Triathlon Blog

Everybody rides a bike once in their lives (I never learned how…no, really). You’ve probably enjoyed zooming down the streets when you were a kid, proud of how fast you’re going.

You: Wow! I just passed that grandma on her wheelchair!
Grandma: It ain’t over yet, sonny!

Sorry to say, triathlon bikes go much, MUCH faster than ordinary bikes do. Triathlon bikes were specifically designed for speed (well of course, it’s a race, after all). Triathlon bicycles were constructed to have optimal aerodynamics so you can ride your best. I don’t know if you’ve seen one before, but in some bicycle tournaments, riders use a technique called “drafting.” It’s the act of riding close together to minimize wind resistance. In triathlon events, this technique is rarely used. Hence, the need for an even more aerodynamic bike is high.

Every part of the triathlon bike is designed to minimize wind resistance. The characteristic “aerobars” is one of that. At the same time, anything which adds to the friction and slows down a rider is removed. The wheels, for example, have fewer spokes than normal to facilitate more speed. The seat angle degree is a severe 80 degrees and the front, the part of the aerobars, is situated lower than the seat, which means the rider would have to bend to ride. This position also helps reduce wind resistance. Other designs to help the cause are the carbon-fiver disks, teardrop-shaped bicycle frame and flat handlebars.

The first triathlon bike built to today’s standards is the Quintana Roo Superform. When it first came out, athletese doubted its potency in a race. However, when 7-time Ironman champion, Ray Browning, finished the bicycle race 30 minutes earlier than his nearest competitor, everybody wanted the then singular bicycle design. And thus was born the triathlon bike.

The first part of the triathlon is the swimming part. Unlike people in beaches, triathletes don’t wear their bikinis or trunks to a race. Part of being a triathlete is having to pick out a wetsuit to use for the race. Unless you want to go naked or wear something which could hinder instead of help you out, you have no choice. Triathlon wetsuits are made of neoprene, a polychloroprene-based synthetic rubber. As are kayaking and surfing suits. The difference lies in the flexibility of the design. Triathlon wetsuits are specifically made for races. The wetsuits made for triathlon offer more flexibility around the shoulders, making it easier for athlete to stroke in the water.

How The Wetsuit Helps You

Neoprene is buoyant due to its rubber property. Your suit might be a deciding factor on your winning the race or just finishing it with everyone else. You would want to have any and all extra help you can get and a neoprene wetsuit definitely is.

Types of Wetsuit

You can choose what type of wetsuit you prefer using — overalls, full-legged sleeveless and two-piece. Overalls are what their name implies — long-sleeved, full-legged overall wetsuits. These types are specifically helpful to newer triathletes as it as these can provide them the boost they need for the swimming leg of the competition. The full-legged sleeveless wetsuits are designed for those who believe that the overalls restrict their shoulders while swimming. These can be used effectively by those who already excel in swimming. And then, there’s the two-piece suit. It consists of a bib-john bottom paired with either a vest or a pull-over top.

The neoprene material used for triathlon wetsuits also differ subtly. Some are thicker than the others, depending upon the level of the athlete in question. There are also products which are aimed specifically to a certain level of triathletes namely newbies, experienced and highly-experienced.

We all know triathlon is no joke. The athletes don’t just swim or run or cycle — they do all three in rapid succession. Only the fittest will survive — literally. Although other aspects of one’s physical performance are very important, endurance plays a key role to win. A burly muscleman could only do so much next to a lithe athlete who can endure hours of physical exertion. That is what triathlon is. That’s why, more than just the strength, triathletes develop their endurance even more. How can you ensure you’ll last for hours at a time during training?

1. Eat Carbs — Lost of ‘Em!

Yes, there’s no room for non-carb eaters in triathlon. Carbohydrate is fuel and you need that fuel greatly. Eat lots of carbs before the race. The rule is to eat carbs at the ratio of 4:1 (carbs: protein) one hour before every rigorous exercise routine. Without eating one hour prior to training, your performance drastically decreases. Afterwards, 90 minutes into the training, eat again for fuel and energy.

2. Drink Up

Athletes get dehydrated quickly and frequently. Therefore, you should always rehydrate by drinking every 15 to 20 minutes. Remember, people can live longer not eating, but not without drinking. Increase your water consumption every time you drink. Also, it might be best if you consume sports drinks with electrolyte contents rather than just plain water. When you sweat, you sweat out electrolytes and water, so you lose both. If you want to replenish your strength, you should take in that which you had lost in the first place.

These are a couple of tips to enhance your endurance. However, you could only improve with your own power and it’s all up to you if you want to further and surpass your present physical capabilities.

When training for triathlon, you don’t just sign up for a gym membership and start training, thinking you’ll be ready the next day. Training for triathlon is planned extensively. Every step you take is assessed and your training will be planned accordingly. Everything will be by the book and everything will be routine. Strength training is one type of physical training which is beneficial for the triathlete. By strength training, that means training the muscles intensively to build mass and hence, strength. Strength training benefits the triathlete in different aspects depending upon the activity.

Let’s start with running. Strength training and building the leg muscles could surely help in the running event. Building the leg muscles means the runner could run long distance without feeling tired. Building the muscles means the runner is able to use his legs more efficiently, resulting in optimal performance. Other than that, the legs being subject to training means they’re more resistant to injuries. This is due to the fact that building leg muscles could improve your leg’s springing abilities.

On to swimming. Leg strength is definitely needed when doing turns and pushing off the wall. The push could be the reason you sink or swim (no pun intended), as it the propelling could help you reach the finish line faster. Building the leg muscles ensures you do optimum kicking. On the other hand, leg training has no bearing for the cycling part of the race. Those who exceed on the cycling part of the triathlon, on the other hand, might not benefit at all from the leg strength training. This is due to the fact that cycling would have already toned their muscles to a T. In a nutshell, leg strength training is big help to triathletes and should be included in their training regimen.

Now is often the time of year when athletes begin planning their training time in preparation for next seasons goals. Motivation levels may be running low, with many athletes experiencing mental fatigue after a long season of focused training. Or motivation may be high, as athletes have seen a glimpse of what can be possible next season. However, shortened daylight hours, cold weather, indoor training, holiday family commitments and simply the need to regenerate mental strength demand a reduction in available training hours. These elements require an increased efficiency in our training.

By focusing on your limiters during the off-season you can accrue your highest rate of return for training time invested and set yourself up well for next season. The following are my tips and guidance for setting up your off-season:

Primary Goal: Regenerate Your Attitude and Conserve Mental Strength for the Next Season, ie HAVE FUN!!

In September and October my phone starts ringing with people seaking coaching for races nine to thirteen months away. The first thing I do is to find out where the athlete’s head is. In December, will he put his feet on the floor at 5:30am and say “I am training for an Ironman in September of next year”?

Folks, that is a very dangerous place to be. If that’s where your head is, you’re at high risk of being in a bell tower by June. All of the tips below are focused on tricking you into thinking you are NOT training for the race you’re actually training for.

My method is very simple, fun, and it works:
1. Insert Cool Events (CE’s) on the calendar.
2. CE’s should come in two flavors: what you love to do and what you need to do.
3. Train for these cool events.
4. Move from CE to CE throughout the year.
5. Wake up 8-12 weeks out from your goal race, realize that you’re in pretty damn good shape, physically and mentally.
6. Apply that fitness and fresh head to focused training for your goal race for a relatively short period of time.

<strong>Schedule a Professional Bike Fit</strong>
Find a good local bike shop with triathlon-specific bike fit knowledge and schedule a fit with them for the month of March. Use this appointment as a goal for to increase your flexibility during the limiter season. Increased flexibility can increase range of motion and comfort on the run. But it can also allow you to assume a more aerodynamic AND comfortable position on the bike, which translates into free speed. Consider pre-paying for the appointment, just as you would a race.

<strong>Create Good Eating Habits</strong>
In my opinion, the quickest path to improved fitness is through improved body composition. Why focus so much time and energy on building a big engine if you’re going to put that engine in a truck instead of a sports car? Improving body composition is largely a function of creating good eating habits and applying these habits consistently over months and months. This gradual process allows you to lose body fat in a healthy manner, rather than trying to “make race weight” a few weeks before your goal race. Create good eating habits in October and November, and use them to limit the holiday damage, then carry them forward into next season. Please read my training article, Paleo Diet, Modified for Endurance Athletes

<strong>Schedule Some Personal Time with Your Local Swim Coach</strong>
Improving your swim technique probably offers the greatest return on your training dollar. You may also be a little burned out from a season of Masters swimming and long yardage. Rather than continue to play wall tag with your Masters group, hire that coach to spend a little quality, one-on-one time with you. Have him critique your form and ask him to write up a schedule of technique focused workouts for you do between personal swim coaching appointments. Then perform these workouts as recovery sessions between your more demanding bike and run sessions. Strong swimmers may consider not swimming at all, or only for recovery purposes.

<strong>Seek to Add a Social Component to Your Training</strong>
In my opinion, the two most valuable training events you can create are a three hour long bike and an hour and a half long run that you execute every week, from now until the end of time. Adding a social component encourages you to make that regular Saturday ride with your buds simply “what you do,” month after month, year after year. I look forward to my weekend workouts the way I used to anticipate $3.25 pitchers at Moe’s and Joe’s in Atlanta. So join a local tri club and meet new people. Train with old friends who’ve been on a different training schedule all year. Check out that running club that meets downtown on Wednesday nights for a run and pizza.

<strong>Train Like a Half Marathon Runner</strong>
That hour and a half long run is perfect for every flavor of triathlete. If you race Olympics, it will help you build a very solid base for next season. If you’re a Halfer, it’s just at or below your peak long run during the season, enabling you to solidify the base you already have. It’s also short enough to accommodate some half marathon flavor intensity. If you’re an Ironman athlete, it’s long enough to help you keep your base while short enough to accommodate the tempo running your Ironman training couldn’t support during the season

For all of these athletes, half marathons are the perfect goal races to help you guide your training. The distance is just long that everyone, Olympic to Ironman, will take it seriously. You’re more likely to get out the door for that hour and a half run with you have a half marathon coming up in two weeks. And it’s short enough that you can race one or two per month and use them as excellent training events. Schedule 5 and 10k’s as training events for your goal half marathons and pretty soon you have a full race calendar of fun training events (and affordable, for a change).

<strong>Train Like a 40k Time Trialist</strong>
I see a lot of athletes, especially northern, trainer-bound folks, get themselves into trouble during the winter by either trying to hold on to the endurance they built during the season or by trying to get a head start on building the endurance required for their races next season. Go back to my advice to make it fun. Remember that warm weather is a loonnng way away. Recall my advice to conserve your mental energy for later in the season. Accept all this and realize that you just can’t hold on to or build that long bike endurance without placing your mental strength at risk.

However, what you can do is build the cycling component that makes you a stronger, faster cyclist at all intensities: power at lactate threshold. Take a look at the roadies who blow by you on your Saturday ride. Those dudes in the front can crank it, hard, for several minutes at a time yet their longest “long” rides are often 50-60 miles, pedestrian by Ironman standards. How do they do it? They ride FAST, often.

Its very simple, if you want to ride fast you have to ride fast. Don’t worry about fast + far for now. Plenty of time for building far when it warms up in the spring.

Note: immediately after writing this guidance I had a conversation with a new client, where I repeated this emphasis on high intensity cycling during the off-season. She noted this was counter to the more common guidance to work on “base” during the winter.

My comments:
Raising your watts at lactate threshold raises your watts at all intensities. “A rising tide floats all boats.”

Base building training and lactate threshold training are not mutually exclusive. They exist along the same range of ways to invest your training time, with LT on the short end and base training on the longer, higher volume end. In a perfect world we would be able to put in large aerobic volume during the off-season. However, REALITY is winter, indoors, family, holidays, and an upcoming 6-9 month training season. Reality dictates that you adopt a training method that is extremely time efficient and does make you faster. Interval training at or near lactate threshold fulfills these requirements.

If you live in a good climate and have the personal schedule to support it, go ahead and keep up that long ride schedule. But I encourage you to do the fun stuff that you were too torqued about during the season to do.

My “Get Faster on the Bike Keys:”
1. If you want to ride fast, you have to ride fast.
2. It’s ok to ride too hard. It’s ok to ride too far. It’s ok to ride to hard and too far, as long as you recover afterwards.
3. You can’t start riding hard and fast too soon. Don’t worry, your body will catch up and you have plenty of time later in the year to do more volume. For now, ride like a kid and enjoy going fast!

<strong>Your Limiter Season Plan</strong>
Let’s gather all of these ideas into “Big Picture” and weekly guidance:

Big Picture
Go to Active.com and do searches for 5, 10k’s and half marathons in Oct-March in your area. Register for an A priority half marathon, preferably in March. Register for B priority halfs in January and February. Register for C priority 5 and 10k’s to use as training races for these B and A events.

Look into your local cycling resources. Is there a local time trial series that runs through the early winter? A regular group ride that meets on Saturdays or Sundays? Can you yourself offer to lead or create cool rides for your local tri club? Register for a February or March road race or organized century/half century and use this event as motivation through the winter.

Explore your local swimming resources? Is there a well-respected local coach you can meet with? Is this coach offering a group swim clinic?

<strong>Weekly</strong>

Swim: 2-3 sessions per week, as drills/recovery. Stronger swimmers may consider not swimming at all.

Bike: 3 rides per week, as 2 x Functional Theshold (FT, focused on increasing watts at lactate threshold) + 1 x 3-4hr weekend ride. I prefer group rides and to mix up the terrain, keeping it fresh and fun. My rule is “the shorter I go, the harder I ride.” Very simple.

Run: 4-6 sessions per week as 1 x Long (1:30-2hrs, hilly), 1 x Hilly, 1-2 x Strides/Aerobic. The key is to schedule a run week you can execute consistently, week after week. Let volume be a result of relatively high frequency.

Stretching and Core work: 3-4 x core/wk, stretch nightly. Just make it a habit, dropping to the floor in the evening.

<strong>In Summary</strong>

1. Adopt this Cool Event (CE) perspective on your off-season training and racing.
2. Pick CE’s that you love to do and need to do.
3. Schedule fun, time efficient training that leads you from CE to CE.
4. Address longer term goals through the creation of good habits and by adding a strong social component to your training.

<em>Rich Strauss is the founder and head coach of Crucible Fitness. He is a Joe Friel Ultrafit Associate, USAT Level I certified, a former Marine officer and the founder of the Pasadena Triathlon Club. Since 2001 Rich has specialized in training, coaching and racing the Ironman distance, having coached hundreds Ironman finishers and delivered pre-race talks to over 400 athletes at IMNA races. Rich offers affordable Half and Full Ironman training plans, and specializes in coaching athletes with a powermeter.

You prepare weeks, even months before the triathlon event. You tone your body to a T, trained like an addict, worked out until your pass out, ate only healthy food and no junk, and just basically, lived and breathed for the day of the race. And then on that very day, that one important day you’ve been busting your arse off for, you look at yourself on the mirror, finally realize what’s happening, and then suddenly get cold feet. For seasoned triathlon veterans, this might not be true any longer. However, for first-timers who worked real hard to join a triathlon, it might be a heart-thumping situation.

So, how do you mentally prepare yourself before a triathlon event?

1. Get It Off Your Mind or Treat it Like an Ordinary Day

When you’ve been preparing for something for a long time — and triathlon trainings would really take a while — you begin to feel the pressure upon you as the day of the event nears. It might be better if you program yourself to think that that it’s just another ordinary day in training so you won’t feel high-strung and nervous during the event itself.

2. Build an Unbreakable Confidence

The first method might not work for some people. Convincing themselves that the even itself is another ordinary day might strip off their competitive spirit. If a person has the tendency to be that way, then it might be better to build up an unbreakable confidence on one’s abilities during the course of the training so that on the day of the event, one would feel confident enough for the competition.

Triathlon, unlike other sporting event, takes up and drains ones resources. To compete in less than your optimal condition would be disastrous unless you’re Ertel.

Gone are the days when women quietly and meekly sit by the sewing machine, making clothes for their children or knitting quietly by the window, prim and proper and subdued. The modern woman loves challenges and the triathlon field seems to be one of women’s new playgrounds. In a sport so physically demanding only the fittest survives, women won’t let men dominate so easily. Bodies which used to be fragile have been honed for tough physical exertion. Muscles which, in women, are hard to tone due to the low testosterone levels are trained extensively so that the triathlete sports a stringy musculature. The women of triathlon sure deserve applause.

Even being sick, she didn’t back out — Emma Snowsill bags first place in Noosa triathlon. Snowsill almost walked away from the competition due to an illness but thought better of it and went for broke. Well, her efforts weren’t in vain since she has won one of Australia’s biggest triathlon events. The Noosa triathlon event is held every November in Australia and Snowsill has won the title from 2003 to 2005. Winning the title again this 2007, I think, means more than all her preceding titles seeing as she has won despite not being in perfect condition.

In other news, Julie Ertel is still probably celebrating her latest and first world cup victory in Cancun. The American triathlete is a gold medalist in the Pan-Am games and this victory is as, if not, a thousand times sweeter. Ertel, reportedly, was recently married and her husband was very supportive of her career (good for you, hubby).

Snowsill and Ertel are only faces of women in triathlon. There are countless others which proves that something as challenge and demanding as triathlon is for everybody and anybody who has the guts and the drive to try.

While watching the swimming events in the Olympics last week, I started thinking about how different the freestyle stroke is (or should be) for Olympic sprinters and amateur triathletes.

Many people in the triathlon world think they need to just emulate Ian Thorpe to have a faster time, or have a similar stroke to Michael Phelps to cruise through the swim. For most amateur triathletes, trying to learn from these swimmers is like trying to learn Portuguese when you really want to learn Spanish. There are similarities, but not enough to get you by.

Don’t get me wrong- Thorpe, Phelps and many of their major competitors have some of the best freestyles in the world, and parts of swimming science are based on things these guys do in the water.

The problem is, most of the freestyle events in the Olympics are actually sprints.

The 50 is over before you can blink, the 100 is an all-out sprint, and the 200 and 400 are both controlled sprints. The 800 is more of a middle distance event, while the 1500 (mile) is really the only pure distance swim in the meet. So can we learn from the mile swimmers at the Olympics? Yes, a little. The swimmers generally have lower stroke counts, and aren’t relying on their kick as much as the sprinters. But those swimmers don’t have to do a long bike and run after they swim!

So, they can put everything into their swim, and their strokes come out looking a bit different than what we are teaching the beginning level, non-swimmer triathlete. Although we can’t use a one-size-fits-all approach to freestyle strokes, there are many aspects I have pointed out that have helped triathletes all over the world that don’t come from a swimming background:

• Keep a low stroke count
• Rotate the hips
• Reduce the intensity of your kick
• Keep your elbows high
• Glide with each stroke

These same tips do not all necessarily apply to Olympic level swimmers. These swimmers have reasons for doing things differently:

They may have a fast turnover rate and a high stroke count for sprinting. Their hip rotation is not as pronounced- they don’t have as much of a need to “conserve energy” as a triathlete does. The kick may be very intense and strong, especially for the shorter events. Most of the Olympic swimmers have been practicing for many years, and some have perfected a stroke that is less than ideal for a non-swimmer doing a triathlon (i.e. Janet Evans is considered the best female swimmer of all time, and had a unique straight-arm stroke that very few have been able to master)

So watch and admire these world class athletes, but be careful what you try to emulate and don’t feel bad that you’re not moving through the water with the same ease and grace they are!

Triathlon wet suits are designed with state-of-the-art materials to help athletes get in and out of the water quickly, efficiently and of course, to keep the wearer warm. Triathlon wet suits are much more than the normal wet suit employed by divers simply to slow heat loss underwater and keep warm. Designed specifically for athletic competition, their first priority is to keep a competitive swimmer on top of the water, reducing drag and stalling muscle fatigue, enabling the swimmer to race faster and for longer periods of time.

Furthermore, the rubber used on the outside of the wet suit is of the slickest and most slippery materials possible to emulate the scales of a fish as closely as possible. The manufacturing technology employed in creating these wet suits has been a bone of contention between athletes and committee members because they reduce the difference between weaker swimmers and stronger swimmers, not only in speed, but also in all-around efficiency.

Because the triathlon wet suit enables a competitor to spend less energy on the first leg of the competition, he or she is able to reserve energy for the other two legs of the process. This can be a huge edge over the rest of the field, assuming of course, that you are not all wearing the same suits.

To begin with, the rubber used in most of these wet suits, regardless of the brand name featured, comes from one supplier - the world-famous, Japanese rubber manufacturer, Yamamoto. There is an important difference in the thickness of the rubber used in each and every different brand name of wet suit produced. Some manufacturers opt for the 2mm thickness, going towards producing a suit that weighs less and subsequently feels lighter to the user and is more flexible.

Other manufacturers go with the thicker rubber, up to 5mm thick, following the rule of thumb that shows that the thicker the rubber used, the more buoyant the suit will be and ultimately, even though it weighs more, will save the user more energy. In the end, it’s the swimmer himself who must decide which option best suits his style.

This article was written by Peter Emerson.

The start of a triathlon can be nerve-wracking, tiring, intimidating, frustrating, and even discouraging (why do we do this sport??). But don’t let all this get to you! The start for everyone is a crazy cluster of splashing, starts and stops, physical contact, and swimmers trying to separate from each other.

Here are some tips to deal with what some consider being the toughest part of any triathlon:

1.Expect the worst. Go into the event expecting that the start will not be easy. Know that you will bump into people, others will bump into you, but 99% of the time it is all by accident. Also know that the chaos at the beginning will not last for the entire swim, it will break up quickly as different speed swimmers separate.

2. Don’t panic. Keep your breathing from getting short. Stay as relaxed as you can while everyone else tries to get pole position. Don’t let others being frantic affect your state of mind.

3. Stay to the outside. Many will try to stay to the inside, as close to in line with the first buoy as they can get. Don’t follow the pack. Start outside and work your way in as you approach buoy #1. You many not get perfectly clean water, but you will save yourself from much of the madness.

4. Run until the water level is at your knees. This will maximize your time on land without being slowed by running through water.

5. Use shorter strokes to get through the chop. If you are swimming in the ocean and it is a choppy day, this technique helps tremendously. Once you get to some smoother water, go back to long strokes to maximize efficiency and conserve energy.

These 5 tips should help you to at least tolerate, if not enjoy, the beginning of a triathlon!