lots of sleep. You need to be consistent with your sessions — so manage your effort every day so you can hit the workouts as written for each consecutive day. In other words, no hero sessions that set you back for a few days…please!

Your mental focus is on riding and running as steadily as possible, and you should be constantly testing your race fit and gear for the bike. Every long ride is a chance to see how your bike position feels, how your clothing choice works, whether or not your nutrition is effective, etc. Race Day is about Execution, Not Fitness — the bike and run courses don’t care what your FTP is…they only care how well you ride them.

Inside Endurance Nation, we put your fitness and execution to the test in the form of two Race Simulation workouts. These are a 112-mile bike (or 6 hours, whichever comes first) followed by a 6-mile run (or 1 hour, whichever comes first). Most likely these workouts will be full of challenges. Not to worry as all these issues will ensure you are fit and ready to go come race day.

Determining Your FTP Pre-Race

Just because coming by an FTP isn’t easy, doesn’t mean you can avoid it. It’s one of the most important metrics you need heading into the race so you can dial in the appropriate race effort that will set up a solid run.

While your first option is to complete another functional threshold test, the odds of you putting out a test indicative of your current fitness levels is pretty slim. It could be good, or it could be the double whammy that hurts your ego (another low number!) and messes up your race calculations.

Your second option is to review the data for the last month and make an educated guess. By using something like Training Peaks WKO to review the power output for the last 30 days, you can accurately find where you have spent the majority of your time riding. You can ballpark your FTP by looking on the right side of the bell curve, as the bars start to drop down…the biggest incremental fall off in 10 watt increments is a good indicator of where your fitness moves from aerobic/sustainable to anaerobic/unsustainable.

Final Bike Thoughts

Your fitness will be what it will be on race day; it’s not how strong you are on race day but rather how you use that strength. Rest assured that as an Endurance Nation member or training plan athlete, you have done all the hard work required to get stronger.

Instead of stressing about the final few watts or pounds, put your focus and attention to nailing the intangibles. Between dialing in your bike fit (see Todd at TTBikeFit.com), good bike setup, smart gearing choices, and how to ride steady/smart, EN athletes get a lot of free speed and smart riding mojo on race day. If your worried that you won’t be as strong as you’d like, then take comfort in knowing that you’ll be more aero, better geared and much, much smarter.

Good luck!

Popularity: 15% [?]

Bike, race execution

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Course Review

Posted by admin On June - 11 - 2011

More than 75 minutes of IMUSA information!

A huge part of the Tri Rally experience isn’t the epic training, even though we will do over 200 miles on the bike in two days! It isn’t the people, even though we average 100 athletes at every training camp. So what’s left, you ask?

The Coaching!!!

That’s right; whether you have Rich or Patrick at your rally, you are guaranteed to get several hours of coaching guidance and support for your $25 registration fee. We talk training, we talk racing, we talk execution, we answer your questions….the list goes on. (Find a rally that fits your schedule here.)

As an example, here are the links to Coach Patrick’s review of the Ironman Lake Placid Bike and Run courses from our 2011 Triathlon Rally. This talk is divided into five separate sections, so fire up your Internet connection, grab a nice beverage, and get ready to get your learning on.

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Review (1 of 5): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8z4nEF6iCE

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Review (2 of 5): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPDkRJlA2BE

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Review (3 of 5): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iknRl2Dg64g

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Review (4 of 5): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUW8lqDFWag

Ironman Lake Placid: Bike & Run Review (5 of 5): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKwBHdsS6sU

Popularity: 12% [?]

Events, IMUSA

Endurance Nation | Triathlon Coaching, Ironman Training, Half Ironman, Beginner Triathlon

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