Skip's HIM

old rusty ironman

Hi Rich, Being that the HIM program is set to finish on my first HIM of the season, it is considered a B or C race, and per Patrick suggestion of taking it easy should I NOT taper and just switch to the IM program that week? Also, I am not sure when you want bricks done on the 2 a day workouts. Is a run with 2 speeds or 2 paces considered a brick? Also, is it ok to go out on moderate to mod hard bike rides not scheduled on program 15 - 30 miles.

Coach Rich

Posted By Stanton "Skip" Fitting on 28 Apr 2014 12:25 PM

Hi Rich, Being that the HIM program is set to finish on my first HIM of the season, it is considered a B or C race, and per Patrick suggestion of taking it easy should I NOT taper and just switch to the IM program that week? See below. Also, I am not sure when you want bricks done on the 2 a day workouts. Is a run with 2 speeds or 2 paces considered a brick? A "brick" is a workout followed by another workout, usually a run done immediately off the bike. It has nothing to do with the two intensities within a single run...not sure I'm understanding your question correctly? Also, is it ok to go out on moderate to mod hard bike rides not scheduled on program 15 - 30 miles. Maybe, maybe not. It depends on where in the training week you plan to do this ride. Please give me more details. 

 

My thoughts:

 

• You're doing an Oly on 6/1 and a HIM on 6/7. 
• If you were to load up the IM plan on 5/26, for example, you'd still need to amend that IM plan for the Oly on the weekend and again the following week in advance of your 6/7 HIM...and then again the week after the race, as recovery from the half Ironman. More details on how we have people modify their plans here, in the Self-Coaching guide. 
• So while you'd technically be in the IM plan...you won't really be in the plan because you'll be making those modifications to the plan to account for those races. 
• And training 12wks for an Ironman (ie, being formally in the IM plan for 12wks) is more than enough, considering that you're doing so after having trained several weeks for a half Ironman. 

Bottomline, you won't really gain anything by starting the IM plan any earlier, other than sense of security, I suppose, due to the modifications you'll need to make to the plan given your race schedule. And more importantly, you don't really need any extra time in the IM plan, as a function of your current fitness. 

 

old rusty ironman

Thanks, 

old rusty ironman

Thanks, We usually have group bike rides on Thurs. and a 3rd Thursday bike time trial (15 - 20 miles) throughout the summer.

Coach Rich

Posted By Stanton "Skip" Fitting on 28 Apr 2014 10:37 PM


Thanks, We usually have group bike rides on Thurs. and a 3rd Thursday bike time trial (15 - 20 miles) throughout the summer.

The long runs in our plans are on Thurs = a no-go for ^those^ rides. 

Coach Rich

...which is to say, that in the HIM plan you could probably get away with moving the run to Tues and doing that group ride in place of your bike interval session that week...assuming this is a hard group ride. I have no idea.

But as you get into the IM plan, the training load increases and it becomes more and more difficult to move stuff around on the calendar and/or to add extra credit activities.