I have used Fink's plan for 9 IM's and it's worked fine. I have not raced IMMT full but I did use it for Canada and Tahoe so it will work for a hilly bike ride. I also used it when I raced 70.3 Worlds in IMMT. The volume will be sufficient it's just a matter of preparing for those hills. Great venue! I will definitely return to race the full someday.

What Gosub7 said. I like his plan as well.

I've used the Fink plan 3 times - Wisconsin, Maryland, and Mont Tremblant. I don't know how good of a cyclist you are but the training plan has bike rides building up to 6 hours. If you are going to complete the bike in less than 6 hours, you're definitely going to be fine. I'm a big fan of the plan, it works well. Mont Tremblant is a great venue and the course difficulty is intermediate I'd say - definitely easier than Wisconsin.

To revive an old thread...

How did this plan work for you? Did you follow it for IMMT? Which one did you use - competitive, just finish, intermediate?

I bought the book in hopes of using it for IMLP 2018. Is the competitive training plan available anywhere electronically? Excel, training peaks, etc.?

I did part of his 70.3 plans, which are similar in structure to the IM plans. I say I did part mainly because his plans are def catered to the 'weekend warrior' who is committing to lighter weekday training (near 1hr max) and then big Sat-Sun hours.

If you DO do his method though, pay attention to not overdoing those long weekend bikes/runs. I'm used to doing a very hilly weekend bike route where I power through the hills at Z3+, but that led me to overcooking myself on the bike volume if I tried to do the same recommended hours he did.

I'm now much more of a fan of working as hard as reasonably possible on limited weekdays and then not going big-volume on the wknds unless you absolutely really have to, but that's def different than Fink's approach.

Interesting...I could probably get in the long run weekdays, but the long bike would still have to be on the weekend. In the intro section it talks about keeping the schedule consistent to not overwork/overdo certain muscles that are already fatigued. How did you find rearranging the schedule?

I liked it. I did the competitive. It seemed to work well for me at IMMT, although I would incorporate more climbing on the bike in the latter half of the build period and continue this in peak. IMMT run course has a fair bit of climbing. Again, if I did it again I'd modify the plan to include running on hills.

It's a good program. I was sceptical about the Z1-2 only in the base period but this really paid dividends over the long haul. My recovery time was shorter and my capacity to take a greater training load in peak period improved markedly.

I think that it's ideally suited for a flat course out of the box. But if you have a bike and/or run with climbing you need to adjust your training to be race specific.

I found the durations and schedule to be bang on. The long ride/bricks were very important. If I had to ditch a workout it was usually the short ride/brick or the Thursday am Z1 high cadence session.

I'm glad to hear this. I am using the same program (Fink 'competitive') for my first full IM (2018 IMTX). A bunch of people in my club used it preparing for IMMT last year, and they all did pretty well. They did incorporate some climbing on the bike, since we have good climbing in abundance near us, but otherwise said it was spot on.

I have the intermediate program in Exel, if you are interrested

---

Follow me on Instagram: [https://www.instagram.com/sobyschwartz/]

Would you keep your HR in the same recommended zones when climbing, or do you inevitably go out of the zones on hills? Since I'm doing LP, I'll definitely need to get some climbing in.

I'm glad you mentioned this...the Z1-2 seems crazy slow/easy. Just seems like no progress would be made. But everything he says is to avoid that middle Z3 training and either be in Z1-2 or Z4 for the most gains.

I think that to remain true to the program you should stick to Z1-2 during the base period. That said, next time I'd do more strength training and hill riding ( eg. fat tire ) before starting the program. And I'd maintain the strength training during the base period.

But it sure is painful going for a run at a Walking Dead zombie pace to maintain Z1. I think putting the plan ahead of the ego is one of the biggest challenges of the base.

I'm hoping to do the same. One of the things people whine most about in the Facebook group is the lack of electronic support to accompany the book. I manually loaded the whole plan into Training Peaks, but not all the pickup and interval details or swim sets. I put a note on the first day of the week in TP so I can cross-reference with the book easily.

Has anyone compared the training plans from the 2nd edition Be Iron Fit to the 3rd edition? I have used the competitive plan from the 2nd edition 3 times with good results, and I'm wondering if there were any changes to the plans in the 3rd edition.