Jennifer Mason 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 (Click to watch the video)
Your Races
- 05/02/2020 300 mile / 5 day ride from Pittsburgh to DC
Your Notes
Just completed my first Ironman: IMLP 15:09 I've not been doing a ton since the race at the end of July. I've run a few times, biked a couple times, hiked a couple times, rollerbladed once and swam a couple times/week.
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 August 28, 2019
- On 8/26/2019 Load the Run Durability for Triathletes 1 (9 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 9/22/2019
- On 9/23/2019 Load the Run Durability for Triathletes 2 (8 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 10/20/2019
- On 10/21/2019 Load the Run Durability for Triathletes 3 (7 months out) -- 4 weeks to end on 11/17/2019
- On 10/28/2019 Load the OutSeason For Cyclists to end on 2/2/2020
- On 2/3/2020 Load the Bike Tour Plan (16 Weeks) to end on 5/2/20
- On 5/3/2020 Load the Post Bike Race Recovery Plan (2 Weeks) to end on 5/16/202
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
Jennifer,
Congratulations on IM Lake Placid! And nice work finding Endurance Nation to help you get back to consistent training and developing as a year round athlete.
Is this the bike tour you are doing? The one that covers the Great Allegheny Passage and the C&O Towpath? https://wilderness-voyageurs.com/adventures/pittsburgh-to-dc-gap-and-co-bike-tour/
That looks super cool. I have run on some of the Tow Path around DC and I had no idea that it connects to Pittsburgh. Awesome.
I typically help folks get their Garmin and Final Surge connected, but you have already knocked that out and are posting workouts. Nice work!
I'll send some links to articles, forums or coach videos that apply to your training. I encourage you to look around and let me know what you are interested in. There are ton of videos, coach lessons and forums that are available to you as a TeamEN member. Get smarter to get faster.
Let's get started. Learn more about your training plan.
First, learn more about your Run Durability plan, how it fits into your season and why we start with it. See video here. (Scroll down, it is about 3/4 down the page. There is an overall video and
http://members.endurancenation.us/TrainingPlan/TrainingPlanCentralPage.aspx#rdp
Again, Power user tip! Subscribe to this Coach Thread and get an email when respond. It keeps the communication moving. Click on the red star and check box just to the right of your thread title. This way you will get an email when you get a response in your Coach thread. See video here:
Consider downloading the Final Surge App.
Final Surge | Mobile Apps
https://www.finalsurge.com/apps
This makes it way easier to add comments about how you felt, ate, weather etc (for the bike) and sets, paces etc (for the swim). Those are all super helpful to you as you track your progress, prepare and plan your for your race.
It's super easy to make comments about your workout. Click on the "pencil" icon to tap "how I felt" or "perceived effort." You can add a few notes about what you ate/drank (helps to figure out what works best for you on the bike), how you felt mentally, the weather or any aches etc. Those comments are really handy when you are comparing workouts, tailoring your own training, evaluating progress and planning for your ride. It also makes it easy to look at and plan for your upcoming workouts. Just a quick not goes a long way.
You can also setup Final Surge to send you emails with your workouts every day.
Let's talk about setting some goals for consistency to get you back in the rhythm of training consistently - chat with me here in this forum or schedule a call with me here: https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1
Talk with you soon.
Matt, Training Plan Coordinator
Hi Matt,
yes, that’s the ride I plan to do sometime next season. A new friend in my local club did it last year. She overnighted at hostel or bnbs in towns along the way. Sounds like fun!
the race I’m training for is Tupper Lake Tinma 70.3. The bike ride isn’t my main race, just a fun extra (it’s listed as race at top of this thread).
My main goal for Tupper Lake is to improve performance on the bike. I want to increase strength and power and also learn how to ride hills more efficiently. I’ve been given some instruction about executing on a hill but when I get on one I don’t feel like I have many options on strategy other than slogging it out to the top. How does this fit in with run durability?
I had a couple of little run injuries during IM training. Rested and PT fixed it but I’m concerned about shifting to a run focused program and running five days a week, although I understand the concept of why it’s there. Any thoughts/suggestions on that?
Thanks,
Jen
Hey Jen, Thanks for the note. We want you to be happy and confident with your training program and we certainly can make adjustments. It is good to know that you had a couple little injuries during your IM training and were able to get through them with rest and PT. We totally understand your concern about switching to a run focused program. We can work with that. Our goal this early in your season plan is to do 3 things:
First, develop consistency in your training schedule. Consistency rules. We can use some swimming or biking here to give you the variety you are looking for in order to develop a sustainable and progressive program. If that means we add a bike or swim and drop a run - to make it fun, then that is what we need to do!
Second, as part of the season progression - developing the run first, enables us to focus on the bike and swim closer to the event while reducing your risk of injury. Starting the run focused training now lets us gradually increase your run volume and frequency without the pressure of a race and the additional stress of the bike. It also lets us build in the rest - (or variety with biking or swimming) to recover from those runs and get stronger.
Third, build a progression. Your run durability phase will last until the end of Oct. Then you will transition into the Bike Focused Outseason - where you put your run into a maintenance mode and really get after it on the bike - developing the strength and power you will need for the bike tour and your Tupper Lake. This part of the season has 3-4x interval and intensity focused bike workouts a week. So the emphasis shifts to the bike and you continue to run - but for frequency and low intensity. We will follow up the Outseason with race and event specific training - maybe starting with the bike tour plan to build volume and then shifting to the Half-Ironman plan. At that point, you will have done enough run durability training that we can keep you healthy as do some HIM specific long runs and intensity on the bike. We (and should) talk about your race specific training as we finish the Outseason. By then, we will have a good understanding of the gains that you made and what we still need to work on.
Why don't we schedule a time to talk and we can go over the current schedule - we can talk about what we need to change in order to develop some durability, while keeping it fun and develop the consistency we are looking for. Schedule something here: https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1 if those times don't work, tell me what does and we'll make it work.
Riding hills:
There are a couple of things we want to talk about: bike fit, gearing and application of fitness (hill execution - i.e. how you approach the hill).
Bike fit. Are you happy/comfortable on your bike? Did you get a triathlon bike fit? Do you have picture of your on your bike from the side? Coach Patrick has some good experience here and can offer you some suggestions if you are interested. Just getting into the right position to you the fitness you have, is sometimes the first obstacle.
Gearing: You can never have enough gears on your bike…seriously.
Hill Execution: As a cyclist, think of watts as a function of:
It is very, very difficult for most riders to avoid this “push harder” phenomenon and it’s even more dangerous if it’s applied across the length of the entire hill because your bike is over-geared for the course. And it’s even more difficult when everyone else around you in a race is doing the same thing, spiking their power at the bottom of hills. So being focused on maintaining a higher cadence, especially at the bottom of climbs, is a good technique to avoid this nearly inevitable power spike begins to express itself.
If Timmy and Tommy are riding side by side at the same watts, but Timmy is riding at 60rpms while Tommy turns the pedals at 100 rpms, Timmy is pressing harder on the pedals with each pedal stroke. Note that while they are both performing the same work (watts) and are going up the hill at identical speeds (oh, Timmy and Tommy are identical twins with the same weight), how they experience/feel their equal work loads are likely very different, due to their different cadences. Let’s now discuss how cadence is related to watts and how this creates some unique conditions when climbing a hill.
Recall that watts is a function of cadence and how hard you press down on each pedal stroke. So if we keep power constant and decrease cadence (for example, staying in a big gear or running out of gears on a hill) we accomplish these watts by pushing harder with each pedal stroke. This “harder” is experienced as increased pressure on the soles of your feet as you pedal the bike.
Likewise, if we keep power constant and increase cadence, we accomplish these watts by pushing less hard on the pedals with each pedal stroke. This “less hard,” or “easier” is experienced as decreased pressure on the soles of your feet.
There are two important considerations to be aware of in these scenarios:
There are No Free Watts: while lower cadence may feel harder and high cadence may feel easier, if the watts of each effort are identical then your body is performing the same work load. Likewise, if your cadence is higher or lower and you find yourself going up the hill faster it’s important to realize that changing the gearing on your bike didn’t magically add watts to you or your bike. The only way you increase your ability to output more watts is to become more fit. But what has changed is your experience of these watts, as a change in pedal pressure and associated cadence. So a gearing change doesn’t make you faster, it simply changes how you experience the watts you produce.
Finally, higher cadence cycling on hills is generally easier on the muscles of your legs, saving them for the run. But of these two scenarios, avoiding the power spike and easier on your legs, the former is more important to keep in mind. In my experience, if you’re climbing up a hill at low cadence you’re nearly guaranteed to be throwing out much higher wattage than you should.
Let me know what you think.
Talk with you soon.
~Matt
Jennifer, Do you want to chat about some goals for this fall?
Schedule a call with me here:https://calendly.com/new-member-phone-call/1 - if that doesn't work for you - let me know what does and we'll get it done.
Or chat me up here.
~Matt
Jennifer, I talked with Coach Patrick about reformatting-rebooting your season. We will reboot your trial period starting 1 October. I planned new workouts for starting with next week in order to give you some structure for September. The Team will start the OutSeason in late Oct - so there will be a lot of folks starting that training block with you. There is a good vibe and a GroupMe text chat where folks share workout details and accountability.
There are three days of running and swimming during the week, along with one ride. If you mix it up and move stuff around - insert the swimming or another bike ride in between the runs. I left the weekend workouts in there to give you the option - if you can't ride because you are traveling - a easy 30-45 min run will be good or rest day. The ABP ride (always be pushing) is a standard ride intensity for us - is typically the pace that you will find with a good group ride - where you are working but not at your limit and not stopping at every coffee shop on the route! The VO2 workout gives some structure and intensity on the bike and along with the FTP bike work earlier in the week are good examples of the bike focused work we plan for October.
I added a Functional Strength supplement- you can move these around to any day that fits your schedule, just spread them out across the week.
Let me know what you think.
Thanks Matt Sounds great!
Also, any word on pairing completed workout with a scheduled workout to turn them green in Final Surge?
I just took a look at the schedule in Final Surge. It starts over with week 1 on 9/16. 9/30 is week 3. Would you change that so it starts week 1 on 9/30?
I emailed the Final Surge guys this morning. They are typically pretty good.
I'll change the week thing too.
How's that?
Magical! thnks
Jennifer,
You can merge the workouts (need to use the Beta view - see the right of the toolbar in the middle top portion of the screen ) on the web version or in the App.
Here is how to merge (video):
New merge/un-merge feature in both our app and our new beta platform.
Beta: https://blog.finalsurge.com/beta-platform-updates-merge-unmerge-full-workout-details-zone-analysis/
iOS/Android apps: https://blog.finalsurge.com/app-feature-updates-quick-menu-merge-unmerge-workouts/
Jennifer, Are you ready to get started again?
@Jennifer Mason
Jennifer - just checking in again. I saw you ran a couple of times last week. What's going on?
Hi Matt, I can get back into forum. Yeah!
I looked at the plan. I see weekly runs: 3-2-4-2-2 with only one long run on the week that has 4 total runs. Maybe it would be easier to just load the run durability as is and if I'm feeling any stress I'll dial it back.
----------------------------------
Jennifer,
Take a look at your Final Surge account. I loaded a new workout plan for you for the next 4 weeks. It has you running 3x week, but weeks 2 and 4 have a longer run. It has some bike and cross-training built in for variety and to build additional fitness without the weight bearing load of running. The cross-training day gives you some flexibility on additional activity for a total of 6-8 hours of aerobic work per week. Plus, a rest day! That should get you back in to a consistent workout plan and frequency.
If this works for you, and you respond to this 3x week running, then we could increase it to 4 or 5 days of running during your next 4 week block.
Check it out and let me know what you think?
Matt
Jennifer, This is what I'm seeing in Final Surge. The grey blocks are all runs. The red are cross training. Green are bike.
7 Oct thru 3 Nov. (You might need to look at this on your computer.)
I loaded the Run Durability 4 Nov - 1 Dec. See picture below - what that looks like:
Take a look. See if that kind of progression works for you.
Yes, I understand that runs are in gray. I'm looking on computer and this is what I see. Maybe you're seeing something different? And does this plan still get me to where I need to get in terms of run durability?
Ha! We have our views for the week set up different! Yours is Sun - Sat and mine was Mon - Sun. I totally see the pattern you are talking about.
I loaded the Run Durability plan 4 Nov - 1 Dec. See how that looks for you.
My thinking was: This first block 7 Oct - 3 Nov would have some good variety, with a number of 30'-40' runs and a long run of 60' and get you ready to handle 4 days of running per week starting 4 Nov.
I want to find a schedule that works for you. I can give you a call if it would be easier.
Ok, I changed to Monday start and now I'm seeing 3/week. Phew!
My thinking was:
Week #1: 3x runs at 20', 30', 40'
Week#2: 2x runs 30', 40' enables you to absorb and adapt to the 3x runs from the first week
Week#3: Add the long run, rest day, then 2x runs to finish the week
Week#4: 2x runs (30', 40') ending the week with another long run 60' leading into the rest day of the next block.
What do you think?
Sounds like a plan! Thanks. :)
Nice job last week. You have both your Garmin and Strava sync'd to Final Surge. A few of your runs last week were loaded twice. You only need one. Keep Strava, disconnect Garmin.
@Jennifer Mason What do you think of your training so far? Does the workout pattern fit your schedule?
I replied to email on 10/22 but it looks like it didn't post. Did you receive a reply from me? This is what it said: Hi Matt, the training fits my schedule although last week was wonky because I started a temporary job with quite different schedule. Also, I signed up for a half marathon on 11/10. It was a last minute decision because a bunch of people on my team are doing it (major case of FOMO!) and it’s a trail run in nice carriage trails, with elevation that I’m stubbornly ignoring. My first trail trail run so I’m excited. My plan is to walk the bigger hills.
Thanks,
Jen
Thanks for reposting! I don't know what happened. But I'm stoked to hear
from you and happy that the schedule works - despite temporary wonky part.
Good luck with the half marathon. The FOMO is strong - friends, first trail
run, scenery. I can totally see how it happened. I feel if too! The trails
and scenery will distract you from any elevation gain.
it goes. Talk to you soon.
@Jennifer Mason So, how did your trail run go?