Zach Copeland Official Coach Thread [PlanEN]
Here's your personal Coach Thread, as promised. This is where you'll return to post all your "coach" questions as responses; I'll see them and reply. This first post is here to guide you through your first year on EN, so you can always come back here.
As you'll see in this forum, I handle all manner of edits and changes. So post away, know that I reply here usually M/W/F each week.
Power User Tip: Click the Star icon by the Title of this thread to subscribe, and you'll get email updates when I do reply.
Coach Notes
Your Races
- 09/21/2019 Redman Olympic
- 05/31/2020 Ironman Tulsa
Your Input
I have done Olympic and Sprint Distance in the past. I am out of shape and need to refocus on what I should be doing. I am signed up for the Redman on September 21st and Ironman Tulsa on May 31st. Biking about three times a week, 3 runs a week, and three swims a week.
Baseline Numbers
- Swimming around 1500 yards per time @2:10.
- Biking around 20 miles @13 MPH.
- Running around 50 minutes @12:30 miles.
Season Outline
These are your recommended training plans, including the date you should start each one (sometimes you won't complete a full plan but transition to another one). You can change your plans on Final Surge by clicking on Training Plans / My Plans. Learn more about each plan on the Training Plan Central Page.
>> Last updated by Coach on July 3, 2019
- On 6/24/2019 Load the -- EN Short Course Plan INT Level to end on 09/22/2019
- On 9/23/2019 Load the -- Post Half Iron Transition Plan, All Levels (2wks) to end on 10/6/2019
- On 10/7/2019 Load the -- Run Durability for Triathletes 1 (9 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 11/3/2019
- On 11/4/2019 Load the -- Run Durability for Triathletes 2 (8 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 12/1/2019
- On 12/2/2019 Load the -- Run Durability for Triathletes 3 (7 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 12/29/2019
- Take a Holiday Week!
- On 1/6/2020 Load the -- OutSeason for Triathletes (Run Focus) Plan, 14wks to end on 4/12/2020
- On 3/9/2020 Load the -- EN Full Bike Focused to end on 5/31/2020
- On 6/1/2020 Load the Post Ironman Transition Plan, All Levels (4wks) to end on 6/28/2020
Training Plan Support in Your First Month
You can connect with @matt limbert as needed in your first month to get dialed in with your training plans and data. You can set up a call with him online here: https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1 and he'll be on this thread shortly!
Your Homework
Tell Me Your Season Goals
- What will make you consider this season a success?
- What's your biggest limiter right now?
Start Learning
Every month we hold live events as part of our commitment to make you just as smart as you are fit. Feel free to visit our Coach Lesson page and our Office Hours page to find the next opportunity to connect with Coach Patrick and your Teammates.
Contact Points
As part of your journey to becoming a Self Coached Triathlete inside TeamEN, we are prepared to give you excellent support for your first 90 days. Our goal is to transition you from live, in-person support to using our digital resources and the Team to help you continue your progress as you execute your Three Year Plan.
These are all the key points in your first year where we must talk. Please remember to include your phone number.
- Welcome Call in Week One (set it up here)
- Training Plan Call in Week Two to talk about your season (set it up here)
- End of Trial Call -- We review your experience & Unlock Year One / Race Execution for you (set it up here)
- End of Season Call -- We review your year & Strategize for your End of Year Gap and Year Two (TBD in this Coach Thread)
Questions
- Coach Questions - Right here in this thread. Always reply to this same thread, it keeps a record for us as we evolve together!
- General Questions - Simple stuff can go to the Q & A Central Forum for the Team to answer. For example, Best Bike? How to improve run cadence? How to flip turn?
- Need Help? - Please check the EN Help Site first!
- Admin Questions - Billing or orders or whatnot? Use the red chat button at the bottom of the Members Site (not forums) or email us here.
- Specific Questions about a Race or Power, etc? - You can post those into the General Discussion Forum and set the title or tags for that topic. Race questions to the Racing Forum, etc. Not sure where to post? Put it in the General Discussion forum and we will sort it out. Whatever you do, PLEASE ask your questions!!
For short or last minute questions, we recommend you use the Red Chat Icon on the main Members website.
We have also organized a complete chart of the best ways to contact us online here.
Your First Month on the Team
You have quite a few things to do when you start up. There are instructions on the top of the website, but you can review them under Resources / Trial Member Welcome.
Your First Year Inside Endurance Nation
This will be unlocked after your trial expires.
Looking forward to working with you this year,
~ Coach P
Comments
I have two big questions. For one I have a smart trainer with power. Right now I have been doing my rides during the week on the trainer with Trainer Road on the weekends is when I have gotten outside. Do you suggest I do the same with your plans? If so I will need to do a FTP on the bike for power and heart rate. I have been doing the trainer road FTP test. Do you have any suggestions on how to do yours on a smart trainer?
Second Question: On 1/6/2020 Load the -- OutSeason for Triathletes (Run Focus) Plan, 14wks to end on 4/12/2020.
On 3/9/2020 Load the -- EN Full Bike Focused to end on 5/31/2020
You have me doing the Outseason and Full Ironman plan at the same time? Or is that a typo? Also I wont be doing the Full 20 week Ironman Training plan? Just the last 8 weeks? Being able to complete the bike ride is one concern of mine and the run. Will this be enough?
Zach, great questions.
Smart trainer with power & outside rides. Yes, we suggest following the same pattern with your EN plan. Riding inside during the week is a great way to get a lot of quality work done. No cars, no traffic lights. Just you - having a conversation with your power meter. Then, getting outside on the weekend is a great way to get a longer ride and develop the bike handling skills. Plus, its just cool to ride outside! So, yes you can keep your current pattern. If you need to move some workouts around, we can certainly do that too. We can talk about how best to do it here (in your Coach Thread) or when you set up a call.
FTP. Start with your Trainer Road FTP test numbers as your guide. I expect your FTP to transition right over. We will know after the first few workouts. Post here (in this Coach thread) and will adjust if necessary.
You can still use Trainer Road if you like. Use the workout creator to build the power and duration intervals based on the plan Coach Patrick has put together for you. If you want to try something else, or look at something besides the blue bars, a lot of our athletes use Zwift. You can do the workouts in ERG mode by building the workout in the workout creator and ride around the virtual space or just follow the workout guidance (power and duration) as written as you ride around Zwift's virtual space. Your call.
OutSeason and Full EN Bike plan overlap. Yes, that is a typo. You will transition from one plan to the other. How and when you transition will be part of next discussion with Coach Patrick - it will be based on how you respond to the half training, how your race goes and what kind of strengths and weaknesses you have as an athlete. After you crush the Redman Half and do a bit of transitional training, Coach Patrick has put you on the Run Durability plan. The intent here, is that you continue to do bike training but emphasize running durability and frequency - which improves your strength and stamina you need to for your upcoming IM training. So, Coach Patrick will refine the approach to 2020 and IM Tulsa based on your feedback, your race in September, and how those Oct/Nov/Dec weeks of run durability progress.
We can talk some more about it or anything else. Book a call with me here: https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1
Power user tip: Click on the "red star" and "check" the red box to the right of your thread and get an email notification for answers to your coach thread.
Another question, coming into this plan midway will be hard for the half. I know I should be able to ride 3 hours for the scheduled ride on Friday. However, my fitness is behind. Should i just suck it up and do it? Or modify? My longest ride here lately was 1.5 hour. I definitely need 3 hour quickly
Zach, great question. Modify. We have some time, but you have the right idea. We want to build into that ride and you have some other key workouts coming up. Let't try to hit 2 hrs for the first ride (Friday) this weekend, then try to come back with another 1 hr second ride (saturday) with a complete rest day on Sunday . The back to back rides are intended to build fatigue resistance. The second ride you start with a bit more fatigue in the legs and it lets you get the affect of a longer single ride without the overall cost.
Same thing goes for the run. Shorten the duration and keep the frequency for the first week or two.
Remember, our goal is for you to do quality consistent work and balance that with recovery. We want a gradual build, so don't get carried away in the first week. Exercise your best judgement and ask yourself "how is what I'm doing today going to affect my downstream workouts?"
Let us know how these workouts go in this Coach Thread. We'll see how you respond to these rides and tweak the next few days/weeks until you get into a rhythm.
How does that sound?
@Zach Copeland great to see you are diving in! I konw you asked a bit about losing some weight. We have a bunch of different resources you can use.
For example, you can jump into the "social accountability" aspect here: https://endurancenation.vanillacommunities.com/sso?Target=/discussion/25772/weight-accountability-challenge
You’ll find some teammates really making great change there.
If you prefer self driven, then be sure to check out my Coach Seminar on Body Composition here: http://members.endurancenation.us/Resources/Seminars.aspx Then I would set up a sheet planning your target weight for each month…basically 4lbs a month is a decent starter goal, or 1 lb a week. If you hit your goal for the end of the month before the end of the month, you can chill out a bit.
@Coach Patrick thank you for the tips on loosing weight. I think I will see tremendous gains in speed if I cut back a lot on the weight issues. Its the heaviest I have been in my life and its effecting my life.
@matt limbert I was curious on you opinion on racing this weekend. Its an Oly, I am going to do the three hour ride tomorrow as scheduled. Skip the bike workout on Saturday and rest. Race on Sunday and back to normal on Monday. I think it would be a good training day. A good mental booster in open water for September. I have not done a oly distance in probably 6 years. Its going to be rough.
Also, I finally got approved to get to take my kids on vacation to Colorado yesterday. Its a long story and I have a crazy ex that tries and stop everything I do. However, I will doing the vacation alone and cant take off on workouts and plus the altitude will be rough anyways. We will be having fun, swimming in the pool at hotel and hiking a lot. Do you think that will mess me up? What should I do? Thanks
Zach, You can fit in the Olympic this weekend, its always good practice to get a open water swim in with other folks. Here are some things to consider.
Any time you insert a new race into your schedule, you may have to modify a few workouts the following week - because the 3 hour ride + Olympic is a lot of work and stress to your body - which is fine as long as we account for some recovery. Even with the rest day on Saturday, there is still an accumulated affect of those longer efforts. We want to keep you healthy by keeping just the right balance of rest and stress. You have your challenge ride (4+ hours) next week too, so we want to you to be ready for that also. If you do the Olympic, here are my recommendations for next week: Mon: drop the run & swim easy, Tues: drop the bike, do the yoga Wed: drop the 1 hr run, Thurs: drop either the swim or the bike. That is just one workout a day next week, in order to give your body a bit of a break after the 3 hr ride + Olympic. See how you feel at the end of the week and we might adjust the challenge ride or move it to the following week - whatever works for your schedule. We are still 9-10 weeks out from the race so we have some flexibility, but we need to make sure that you will be good to go several weeks from now too. How does that sound?
Coach Patrick just did a Coach Lesson on post Race Recovery:
http://members.endurancenation.us/Learning/CoachLessons/PersonalizingYourRaceRecovery[July2019].aspx
Congratulations on your Colorado vacation with your kids. There is so much to do in Colorado, having fun with your kids will keep you plenty active. If you want a "training" goal for the trip - look for opportunities to make good food choices while having fun with your kids. Its all part of an active lifestyle. When is your trip? We easily make some adjustments to your plan.
@Zach Copeland
Zach, Coach Patrick just did a Coach Lesson on Personalizing your Post Race Recovery:
http://members.endurancenation.us/Learning/CoachLessons/PersonalizingYourRaceRecovery[July2019].aspx
@matt limbert I will be gone to Colorado from July 28th till August 3rd.
@matt limbert Those links you sent me of coach patricks lesson says I dont have access to few them.
@Zach Copeland I'm on it.
@Zach Copeland Try this link:
http://members.endurancenation.us/Learning/CoachLessons.aspx
This is Coach Patrick's most current lesson. You can see the entire list of other lessons in the archive. Those archived lessons are always available as part of TeamEN membership. During first 30 days as a PlanEN member - we can get you access to any of the other Coach Lessons that you are interested in. Let me know and I'll send you a link. (I will send you any that impact your training specifically.) The big difference between the PlanEN and the TeamEN is community of like minded athletes and the learning opportunities with the extended access to: the Forms with other team members covering nutrition, equipment, training and racing; archive of Coach Lessons, Office Hours, member led Seminars, and best practices.
Thanks for the dates. July 28-Aug 3 is the first week of a 4 week build. We can talk / chat here following your trip. My initial idea is that you will be able to pick up the following week of training (week 2 of the build) with minor modification. Let me know what you think.
How did your race go?
@matt limbert Sounds good on the modification after my trip to Colorado. Just let me know what I should do. I was having lower back issues maybe from training more than I used to during the week. I gave myself two days off leading to the race. in stead of that three hour bike ride on Friday. My lower back felt great the day of the race.
The race actually went fairly well. I am not a strong swimmer but I think I did well with sighting which I struggle with. I kept an easy pace throughout the swim. I swam it at @41:35 for the 1500m. The bike was flat. I biked at 1:28 minutes which I avg 16.6 on the bike. The run I knew would be difficult. It was hot and muggy. My slow and steady pace is @14:30. I avg 14:06 over the six mile run. My question is should I continue what you had for me to cut some of workouts this week and should I still do my big bike week and push through it? I am really sore and did get some minor chaffing between my legs.
Congratulations on the race. Good to hear your improvements on sighting. Your run pace is a good sign that you got your bike pacing correct. Nice job!
Yeah, I think we stick with the reduced workload this week to recovery from all the work over the past few week + race. If you can swim EASY today great. Otherwise, bike easy. 30-40 minutes either way. Some easy activity is better than no activity to help with your soreness. Yoga on Tues would be great if you could do that again - but avoid hot yoga, the extra sweating and heat stress would be bit too much, but the yoga will help with the soreness and recovery too. We'll keep to non-load bearing activity (i.e. no running - focus on swimming or biking) to help with recovery.
Mon: drop the run & swim easy,
Tues: drop the bike, do the yoga
Wed: drop the runs and bike for an hour (moved Thurs bike to Wed),
Thurs: just swim.
Can you do the challenge ride next week? If so, switch this Fri, Sat, Sun with next Fri, Sat, Sun. We are still 9-10 weeks out from the race so we have some flexibility, but we need to make sure that you will be good to go several weeks from now too. How does that sound?
@matt limbert will you look at my schedule this week. My split run for Wednesday has two runs of course and a bike ride? Is that a typo. Also do you still advise me to drop the workouts like you put in the past email even though I did not complete the three hour bike ride this past Friday before the race?
Yeah, you can delete those runs on Wed. Just ride. We what to get rid of your soreness before we tackle more intensity. Good work = work that you can recover from. Let your body recover from the race for the next few days. I expect you will be able to do the ABP rides scheduled for next week if we move them to this week, then return to the normal set of workouts next week + challenge ride.
If you want I can move all that stuff around to make it easy to follow - if that plan works for your schedule?
@matt limbert yes please move all of them for me so I for sure know what you want me to do.
@Zach Copeland You're all set in Final Surge!
Thank you!
Zach, How did this week go? I saw the swim earlier in the week. Everything ok?
@Zach Copeland
@matt limbert this past ten days has been nuts and spiraling out of control. My job this past weekend I had to do several mandatory overtimes. Which in my job we have to work 16 hours then. 8 on top of my normal shift. Also my girlfriend of two years broke up with me so I have been dealing with the logistics of that since we have some stuff in both of our names. I am tryin to salvage this week by finishing the bike and run tests and then I don't care I will attempt to complete the big ride on Friday before I leave for vacation with the kids on Sunday. This half-Ironman will be a grind and tough is what its looking like.
Wooah! Girlfriend. Overtime. Thanks for sharing. That is a lot to manage. I was concerned you were injured. So, let's be smart about this ride on Friday. Keep it aerobic, under 2-2.5 hours max. There is no additional value in burying yourself. No single workout is game changer or more important than your long term health and your season goal. Enjoy the break from the crazy week, regroup and focus on having a good upcoming trip with your kids. We will regroup after your trip. We'll get back at it when you get back.
@matt limbert I know my trial must end next week. I think Patrick said I get one more phone call with him and he will plug the rest of the season in with me? Also when I get back I won’t have you to get me back on track. I am thinking up doing the coaching maybe for another month to have the support right when I get back from vacation. Any thoughts?
Zach, I can help you get back on track when you get back, but some additional coaching when you get back would be a good option.
How about you can also book a call with me ( here: https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1) once you get back. I am thinking we can shift you to a less time intensive plan until your race at Red Man, recover for 2 weeks, then get you back on your season plan with Run Durability in the fall - building towards your goal of the full in June. We can also talk about how you want to manage your membership and coaching in preparation for the race and long term.
If you want to talk with Coach Patrick. Book your call with Coach Patrick now - he fills up fast: https://calendly.com/pmccrann/coach-30-check-in-call-new-member-free?month=2019-08
Let me know when you plan to talk with him and we can follow up here.
Your season is build out until 31 Dec. You (or I) can load the additional phases, but most folks wait until 3-6 months out just because things change etc.
@matt limbert okay thank you. I guess I will let the membership ride as is until I talk to Coach Patrick and yourself. I scheduled you both on August 5th.
@Zach Copeland Sounds good.
Zach, It was good to talk with you. You just got started and then had a crazy last few weeks with work and other stuff. Bonus, you got to spend lots of time with your kids in Colorado on vacation. It is tough call, but it is the right call -dialing it back from the Half IM to the Olympic for your upcoming race in September. The HIM would have been been at significant cost to your body and it would have taken you longer to recover. This way, you can still race, but we can get back to work a bit sooner and develop some good consistency with the follow-on Run Durability and Outseason plans. These plans are designed to develop the strength in the Run and Bike and don't have the really long bikes of the HIM and IM plans. The rest of the team typically transitions to these plans too over the fall and winter as part their builds to early spring HIM and IM races. There is plenty of WORK in there, trust me. After focusing on the run (with Run Durability), then bike (Outseason bike focus), - you will be able to do some quality work and IM specificity - dropping into the final race prep 16-12 weeks out from your race. This final race prep gives you more volume and opportunities for race rehearsals in order to figure out your pacing, fueling and hydration for IM Tulsa 31 May.
You have gotten a lot of the admin of of the way. You have sync'd your Garmin to Final Surge, updated your zones and subscribed to this thread. So, now we can get to work and build some consistency. I look forward to hearing how you training is going. If you need some help hit us up here or book another call with me. Talk to you soon.
@Zach Copeland - Just a heads up that I have updated your Roadmap to reflect the switch to Short Course. I made some edits for you foR next week and to the plan in general. Should be much more achievable.That said, there is some more intensity in the short course plan; you can adjust down to Zone 2 or Zone 3 if required. Remember, our top goal is that consistency.
Please let me know if you have any questions!
~ Coach P
PS - Let's update your profile picture when you get the chance…it really helps the Team to "get to know you" a lot better.
@Coach Patrick kDid you reset my password and stuff? I am able to go to the link of the post but I can’t log in. Final Surge maybe updating? I can see the different new workouts if I go to the calendar but on the training plan history it don’t show the change? Just making sure I am looking at the correct workouts.