How do I get faster?
Sometimes I try to be a little provocative with a title, and today is one of those, because we all know the haus answer. :-) It's the outseason, baby!
But as many of us are hitting the end of our seasons, I actually think it's a legitimate thing to consider in reflection of our season past. I just finished Wisconsin to finish my season. I know it's surely not time yet to take any action to get faster for next year, but this down time is probably a good one for some realistic self analysis. (It was 2 years ago at this time that I consciously changed my running form, for example.) If I recall, November is the biggest out-season start month, but October, December, and January are also out there. In any case, maybe now is the time for a lot of us to start thinking seriously about our strengths and weaknesses and what we want to address for next year. How do we face the outseason? If we ever were to tweak it, what would we do? Is now the time to start to work on a new bike position? Is now the time to get some new shoes and work on a new running form? These are the kinds of things I think are worth pondering
I will go ahead and stick my neck out and post thoughts about myself and ask for input from the haus - knowing full well that one of the purposes of having a coach (or in our case 500...) is sometimes to just say the obvious things that the athlete is blind to.
Where I stand: I finished iM WI in the top 10% for my age group, in 22nd position, in 11:22. It was not quite the time I had hoped for, but the placement is probably reflective of where I am.. I finished the KS 70.3 in 6th place for the AG. I finihsed an off brand HIM at about the same place, that time 7th. In 2009, I placed 9th at Steelhead. My HIM times are under 5:00 on a good day.
My goals: While I think much of the easy work is over, I think I can get somewhat faster still. Although I do not think I want to do an IM next year, I still think I should have a sub-11:00 race in me. The top 5% of AG at KS 70.3 and Steelhead 70.3 was just a few minutes faster than my time. At WI, the top 5% was 10:55...the kind of time I hoped/expected to do but did not. I would have qualified for the 70.3 champs at KS this year had it not conflicted with Madison, but not at Steelhead in 2010.
I think setting a goal of being a top 5% athlete is not out of line. That could get me a spot at the LV 70.3 champs if I were to do it next year, and that feels like a very good challenge. I also think, but do not know, that the development of my speed is probably best done in a year that I do not race ironman. I flirt with the idea of qualifying for Kona, but know that if I were to have done so this year or next, it would be a fluke. Perhaps with a couple more years' progress it would be more realistic to think about for the year I race at age 50 or 51. (I will be 48 in 2012,)
So, to be serious, how do I get faster?
The low-hanging fruit is probably mostly gone having trained this way for a couple of years. Additionally, my transitions are efficient and I don't waste time with stops. There is a bit of "mechanical" time to recover, but not much.
Swim: I had two bad swims at my HIM events this year, with times nearing 40 min. There were "excuses", but the bottom line is that they were slow. My swimming did peak, though, for WI, and I turned in a sub-1:14. My focus in prep for WI was fitness based (frequency, harder, longer efforts), compared to early in the season where I was focusing on technique. In all likelihood, though, the early technique focus allowed the fitness focus to work.
I am at the point where the few minutes to be gained swimming is at least comparable to the few minutes to be gained running. If I could get down to a ~32 minute swim, for example, that would be at least as much progress as I could ever expect to make running. [Note - this applies only to the HIM distance. At IM distance, I need to execute my marathon properly and will recover an "easy" half hour...]
There is an outside shot of a masters program starting in my area some time soon. If it does, I will be very tempted to join to try to improve my swim, if I can get some assurance that the coach will actually coach and not just hand us a workout. In the absence of that, I am open to suggestion.
Bike: I sincerely hope there is progress to be made here. The bike improvement I showed in 2011 was not riding more powerfully than 2010, but riding about the same time and power with it taking less out of me. I want to ride faster. My TT-bike FTP of about 230 is almost 3.5 W/kg at my race weight of about 145. That, i believe, needs to go up. The biggest number of minutes to be saved is probably here. I am already a pretty smart rider for what little power I have; I think I just need more of it. I will beat other guys at my W/kg on a hilly course because I know how to ride it, but most of the people in the top 10% are beyond making silly mistakes. I have to hang with plain better cyclists.
Is the answer here just more of the same? OS and the planned workouts? I am contemplating doing my OS "sitting up" rather than in bars just to build the maximum power possible and then not feel bad when I take the positional hit in the spring. Do I need to go find a road bike and just try to hang on with the local intense roadies in the spring once a week? Or just "calm down, boy, and do what we tell you" in the OS and on-the-bars training plan for races. This is where maybe I need the most reassurance.
Run. Since 2008, I've gone from a 3:30 open marathon time to a 1:29 open half and 1:31 HIM run...an equivalent of approaching 1 minute per mile at the marathon distance. I did not break 20 min in 5K until 2010, but I got very close to 19 in 2011 in the OS and did equivalent runs that scored my VDOT at 53 midseason. I think I have the run thing down and basically following the OS plan and training plans will work for me. I may not get a lot faster, but this is already my fastest event, compared to my peers. I am probably nearing my potential here, but I will do the work. If I merely hold on in the run, I'll be ok with that, but it would of course be nice to get faster still.
As far as IM racing, I have not run what I should be capable of. There is speed to be had from execution and I completely realize that.
So, I ask again... How do I get faster?
Comments
Wm - during my efforts at getting faster - both at short and long course - between ages 50-60 (when I hit my IM PR), I discovered a few truisms that may give you some food for thought.
- First, there's no substitute for experience. For me, I had a lifetime of medicore, but persistent swimming, which gave me a leg up on the first event. I minimized swim training for the most part, and was able to get away with it. Also, I entered my triathlon career after about 5 years of numerous multiday bike trips, including one across the country, as well as lots of mountain bike day trips. These both provided a base of strength, but not speed. For that, I needed the intense trainer work to make a difference. And, I was a running novice, so it wasn't until I had about 4-5 years of run training under my belt that I discovered it was actually my best event. My point: think of triathlon as a multi-year career, and build on what you currently have to work with.
- Training variety fast-tracks fitness improvements. Doing the same thing week after week, month after month very quickly leads to a plateau. 4-12 week blocks of focus on one thing, and then another works much better. And even mixing up the three sports. E.g, from Nov-Feb, I might work on endurance (LSD) in swimming, speed (FTP and VO2 max intervals) in biking, and "tempo" speed (racing half marathons) in running, then switch up starting in March, to speed in swimming, longer slower work in biking, and running off the bike. Or whatever.
- Unless you need a mental break, down time away from training more than 1-2 weeks comes with a cost of lost fitness which must be recouped before the next leap can come.
- Strength training for those over 45 is mandatory. I lose strength very quickly if I don't go to the weight roonm at least 1-2 tmes a week year round. It's easy to get leg strength back, but the older I get, the harder it is to keep my arms and other swimming muscles strong enough to do the work I want from them.
- Variety in racing may also help - Xterra, Sprints, whatever. Anything shorter than an Ironman will inevitably improve speed.
As to your specific needs: Obviously you do have big opportunities in both swimming and biking. The cruel fact is, a decent swim is an entry ticket to the pointier end of the race. Keeping it up in the OS is mandatory, and even to point of doing short hard intervals 1-2 times a week. And, yes, a goal of 4 w/kg is what you should work towards over the next 12-15 months for your bike. All sorts of biking will help with that: slamming intervals on the trainer, spinning class, doing hard hills on a mountain bike, chasing roadies on that new machine you want to buy, going on a multi-day bike trip with friends at home or abroad - it all adds up, and the variety will keep you engaged.
ROI would say that spending a lot of mental or physical energy or time on your run would be the least productive, but racing in the winter will keep you sharp. The 10k, to me, is the most honest race for that. 20 minutes is too short, and the HM is too easy, to really make you work enough to keep the speed flowing.
There's no question you could do a sub 11 hour Ironman RIGHT NOW, at Arizona or Florida (I'd predict a 10:40), so if that's what you want, try one of those courses. But your goal of relative rank in the AG (or even overall) is really the right way to look at documenting your improvement. The best part is: you still do not know what your upper limit is, and probably won't for years.
I look forward to seeing how you do!
-Ann.
@Al Thanks for your always thoughtful and provocative reply. The plateau bit is clearly crucial over the course of a year. Planning all that out right is important. Regarding time off, I am taking a couple weeks off now, and I expect losses, but an annual reset is important for me. Throughout the year the usual recovery/transition after races generally is enough to keep me sane during that part of the year. I have only this one "outseason" under me, but the break at the end of it - comparable to the recovery after the boston marathon in 2010 before training again that season was enough.
Since I got out of the weights game a while back, I have no idea what I would do going back to it a couple of times a week. are you doing swim-type things with cables and high reps or lower reps to exhaustion to build strength or what? I know everyone's "recipe" on that is a bit different, but I wouldn't have the first idea where to start and be time-efficient about it.
I wish winter run racing were an option, but it is not here in central Iowa. There are a few "polar bear 5K/10K" races, but they are an exercise in trying to keep warm and not kill yourself on ice, rather than an exercise in running fast. I am lucky to have access to a high quality 300 m indoor track all winter. Not glamorous, but more tolerable than a treadmill and essentially always available. You certainly have a point about the 10K though. I run very few of them, but I know them to be very hard races - exactly as you say. A sub-40 10K might be a fun goal, just as a 90 min half was last year.
Unfortunately a shiny new road bike is probably not an option this year. We have just started on a basement-finishing project, and oddly enough, my wife thinks having bathroom fixtures is more important than me getting another toy bike. However, a real live exercise (treadmill,trainer/TV) room is part of the deal so I like that. :-)
While I am new to the Haus and power training on the bike, I was wondering about your bike. I assume from your post that your FTP this season is around the same as last season?
If so, that led me to two thoughts — (not really original but raise the left, and push up the right of the mean maximal power graph).
The first was to focus on your FTP and why your FTP hadn't improved much (at all?) during the OS. Is your problem your "attic", and if so, did you really drill yourself with the VO2 max sets? If this is the issue, perhaps there is an argument that you need to do much more work on your VO2 max during the year than normal. Alternately, you may have just plateaued for the time being — I have seen suggestions for this problem that included trying 3 times 20 mins @ FTP etc.
The second thought was trying to raise your critical power @ 2 hours 30 — The thread on TJ's bike at Lake Placid is the direction I was thinking.
Cheers
Peter
If I captured your stats right your FTP is 230 and at race weight of 145 a w/kg of 3.5 and a vdot of 53.
I think your biggest time gain opportunity is the bike. You need to get the w/kg up into the 3.8 – 4.0 level. I think Al was ~4.0 last year in prime form and he is about your weight. For IM lOU I was 3.65 and target 3.8 for IM AZ.
So assume you get to a w/kg level of 3.8, assuming the same weight, that is a FTP of 250. This 20 added watts will net you ~ 14 added watts at a IF of .70. These 14 added watts will get you around a IM bike depending on the course ~ 9 – 15 min faster.
How to get those added watts – yes the OS. Plus I second what Al said on the value of weight training once we get older.
Second to the bike, I agree that a ~2 min improvement in your IM swim time is easily within reach. You have solid the fitness but (I’m not being critical ) I think a 1:14 IM swim says some added work on form will get you the 2-3 min you are looking for. Get some one to do a solid video analysis of your stroke. Understand what areas to focus on before hitting the master’s circuit. To your point a masters coach will not have the time to get to the specifics you need to focus on.
On the run your Rock – a 53 vdot is solid. Proper strength training can help your form hold together in the later stages of the run. This may be good for a couple of min.
@Dave: Matt has the numbers about right
I have tried desperately to lose weight, but it would require herculean effort to do and maintain, at least if I kept biking. As my biking improved, my BF dropped but not weight. At one time I thought I could get to 140 maybe, but seriously, it would require liposuction and a tummy tuck. (I used to weigh 180+)
@Peter - your point is really well taken. My FTP went up something like 25 W during the outseason, where I was not as concerned with my position. Sitting up, I got either 255 or 260 as my best on the trainer. I could look it up, but the bottom line is that it was a lot more than I could do outside. At the same time, I was making my "down" position" as aggressive as reasonable. When I went outside and measured - glued to the bars - it was a soft 230. Over the course of the season, what happened was as you described, the length of time for which my FTP was meaningful was longer and longer. I'm not saying I could hold 230 for 2.5 hours - far from it - but all the projections that you would draw from that were valid for longer and longer distances. For example, my bike ride from my 2nd HIM was something like 10 W more powerful than my first HIM. The fit I have is pretty efficient for me, though. My velocity per watt is measurably up from last year. (one thing I have considered is getting some short cranks to open up my hips more, but that's an expensive experiment!) Also, my run times were going down after the bike, so i figured the lower watts were at least not hurting me there.
So, while the number didn't go up, it wasn't as if I didn't feel like I made progress in a way that was harder to quanty yet tangible.
And, if anything, I was an overachiever on the 2.5 min sets relative to FTP. I too have seen people suggest things like 3 x 20. If you read what Rich does, it sounds like that's the reality of what he's doing a lot of the time.
@Matt re swim. I did invest in a couple of high cost video sessons with the college swim coach (Trip Hedrick) with video and the whole shebang. I think they did help me for sure. But even he said i needed to just put on some beef (or words to that effect). I can afford to do that a few times a year, but not weekly. My hope - if we get a masters team - is to be quite frank with the coach (who says he wants to do an IM down the line....we'll see) and try to use the other people to "put on the beef" and him to keep me honest form wise. I am at a bit of a loss as to what other plausible approach to try. If the masters team doesn't develop, I will surely set up some lessons again.
I'll ask you the same thing of him.... what sort of weight training do you do?
Weight training - what I do: First, I vary the workout about every 3 months or so - the old plateau issue. But in general, in the OS, I will emphasize leg work, primarily to get strong for skiing! Using a squat machine, where I lie at an incline on my back, and press up. Also leg extension and hamstring machine. No calf work (I think it's bad for running to get bigger calves!)
I always am doing arm work thru out the year, the number of reps and weights varies, more to vary the workout than from any plan. I use free weights or machines, not stetch cords. I will tend to add or subtract exercises depending on where I think my current weakness is. I view it as an adjunct, and try hard not to injure myself, tire myself out, or take up too much time with it. I have access to 3 or 4 different gyms, so I never drive more than 10 minutes to workout, usually less, or on the way somewhere else.
My primary workout routine usually takes 30 minutes, and I usually use the "Super Slow" protocol, first developed in 1984 at Nautilus in Florida by an exercise physio. looking for ways to get older (75+) people to make muscle and strength gains without risking injury to fragile joints and tendons. I won't describe it here, just refer you to the link above. But each muscle or muscle group is exsercised once, for a total of 2 minutes, with one minute of rest between. And done right, with about 4 reps/2 minutes, one can get quite drained in only half an hour.
I work with a very knowledgeable trainer 2X a week in 1 hr sessions. The trainer knows and understands my objectives of improving IM distance race performance. The hour session hits all muscle groups. Typically 3-4 exercise in a block each block repeated ~3 times and we end up with 3-4 blocks for the hour. I never thought so much work could be packed into 60 min! Repetitions are in the 8 -15 range per exercise. At the end of an hour you think you did an FTP test!
There is very little work that is done on a weight machine. Almost every exercise involved the core and or some form of stabilization / balance element. The focus is not just on strengthening the muscle groups but to improve the interaction of the muscles in a manner that facilitates the proper muscle firing sequence to create efficient motions that an IM needs.
The following link explains this a bit http://www.coreperformance.com/daily/movement/train-movements-not-muscles.html
There is a lot of variations on lunges and single leg balanced exercises. When I first started these, my balance and coordination levels were pathetic. Now I flick a mental switch and the needed muscles of the core engage at the right time and I am stable and balanced though a wide range of exercises. This improved core stability has directly improve my running form.
Also there is a lot of work done on strengthening the Glutes and getting them to fire properly. Those of us that sit all day have lost most of our but power! The stronger glutes have helped both my bike and run.
We have worked though 6 -8 week cycles focused on creating more power in all muscles with an obvious emphasis on legs. Just like some of our OS work, these efforts work to get more muscle fibers firing and firing in an efficient movement centric manner.
A third element that has been worked into the mix is Plyometric Exercises. Box jumps, single leg bounds, toe hopes, on the list goes. The focus is again on efficient power generation and on strengthening the tendons and ligaments.
At the start, I was concerned about adding to much mussel mass. I gained 7 lbs of muscle in 7 months. 3 in legs 2 in core and 2 in arms. In the final 6 weeks of build for IMLOU, I lost 2 lbs of that muscle. Its hard to keep it doing what we do!
I am convinced of the value to my performance of this type of strength training. As long as I plan to do IMs, I will continue to find a way to fit strength training into my weeks.
RnP and EN have help me learn how to execute an IM. If I had to figure that all out on my own I would still have a long long way to go. Here also, I now appreciate the value of what a true experience trainer can bring to the table in an effective training program.
All:
Great discussion and likely points to a need for PnI to write a series of blog/wiki posts and do some podcasts on this topic. I know that he and I have our own thoughts about how to get ourselves and you much faster now that we've each put ourselves through the meat grinder of a pointy-end IM season.
Notes:
Swim: you're still in that "swimming faster is about technique" area. Hire that masters coach for 1:1 lessons if you want to spend your time wisely to improve your swim.
Season planning: per some notes I've made elsewhere, and need to formalize through a series of wiki/blog posts, I think the next evolution of EN season planning will be to leverage the fact that 90% of us are registering for an IM a year in advance and leverage that as an opportunity:
Within this guidance, your biggest opportunity is to explore group riding while your weather still cooperates. Not sure if you need a road bike for this. We have enough guidance in here about how to ride with a group that you "could" show up to a sorta accommodating roadie ride and be safe, at least not dangerous, and not embarrass yourself. But, in my experience, the roadie culture responds to good bike handling, riding within the unspoken but understood rules of the group, and bike strength, regardless of what bike you're one. For example, if you go to the front and take some strong pulls at their pace or higher, find opportunities to do more work than others, lend a wheel to someone who's in difficulty, don't look like you're ever in distress, and don't ride squirrely, you'll be fine.
Lastly, Trent touched on mental toughness as a training tool but it's also a racing tool. The ability to turn yourself inside out on race day is worth several minutes, especially at Ironman. That's truly what seperates the top 3-5% of the AG from everyone else. Dave Tallo and I talked about this a lot over beers in Madison after the race.
@Trent - You, of course, are the model for mental strength. Thanks for the reminder.
@Rich - yes, thanks. It will be very interesting to see what you guys put together. I do have an ancient road bike that I can whip out. I will have to figure out if it can be modified to accommodate my PT wheel or if I have to ride it "blind" as far as power goes. I have ridden with the local group a few times before and can handle it for the time I can handle it...and then I fall off the back. :-) I take my turns when I'm there. But that was a couple years ago; maybe by now I could keep up a little better.
Your WI swim time seems slower than your 1000 yard TT would predict. What were your full distance race rehearsal times? As I recall from the swimming ebook, your 1000 TT time would put you into the "I need to focus on getting faster" camp but your IM time puts you into the "I need to focus on my technique" category so you need to figure out what's going on there. It seems like something endurance-related which tells me something could be tweaked with your technique.
Riding with fast people will definitely help. One of my two riding buddies was 18th overall at WI and trying to keep up with him took me to places I had not been. We always rode our tri bikes, but if you have a good road group you want to try and hang with then that can work too but don't feel like you have to spend $3000 on a brand new fancy road bike. There are great used ones on eBay all day long for half that.
Al's comments on experience are key. I don't know how long you've been in this game, but I think there's a difference between riding at 70% on race day and having a great run, and riding at 70% on race day and surviving the run. It takes a long time to get the base to be able to have that great run. After two race rehearsals at 72%, I knew I wasn't going to be able to hold that and have any hope of even running the whole marathon, let alone running well. I ended up at 66% on race day and was still hanging by a thread during the latter stages of the run.
On the other hand, another KQ-level guy I ride with has basically the same w/kg and vDot as I do and weighs about 10 pounds less. I consistently beat him in an indoor time trial series last winter. He rode 75%, almost 30 watts more than me at the race, (but only went 15:00 faster, terrible VI, another story...) and went on to out-run me by more than 30 minutes while punching his ticket to Kona. The difference? This was his 17th IM and about his 40th marathon. I've done 2 IMs and have now completed 3 marathons. That is a massive difference in lifetime base fitness.
I'm not done for the year (Austin 70.3) but have also already been thinking about what I can do to be faster next year. I have some things up my sleeve but don't want to hijack your thread...
I just took my old 7-speed-cassette clunker to the shop to get the right spacer for my PT wheel on it...
I've been in triathlon really for 4 years now. 2 marathons ~1990. 3 open marathons in 2000s. 6-7 HIMs, 2 IMs. I feel pretty confident about the HIM distance.
And, yes, start your own thread on the same thing! While I am of course selfish about wanting counsel for my own cae, the whole notion of self examination and talking about general approaches in different cases was why I started this!
I almost feel bad for you skinny guys, us fat guys only have to drop some pounds to get faster, you have to do the hard work. While you have a lot of answers which are good you are going to have to learn to swim faster, bike faster and run faster. Easy enough, right? You swim is still a big liability for you. That will only become a bigger factor as you get faster at the other 2. As Rich suggested it is time for some lessons and maybe a lot of swimming.
For cycling your w/kg needs to be better than 3.5. There is a lot of improvement to he had there. That is only going to happen if you learn to suffer much more though. There is no reason why a skinny guy can't be 4 w/kg if the right amount of work is done. If you think I am wrong about that than go talk to to Andy Coggin, its his idea not mine.
Same with Vdot, no reason you can't be a faster. Again, some serious suffering is in order. Whether than will translate into faster IM running is entirely up to you though. Trent nailed it, the mental aspect is huge always but never more so than in an IM. You can about fake it in a half, no so much with IM. There are guys with pretty non spectatular Vdots who can run very fast off the bike time after time [think Coach P] and guys with high Vdots who never manage to break 3:45. The only reason I have come up with as to why is that some people are able to suffer more than others or are at least more willing to do so. Everyone is shelled out there, everyone's legs feel like lead, everyone feels sick at one time or another during the race but some move better than others at the end of the day. Read Dave Tallo's RR from Moo. Dude was sitting in a porta potty unable to move forward at all and then ran his way to Kona. I am sure that felt awful.
I would also stop focusing on the math of it all or percentages or place in category. They are not very helpful for anything other than justifying the performance and thinking "hey, I did pretty damn good". Even PR's while they are cool to note along the way and faster than before is good, if you want to go FASTer than you have to leave all of that nonsense behind. Really does not matter if you are faster than you were before and faster than 90% percent of people out there in the world, if you were happy with that you would not have asked the question.
...hey, you asked
And yes, I think it's entirely possible to get too hung up on numbers, etc., and perhaps I am one who does that. However, I feel strongly that number/statistics are actually fairly useful, at least up to a point. Getting to the point of being an outlier,s great, but along the way, progress is measurable.
But in any case, yes, I asked. I want to get faster and I am willing to sacrifice to do that. But as with much of the EN methodology, I hope to avoid having to rediscover the wheel on how to do it. So, I appreciate the advice, at least a lot of which seems to be a version of HTFU.
* You need to get faster in the water. 1:1 with a coach and then a few solid swim weeks (4-5 sessions a week) before your next A race should help.
* Your bike fitness has plenty of room to grow. I'd consider finding a roadie group and learning how to truly suffer (and how to actually ride a bike). Very educational and can be done year round depending on your location until 12 week before A race prep. Coach Rich does solo saturdays for 2 hours then drops in on last 1.5 hours of a roadie ride for pain. 3.5 hours, done.
* Your run is on track and I wouldn't sweat it so much. Strides/foot speed is good. Maybe some of the strength / flexiblity Al talked about BUT you can't honestly see improvement across the board.
I'd look at 2012 being the year of the bike for you...
Since I am very new to this forum you can take what I say with a grain of salt.
I read your race report and I am pretty sure we met in Wisconsin at the camp, I was going to follow you out on the course the first day but you had problems with your rear cassette? I have not heard much (not that I have really looked) about annual training volume here on EN. You are getting towards the front of your age group and if you want to become an outlier or a KQ guy maybe the swimming & biking the volume has to come up.
I was never a high school swimmer or college swimmer, but swam a 1:04 at Wisconsin. I wanted to swim right at an hour but for my 1st race I was ok with the result. I would guess you are leaving 10 minutes on the table with your swim. I am pretty sure you are a professor at Iowa State, do they have a women's swim team? Any chance you can buddy up to an assistant coach to try and get some instruction from them or possibly join a practice or two? I am suprised that there isn't one masters swim group in the area?This past year before the volume really kicked up for me I made sure I was swimming 10,000 yards a week on 3-4 swims. What kind of weekly or annual volume have you been putting in when it comes to swim?
For your bike I know you are in Iowa, I am in Kansas City and we both probably spend a fair amount of time on the trainer in the winter. One suggestion I will make that could help push you in your workouts are The Sufferfest video series, these videos are motivating and tough. You can find them at www.thesufferfest.com, I have no affiliation with them, I am a part time spin instructor for Lifetime Fitness & 24 Hour Fitness and I use these videos in my classes, they are great. I would also suggest some of the Robbie Ventura videos that you can find on http://www.cycleops.com/en/products...-dvds.html Race Day, Force, Power & Climb are all very good. These might help in Dec, Jan, & Feb when you need some extra motivation.
From what I understand about this sport, the bike is the easiest thing to get faster on. Next year you will be faster almost regardless of what you are doing or do as long as you keep riding. I would also ask what kind of annual volume have you been putting in on the bike? I know in the off season volume comes way down here on EN and I will be trying this for the first time, but there is the post about the Volume Elephant in the room where Rich & Patrick explain about all the training they have been doing. I kind of wonder if you might need to move a little more into that realm? I don't really know.
Run: It sounds to me like your running is your strength, this is something I have no insight to offer on. I will only say one thing. I read your race report and on race day it sounded like you took a gamble on the run and did not stick to your game plan. In the end I think this hurt your overall run time because your run pace fell off. My suggestion would be to stick to your run plan & not roll the dice until later in the run.
Other: I am pretty sure you race & train with a long sleeve shirt on? My question is on race day why not lose the long sleeve shirt since I know you are wearing sunscreen? I know you might be prone to sunburn, but with sunscreen on and then having it quickly reapplied when heading out on the run, I would think for one day you would probably be ok. The long sleeve top is probably is causing your body to work just that extra bit harder to keep you cool? Unless I am wrong and you are wearing a CRAFT top like Tjorbin Sinbale used to wear in Hawaii to keep him cool? Just another suggestion to try and help you go faster on race day.
Swim: I think a good goal would be to drop 10 minutes from your swim, this will be some serious work, but 5 minutes should be doable for sure.
Bike: 10-15 minute improvement
Run: Just sticking your execution plan I figure there are 10 minutes there
Clothing: 2-3 minutes improvment if you are cooler?
That 11:22 I think can become a 10:52 or possibly faster and that would have put you in the top 10 in your age group.
Yes, there is a women's swim team, and there is also a very active high school swim culture (state champ competitive) and youth club in town. In part, that's one of the reasons that getting a masters group has been a struggle...pool time! But there has been a big turnover just in the last month or so with the club swim coaches, and there are some noises about getting a masters program going now...actually in conjunction with the "not full time swimmers high school age" group. There is also the old men's college coach still in town who is quite a competitive 50+ swimmer himself and works with TJ Tollakson as well as all the HS aged swimmers who aspire to college swimming....so lots of people from whom to get high priced lessons. (I got a couple from the college guy and they were very helpful.)
Yes, you are right about the gamble I took... and I should have run slower from the beginning. As I stated there, I underestimated how hot it was and didn't set an appropriately slower pace.
For the HIM distance, I race w/o long sleeves. My top was quite tight on IM race day - not sure if it cost me any time or not, especially since I didn't need to stop at all for sunscreen. Of course, I wore it under the wetsuit. I was just scared of being royally burnt.. The brand I wore was UnderArmour, but same basic idea. It was also great for squirting some water on during the bike to keep cool.
Thanks for the pointers!
William,
The smart people have already weighed in, and I don't know if I'll be able to offer much additional tangible input. Also, my points are a bit incoherent, but I hope when you read the entire thread in its entirety, this will be one small piece on your quest. Also, I want to caution that saome of these might go against what the current EN plans outline, and i'm putting them forward only because they have worked for me and in my circumstances.
Couple of pieces on your self-assessment to start.
-First, congrats on putting yourself out there. A frank assessment of where you are, where you want to be, and your limiters is not an easy thing to do, to say nothing of putting it out in a public forum. So, to me, this speaks of a huge Will to improve, and without it sounding trite, this is where the a lot of the money is, assuming that Will carries across the post, to the OS, to the Season, to Race day, and self-renews, year after year. I'm pretty sure it will - you're not exactly a dillettante in this game.
-There's a lot to be said for just punching the clock, putting in the time, and continuing steady progress. Especially in longer-course events. You haven't mentioned consistency in the OP, but I think that it's as critical as it gets to continue to put the work in, day after day, week after week, and so on. As things get 'faster,' the sexier stuff tends to grab our attention first, but believe me ... this is where we all keep coming back to.
-And this means doing whatever is in your power to remain injury-free. If injury-free means 2 h of core work every week, or new runners every month, or fortnightly ART/PT, or driving 5 hours to a bike fitter who knows about leg lenth discrepancies, or whatever, make it so.
-Faster equals rethinking your rest and making sure you are continuously setting the conditions to ensure you can train fast tomorrow. My most significant breakthroughs came in seasons or blocks where I committed to and implemented a "get X hours sleep a night and 1 hour nap after every hard weekend session" policy. Again, I feel like its stating the obvious when I note that, but it's that important, and I would suggest even moreso as the end you're in gets pointier and pointer (and as we get older and older!).
-Single sport groups. Lots of respondents hit this for cycling already, but I would add running to this prescription, and particularly during one of the single-sport blocks. Over the last 2-3 years, I put out a lot of questions to the team about improving my run speed, and I recall that this advice came back in every thread.
-Running on the track. I put in a lot of work on the track year-round because there's just nowhere to hide. And not just the faster stuff ... the blue-collar stuff as well. For example, literally every long run I do between April and December has me putting in the opening EP miles on trails or roads, and doing my MP and HMP running in circles on a track, until cooldown. 2 hours into a long run, if you have Track William breathing down your neck every 1:40 telling you to hit the lap on pace, lap after lap, you're going to get very good at not slacking and not dropping pace. And when there's nothing else to think about except Track William maintaining perfect form for just one more lap, you are going to build a faster long course triathlon runner.
-From Early EN / late CF Rich: If every weekend from now until the end of time, you schedule a 2-3 hour bike and a 1.5-2 hour run (naturally, more in-season) there won't be anything in triathlon that you can't do. Now, this isn't precisely what's prescribed in our current OS, but it's a maxim that I've tried to keep up. I like it because it doesn't feel like it has too much of a downstream impact, it's fun and challenging, and it's just What I Do as an endurance athlete.
Again, still stuck in 2005, but I do:
-the bike as a short WU, right into prescribed main set, remainder at 80-85% as blocks of 40 minutes work, a few minutes recovery, repeat. Or, just 80-85% for the whole thing, with a few minutes every 40' to give some mental recovery.
-The run as a short WU, prescribed main set, remainder at MP, to 90-120'. Alternately, for years, I would run by HR as 30'EP, 40"MP-HMP, 20"TP. Might go back to that this season.
-as i'm typing those two 'week after week' sessions, I'm reminded that when done properly, the last 20-30 minutes of these suck quite a bit. While there's no comparison between the suck you feel at mile 15 of an IM run, these sessions definitely make you develop strategies to handle discomfort, maintain focus, renegotiate your relationship with time, and build that low-level pain tolerance that is quite a different animal than the acute pain tolerance you exercise in, say, vo2 stuff.
-get light, fast race shoes. I think you were in on the summer thread on this, but if not, jump on board.
-Learn to really ride a bike. Roadie-level cornering skills, group riding, descending, etc etc. This finds you faster lines in races, eaches you to legally draft, and equals free minutes over 56/112.
-continuous improvement of run form. Your OP noted you hit this a few years ago. Again, be relentless. If it means cornering the CC coach for a form session on your track, posting "critique my run" vids on Youtube, re-visiting the basic form drills you had used to breakthrough from 'okay form' to 'good form' but have long since forgotten, or whatever, do it all. I THOUGHT I had very good form until this summer until I stumbled on some Bobby McGee articles I had read (but not really absorbed) years ago. I tried a few of the drills, and had one of those moments where I realized that "oh ... THIS is what they mean by high elbows ... and THIS is what stance line should feel like." After that, I started to reread everything I could find. Based on feel alone, I can't emphasize how big a game-changer these new-old insights will be for my run over the next few years, but I think the bigger takeaway is that there is always room for technique and form improvement (as well as being surprised just when you think you've figured something out!)
-a few big bike blocks. A few contiguous days of 5 hr a day rides are fitness centre / science lab / technique class / nutrition test centre all rolled into one. Sometimes these can align with your races and play the role of specific prep, but they can also get tossed into OS (or single-sport block that isn't necessary immediate race prep) for fun, and spit you out on the other end as a slightly stronger, more efficient, or smarter athlete. This stuff accrues over time.
Anyhow, looking forward to hearing how you will be implementing the advice in this thread. Keep posting these Qs!
-Dave
The use of trite and dilettante in the same paragraph for starters -- AWESOME!
The level of detail in the following paragraphs is great to read and has me thinking -- trying to keep a 90'+ long run most of the year as just one example (with fast finishes).
@Jeff - the year round 90-120 min long run if fairly common advice in the run-world even for people who have no intention of super early spring racing.
I'm going to throttle Rich (well, maybe that's not such a good idea to say....given his background).... strike that..... I'm going to think of something self-deprecating to say and try to de-fuse the situation if Rich calls me "Dr. Jenks" in public any more... half this team is Doctor Someone.... I know everyone means well and just to be friendly...maybe to tease a little, but I really like just "William" better.
It was kind of funny to get called Professor Something when I put up some post with a bit of algebra in it, but I need to stop this before it gets carried away. I don't let the secretaries call me Doctor Anything and I even sign all my emails to undergraduates as just William. (OK, if the person is being a turd, I sign "William Jenks, Professor and Chair".) I have the 10 year old kids on the soccer teams and the 17 year old ones too...just call me "William". I'm never "Dr. Anything" unless I REALLY have to!
I know people mean it as a friendly salutation, but it's just not like me...
PLEASE... just William ... OK? :-)
Thanks for setting us all straight William!
I promise a more thought ful reply to Dave later.