Just throwing this out there for anyone interested - I've lately been revisiting minimalist/barefoot-style running. Note that I run perfectly well in regular running shoes and have my whole life, so this is totally unnecessary and extra for me to adopt minimalist running, but I'm at the point in running where I like a new challenge.
It's a hard transition - the achilles really take a beating. I'm still in the early stages, but have worked my way up from 3 miles per week total in minimalist shoes (I run in water shoes, actually), to 20 miles this past week all at easy paces.
However, I found to my pleasant surprise in my last Oly tri which had a 0.3 mile run from the swim exit to T1, that having even a little of minimalist style run training helped a TON on that brief stretch. I ended up with the 2nd fastest T1 out of 140+ competitors, and only missed the 1st spot by <2 seconds, mainly on the strength of that fast T1 run. And I'm not typically a tip top transitions guy by any stretch!
I wasn't even trying to race hard on that transition run portion, but for sure, it felt wayyyy more natural to run at speed having that minimalist training. In contrsat, I did a similar distance T1 run last year which felt god-awful despite being in near-top run shape - if you don't train that barefoot run technique, it's totally bizarre when you start booking it out of the water.
Just my 2 cents for anyone who wants to gain some speed in T1 - consider adding 1-4 miles of water shoes or other minimalist-style running to your regimen - it'll feel a TON more natural on race day to run out of the water.
It's a hard transition - the achilles really take a beating. I'm still in the early stages, but have worked my way up from 3 miles per week total in minimalist shoes (I run in water shoes, actually), to 20 miles this past week all at easy paces.
However, I found to my pleasant surprise in my last Oly tri which had a 0.3 mile run from the swim exit to T1, that having even a little of minimalist style run training helped a TON on that brief stretch. I ended up with the 2nd fastest T1 out of 140+ competitors, and only missed the 1st spot by <2 seconds, mainly on the strength of that fast T1 run. And I'm not typically a tip top transitions guy by any stretch!
I wasn't even trying to race hard on that transition run portion, but for sure, it felt wayyyy more natural to run at speed having that minimalist training. In contrsat, I did a similar distance T1 run last year which felt god-awful despite being in near-top run shape - if you don't train that barefoot run technique, it's totally bizarre when you start booking it out of the water.
Just my 2 cents for anyone who wants to gain some speed in T1 - consider adding 1-4 miles of water shoes or other minimalist-style running to your regimen - it'll feel a TON more natural on race day to run out of the water.