Suggestions to improve my training schedule?

May 22, 17 3:46

Post #1 of 16 (1958 views)

I'm currently training towards Marmotte des Alpes at the start of July and an IM70.3 in mid August.
While the IM is my A race for the year, I need to compromise and allocate extra attention to cycling, including time on the road bike or I risk not even finishing the Marmotte des Alpes (176km but includes a massive 5500m or 16,500ft of climbing including Galibier and Alpe d'Huez). Below is my current training template. Just wondering if anyone has any feedback. Stick with the current plan or tweak it. I'm limited to about 11-12hrs training most weeks but plan to peak at around 14hrs.

Now until Marmotte:

Monday: Easy recovery cycle and short easy run, 30-40mins each
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer (tri bike)
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1hr Zwift race or 5x5min VO2max intervals (tri bike)
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Endurance ride in the mountains 4-6hrs (road bike)

My running volume is too low at the moment. Not sure I can increase it without sacrificing bike time but I'm going to try and fit in some short easy runs after bike sessions to add a little frequency. Swim volume is low too, I'm going to live with that for now.

The Marmotte is 2nd July. I plan to cut back on running for the last week and just do a couple of easy 5km runs.
I plan to taper the bike from 2 weeks out. Last ride over 4hrs on June 18th.

There's 7 weeks between the Marmotte Des Alpes and my IM70.3. I'll need some recovery, not sure how much but I'm guessing I'll need to take it easy for 7-10 days. I'm staying in France for a week after the event and will have the bike with me so I may do some light cycling and a few short runs if/when my legs are able for it. Once I get home, if I'm fully recovered, I have 4 weeks to re-focus for the IM70.3 before a 2 week taper.
My plan on the lead up to the IM70.3 is to increase running and swimming frequency while switching all rides to the tri bike and shortening the weekend cyles to 3.5-4hrs. As follows:

Between Marmotte and IM70.3

Monday: Short interval run & Swim
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer followed by short easy run
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1.5hrs ride - Sweetspot session on the trainer or road. Short run.
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Long ride, 3.5-4hrs.

So, sensible or all wrong?

Last edited by: Ai_1: May 22, 17 3:47

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 3:59

Post #2 of 16 (1943 views)

Can you cycle to work? My commute is a 50 minute ride each way. I only do it once or twice a week (should do more really) but it's a good way to sneak in extra mileage. Friday looks like a good day to do it as swim's don't count

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [chilled] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 4:12

Post #3 of 16 (1933 views)

chilled wrote:

Can you cycle to work? My commute is a 50 minute ride each way. I only do it once or twice a week (should do more really) but it's a good way to sneak in extra mileage. Friday looks like a good day to do it as swim's don't count

I could, but I had decided it's more trouble and added time than it's worth. It would be poor quality and a little dangerous as it's a very traffic heavy route at the times I'm travelling and includes lots of junctions. Doing this would reduce time available in the evenings for focused bike sessions so I don't think it would gain me anything. Also there's no showers or secure bike storage at work (I'm currently working out of temporary offices on a large construction site).
As for using Fridays - I'm trying to make that my semi-rest day! I've considered adding a run or bike session but I thought it would be better spent recovering from Thursday's hard session and being fresh for my long run on Saturday. I don't know if this is the right way to look at it. I could do another session on Friday. Should I?

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 4:24

Post #4 of 16 (1925 views)

Hows ya plumbings?

Is this your first 70.3 or are you a sub-5 ?

Whats your training history, 1 years, 5 years, 10 years?

http://www.sweat7.com
Facebook Page: Sweat7
Twitter: @sweat7coaching

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [salmonsteve] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 4:31

Post #5 of 16 (1911 views)

salmonsteve wrote:

Hows ya plumbings?

Is this your first 70.3 or are you a sub-5 ?

Whats your training history, 1 years, 5 years, 10 years?

Plumbings?

I've done 2 previous 70.3s and one full IM.
I've been cycling and doing sprint duathlons for about 6 years but only casually until about 3 years ago, when I started taking it a little more seriously (still a step down from most here!)
This is my 3rd year of triathlon.

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 5:35

Post #6 of 16 (1858 views)

I guess biggest issue is swim Friday and sat and no swim for 5 days
And you should run off bike Sunday

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [pk] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 6:05

Post #7 of 16 (1829 views)

pk wrote:

I guess biggest issue is swim Friday and sat and no swim for 5 days
And you should run off bike Sunday

Thanks for the feedback.

The main reason I put them back to back is that I initially just had a single swim on Saturday which is the only time I'm likely to manage an OWS. But then I figured I could fit a pool swim in on Friday as well - Friday was originally a complete rest day.
I was between minds on whether this was a good idea. On the one hand that leaves a 5 day swim gap but, spreading the swims more evenly still leaves at least 2 and 3 days between swims. In terms of familiarisation and technique improvement (mine needs lots of improvement!) I thought 2 days back to back might actually be better, since the second day should be able to build on the first without the loss of familiarity that would occur between every session if I spread them out. i don't know what the conventional wisdom is on this. I suspect it's "swim more!"

Regarding running off the bike: do you mean before or after the Marmotte?
It's probably a good idea afterwards, I should add that.
Before the Marmotte I'll be on the roadbike for the long Sunday rides. I think it would be difficult to run well after 5 or 6 hours on the road bike and I'm not sure there'd be much benefit. It's not representative of the position I'll be using in the IM70.3.
I think I'd rather concentrate purely on the bike those days.

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 6:23

Post #8 of 16 (1812 views)

Ai_1 wrote:

I'm currently training towards Marmotte des Alpes at the start of July and an IM70.3 in mid August.
While the IM is my A race for the year, I need to compromise and allocate extra attention to cycling, including time on the road bike or I risk not even finishing the Marmotte des Alpes (176km but includes a massive 5500m or 16,500ft of climbing including Galibier and Alpe d'Huez). Below is my current training template. Just wondering if anyone has any feedback. Stick with the current plan or tweak it. I'm limited to about 11-12hrs training most weeks but plan to peak at around 14hrs.

Now until Marmotte:

Monday: Easy recovery cycle and short easy run, 30-40mins each
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer (tri bike)
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1hr Zwift race or 5x5min VO2max intervals (tri bike)
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Endurance ride in the mountains 4-6hrs (road bike)

My running volume is too low at the moment. Not sure I can increase it without sacrificing bike time but I'm going to try and fit in some short easy runs after bike sessions to add a little frequency. Swim volume is low too, I'm going to live with that for now.

The Marmotte is 2nd July. I plan to cut back on running for the last week and just do a couple of easy 5km runs.
I plan to taper the bike from 2 weeks out. Last ride over 4hrs on June 18th.

There's 7 weeks between the Marmotte Des Alpes and my IM70.3. I'll need some recovery, not sure how much but I'm guessing I'll need to take it easy for 7-10 days. I'm staying in France for a week after the event and will have the bike with me so I may do some light cycling and a few short runs if/when my legs are able for it. Once I get home, if I'm fully recovered, I have 4 weeks to re-focus for the IM70.3 before a 2 week taper.
My plan on the lead up to the IM70.3 is to increase running and swimming frequency while switching all rides to the tri bike and shortening the weekend cyles to 3.5-4hrs. As follows:

Between Marmotte and IM70.3

Monday: Short interval run & Swim
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer followed by short easy run
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1.5hrs ride - Sweetspot session on the trainer or road. Short run.
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Long ride, 3.5-4hrs.

So, sensible or all wrong?

Here are my suggestions in no particular order:

For now, set up your road bike so your hip angle in the TT position on the Tri bike and hip angle in the hoods on the road bike are the same. Before Marmotte, you can open up the hip angle by adding more stack to the bars. This way there is essentially no diff between your road bike and tri bike training for your half IM....it's always easy to adapt to "more open"
To each of your bike rides, add 10-15 min easy running. If time is short, reduce the bike by 5-10 min and shower faster
Personally I would get rid of the internal run on Monday and just swim and then on Tuesday, run intervals and then immediately get on the trainer and bike intervals...sure your bike numbers will be a tad lower, but that's fine
I would make the Wed run a medium distance run at a steady pace. If not you're doing intervals Tue, Wed and Thu. It is unclear how hard you swim, but I bet you are also swimming harder than you think, so make that internals Mon - Fri.
At some point, you need to swim hard in your program so that you can bike and run hard. Just keep that in mind. Some hard kick sets would also be good if this is a no wetsuit swim

Good luck on the Marmotte. While you might think your 70.3 is your A race right now, at the end of the year, you're going to say Marmotte was the A event.

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 6:54

Post #9 of 16 (1774 views)

Ai_1 wrote:

Now until Marmotte:

Monday: Easy recovery cycle and short easy run, 30-40mins each
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer (tri bike)
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1hr Zwift race or 5x5min VO2max intervals (tri bike)
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Endurance ride in the mountains 4-6hrs (road bike)

If it were me...

I'd add a swim on Monday, or move the Friday swim to Monday. Nice way to recover from the long Sunday ride, and take some load off the legs after long run Sat and Long bike Sunday.

I'd add a short brick run off the bike on Tuesday and/or Thursday....just 15-20 minutes---mostly for frequency sake. As a brick it doesn't eat too much extra time. I often find I run surprisingly well after hard/short bike workouts like those. The first couple of minutes suck, but then the legs seem to settle into the rhythm pretty quick.

Not sure about the value of the 5x5 at this point. I'd probably add something more race/event intensity specific---maybe an hour at HIM pace or above (plus warmup/cooldown)?

If you move the swim from Friday to Monday...you could add another bike on Friday. Given your short term focus on the Marmotte (which looks EPIC by the way!!)...extra bike volume would probably be a good choice.

Ai_1 wrote:

Between Marmotte and IM70.3

Monday: Short interval run & Swim
Tuesday: 2x20min threshold on the trainer followed by short easy run
Wednesday: Medium distance run with tempo intervals, 1hr
Thursday: 1.5hrs ride - Sweetspot session on the trainer or road. Short run.
Friday: Swim
Saturday: Open water swim & long easy run
Sunday: Long ride, 3.5-4hrs.

So, sensible or all wrong?

That looks fine to me (for whatever my random internet guy opinion is worth). Optional thoughts....

1. Add one more easy run...either Friday or bricked after Sunday bike.
2. What's the composition of the Sunday ride---all easy/LSD? I'd add a long race-pace(or slightly above) section to the first half of the ride---maybe start at an hour, and increase over the 4 weeks to 2 hours or something??
3. 3x swims is still pretty minimal, unless you are already a good swimmer. Could you squeeze in a Wednesday AM swim?

Last edited by: Tom_hampton: May 22, 17 6:54

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 8:20

Post #10 of 16 (1735 views)

Ai_1 wrote:

In terms of familiarisation and technique improvement (mine needs lots of improvement!) I thought 2 days back to back might actually be better, since the second day should be able to build on the first without the loss of familiarity that would occur between every session if I spread them out. i don't know what the conventional wisdom is on this. I suspect it's "swim more!"

My own experience (as a sucky swimmer) is that swimming back-2-back leaves my swim muscles tired on day 2, and my technique suffers on the second day. Plus, 5 days out of the water is a long time to forget any "improvements" you might have gained. I've been swimming 3-4x for months...I just took 6 days off, and got back in the water today. Everything sucked from just that 6 days without swimming.

I'm trying to work up to swimming every day, or at least a few days in a row. But, I'm finding it takes time...and, as I said above technique on day2 suffers until the adaptations work in.

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [devashish_paul] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 9:03

Post #11 of 16 (1702 views)

devashish_paul wrote:

.....

Here are my suggestions in no particular order:

For now, set up your road bike so your hip angle in the TT position on the Tri bike and hip angle in the hoods on the road bike are the same. Before Marmotte, you can open up the hip angle by adding more stack to the bars. This way there is essentially no diff between your road bike and tri bike training for your half IM....it's always easy to adapt to "more open"
To each of your bike rides, add 10-15 min easy running. If time is short, reduce the bike by 5-10 min and shower faster
Personally I would get rid of the internal run on Monday and just swim and then on Tuesday, run intervals and then immediately get on the trainer and bike intervals...sure your bike numbers will be a tad lower, but that's fine
I would make the Wed run a medium distance run at a steady pace. If not you're doing intervals Tue, Wed and Thu. It is unclear how hard you swim, but I bet you are also swimming harder than you think, so make that internals Mon - Fri.
At some point, you need to swim hard in your program so that you can bike and run hard. Just keep that in mind. Some hard kick sets would also be good if this is a no wetsuit swim

Good luck on the Marmotte. While you might think your 70.3 is your A race right now, at the end of the year, you're going to say Marmotte was the A event.

Thank you very much.
I'll go through this properly later, I'm on my way out the door right in a moment but it looks useful.
On the last point re Marmotte being my A event. You might be right. But I just want to finish that. I have a buddy I need to beat in the 70.3 ;)

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Tom_hampton] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 9:09

Post #12 of 16 (1694 views)

Tom_hampton wrote:

Ai_1 wrote:

In terms of familiarisation and technique improvement (mine needs lots of improvement!) I thought 2 days back to back might actually be better, since the second day should be able to build on the first without the loss of familiarity that would occur between every session if I spread them out. i don't know what the conventional wisdom is on this. I suspect it's "swim more!"

My own experience (as a sucky swimmer) is that swimming back-2-back leaves my swim muscles tired on day 2, and my technique suffers on the second day. Plus, 5 days out of the water is a long time to forget any "improvements" you might have gained. I've been swimming 3-4x for months...I just took 6 days off, and got back in the water today. Everything sucked from just that 6 days without swimming.

I'm trying to work up to swimming every day, or at least a few days in a row. But, I'm finding it takes time...and, as I said above technique on day2 suffers until the adaptations work in.

As I said to Paul - I'm just on my way out the door so I need to have a better look at this later but it looks like good feedback. Thanks for your time!

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 22, 17 15:18

Post #13 of 16 (1627 views)

You aren't training nearly enough on the bike. You shouldn't be doing 2 x 20 when your climbs are much more intense than that. Alpe d' Huez alone is going to tax you heavily. I appreciate that the Marmotte isn't your A race but you don't want to get out there and do the death ride from hell.

Eric Doehrman
E3 Multisport

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Eric Doehrman] [ In reply to ]

May 23, 17 3:55

Post #14 of 16 (1524 views)

Eric Doehrman wrote:

You aren't training nearly enough on the bike. You shouldn't be doing 2 x 20 when your climbs are much more intense than that. Alpe d' Huez alone is going to tax you heavily. I appreciate that the Marmotte isn't your A race but you don't want to get out there and do the death ride from hell.

I'm confused by this.
When you say I'm not doing nearly enough on the bike, are you suggesting I shouldn't do the Marmotte des Alpes at all unless I'm going to do more than 7-9 hours a week on the bike? Also, do you mean it's not nearly enough to finish, or not nearly enough to do a "good" time? Just to be clear, I have no expectation of doing a gold or silver time which I believe are currently <8:39 and <10:18 respectively. I'll likely be closer to the 11:30-12:00 range.

Similarly, I'm confused as to what you mean by 2x20 not being intense enough. That's 40mins close to FTP (I typically do these around 90-95%FTP) in a session lasting about 70mins including warm up, cool down and a 5 minute recovery. I could do more volume at a lower intensity (if I had more time) or less volume at higher intensity, such as VO2max intervals, but I don't think it's realistic to try and do equal or greater volume at higher intensity. Firstly I'd likely struggle to complete the sessions. Secondly, I expect to need more recovery afterwards and overall training quality/volume would not improve.
As you can see from my original post, I was planning to do some 5x5min VO2max intervals as my Thursday session but I'm inclined to agree with previous comments that this session would if anything be too much intensity and I'm thinking I might change this to another threshold session or some sweetspot training.
As I understand your comment, it suggests I should train with greater specificity and therefore higher intensity to reflect the climbs. But, I should be doing the vast bulk of these climbs at LOWER intensity. It's obviously impossible to spend multiple hours above FTP climbing these mountains. They're not short sharp speed bumps you can sprint up. They're big climbs that I'll be settling into for the long haul. I may need to reach FTP intensity or higher very briefly on a couple of the steepest ramps but if it's any more than that I expect I'll be in trouble.

If it's of any use, my current FTP is somewhere around 280-290W and I weigh 82kg. So I'm hardly a natural climber or a top class cyclist but I'll try and make the best of what I've got.

I did a ride of 150km with over 2000m climbing this weekend. That included several kilometers of climbs with similar gradients to those on the Marmotte but most were easier. I'm doing a 201km sportive with about 2800m of climbing in a couple of weeks and that'll be my biggest preparation ride. The closest I've done to the climbs in the Marmotte was Mt Teide in Tenerife where you can ride from the beach up to to 2200m, climbing the entire time. It's a 35km climb so the average gradient is about 6% but the last 10km have plenty sections of 9-10% and finishes at higher altitude than Alpe D'Huez but ~500m lower than Galibier. I did that climb twice about 3 years ago and found it tough but I'm in better shape now, I think. I'm well aware that Marmotte des Alpes is going to be incredibly tough to complete. It finishes with the climb up Alpe D'Huez and there's an option to bail out at the bottom but I have no intention of taking that option if I have any say in it.

I'm not in bad shape right now but I'm not there yet. I think I'll struggle on endurance but hopefully the long rides in the coming weeks will help with that.

Oh, one more thing regarding intensity on the climbs:
My road bike is equipped with a 50/34 compact and I normally use a 11-28 for the mountains. I've bought myself a long cage derailleur and 11-32 cassette which I'll fit soon and use for the Marmotte. I'll still need to do the work and make enough forward progress not to topple over but hopefully this will help preserve my knees/legs a bit longer on the steep sections.

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [Ai_1] [ In reply to ]

May 23, 17 5:11

Post #15 of 16 (1485 views)

I think you are overestimating the Marmotte. In 2013 I trained plenty for it, but I was in no way, shape or form a good athlete (I ran a 4h marathon later that year).
I snuck a gold time and 2 days later rode the Madeleine and Glandon.

You won't need a week to 10 days to recover, it isn't a marathon, your legs don't take a pounding.
Friends of mine who rode with me did limited training and still made it around no problem and rode a couple of days later.

If your FTP is actually 280-290 and you weigh 82kg, as long as your endurance is good, I would say you'll do 9h. Don't expect it to be easy, but unless you are going for 7h or so, it is basically a fun ride over some great climbs. Make sure you have the right gearing, a 39:25 is not enough, go for a 34:27 or bigger and you should be fine.

Enjoy it. The Marmotte started me off in endurance sports, it is a great ride and still counts as my favorite ride that I have done, even though I had done all of the climbs individually before then anyway!

Re: Suggestions to improve my training schedule? [NUFCrichard] [ In reply to ]

May 24, 17 3:18

Post #16 of 16 (1408 views)

NUFCrichard wrote:

I think you are overestimating the Marmotte. In 2013 I trained plenty for it, but I was in no way, shape or form a good athlete (I ran a 4h marathon later that year).
I snuck a gold time and 2 days later rode the Madeleine and Glandon.

You won't need a week to 10 days to recover, it isn't a marathon, your legs don't take a pounding.
Friends of mine who rode with me did limited training and still made it around no problem and rode a couple of days later.

If your FTP is actually 280-290 and you weigh 82kg, as long as your endurance is good, I would say you'll do 9h. Don't expect it to be easy, but unless you are going for 7h or so, it is basically a fun ride over some great climbs. Make sure you have the right gearing, a 39:25 is not enough, go for a 34:27 or bigger and you should be fine.

Enjoy it. The Marmotte started me off in endurance sports, it is a great ride and still counts as my favorite ride that I have done, even though I had done all of the climbs individually before then anyway!

I hope you're right but I think you're underestimating how afraid I should be!
My FTP is from the Zwift 20min test protocol. I'm not sure it's exactly representative since I find intervals based on that extremely hard/impossible. Maybe I'm just soft!
I reckon a true 1 hour FTP test would probably give a value closer to 270-275W but I haven't done one - it's in that sort of region anyway.
I'm not sure my endurance is quite good enough yet. Despite my FTP, I think I'd be limited to about 150W average (maybe 160NP) on a course like Marmotte. And that sort of power is going to be slow up the hills! Hopefully the next 6 weeks will improve my endurance and raise that figure a little but I'm planning to ride conservatively regardless. If it's a choice of reaching the end in 12 hours or bailing out half way up Alpe D'Huez having done a 9hr pace up to that point, I'll take the former! Honestly though, I can't see any possibility of making it around in anything close to 9hrs.

Our Partners

transition-DOT-area-AT-slowtwitch-DOT-com

Advertise with us

©1999-2024 Slowtwitch, Inc., and Slowtwitch.com
Reproduction of material from any Slowtwitch.com page
without written permission is strictly prohibited.