I'm following Gale Bernhardt's 13 week training program for my 1st IM in September. Some weeks it looks daunting, but it's pretty easy to rearrange things to fit in some normal life. I throw in a group open water swim in the middle of the week to help out. So far so good though.

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You win some.
You loose some.
You wreck some.
A-

I have not done an IM (yet), but if you have a plan, I have one piece of advice: FOLLOW IT. especially for your first IM. I've had a couple friends tell me that the first time they followed a training plan for an IM, it felt way easy for them. but come race day, they were all happy that they followed the plan. so I would say hold back, chill out, and execute your plan, just like in a race. you might look at this: http://www.byrn.org/gtips/rules.htm.

oh, and BTW, if your long ride and long run were not back to back, it would be better for your recovery.

my $0.02

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"At every endurance event, there comes a time when you'll say, 'What the fuck am I doing here?' And then you'll say, 'This is what I do.'"
--John Spas

Whats your key limter?

Whatever it is ..work on your build phase for that.
The advise of 8+ century rides is not bad.
You want to build as much muscular endurance for your bike,especially if it is your limter.
Towards the last phase of your IM build ..focus on your long runs with some bricks(bike-run) thrown in.

Always good to have a goal,but, for your first IM, I'd say focus on just finishing .

I always thought that a good acid test for your body at the 3/4 point of your training is a race day simulation.

Swim for an hour,easy transition to a 6 hr bike ride..then run for 2 hrs.
See how that feels with your nutrition plan.

If you come out of that feeling OK..then you're on track.
The key(IMHO) is to imprint that session in your body early enough in your training so you can make adjustments if needed.

Go to Gordo's 4 Pillars article.
Its all there Occy.

Thats just my worthless 2 bits.Good Luck with the training.

Fish

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Seeing him in deep torment, I said. " You can have my last GU , but its been down my pants for most of the run". - John Hirsch

Take care of your body, its by far the coolest thing you're going to ever own.- Can't remember who told me this, but I love it.

Always listen to the local triathletes, they know everything. I wonder if any more than 3 centuries is necessary for a 1st time Ironman. 8-9 just seems like too much to me. Would you do 8-9 20 miles runs leading up to a marathon?

What the hell do I know, I've never done an Ironman, but quality trumps quantity any time.

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Striving to have sex more than 66 times per year

I am not a great athlete by no means but sometimes things seem harder than they really are.

My wife is doing an IM this year so I decided to cut back on my activities and training. I usually do 2 marathons a year and a couple of tris. I usually run a 3 hour marathon with about 50 miles a week at peak training. I got 30 miles or less a week of training (14 weeks of training) this year and focused primarily on my long runs with one bike and one swim per week. Ran the same time in my marathon (and felt better) and had the same time in my tri. Not that I am a natural, but I think I have built up significant endurance over the last 8 years. I also have a very physical job.

My wife has a coach and is doing awesome. I have no doubt she can qualify for IM Hawaii.

Don't kill yourself, but have enough anxiety to force yourself to train and stick to your schedule.

What? I think you posted to the wrong thread. ;)

Thanks tons to the others with your responses. I start thinking about the time it takes to do a 100 mile ride and just sorta glaze over. I wish I had a trainer so I could get up at 4:30am, ride from 5-8am, and then switch to the outdoors....

Anyway, Wife is calling.
Later
Trae

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Trae McCombs
TSR - Sponsored by the Masses. Racing for the hell of it.
Ironman Finisher 2005 -- 14:09:18

Without knowing more about your background that you are bringing to the training...I think if you have a plan...stay with it. Document EVERYTHING...what works, what doesn't, nutrition, etc...EVERYTHING. I'd be that somewhere around 5-6 weeks out...sometime in late Sep to early October you'll be back here wondering how to keep up your motivation to get through the last few weeks...

No canned plan is optimal for an individual athlete...but they do provide a decent roadmap to get you from point A to B. You'll learn A LOT about yourself, your response to training overload, and how well this level of training prepares you for the race.

Beware of the inevitable "local expert" advice...they are probably coming from a place of much more experience than you (though I certainly don't know that for sure)...for them...maybe 8-9 100+ milers is easy or the right training...for you, who says he just did his first 70 miler (with what most would say is an inordinate amount of stop time)...thats reaching REALLY far...maybe if you did 8-9 100 milers over 6-7 months...but between now and November? I think you'd end up sidelined with injury or lack of motivation or both...

Beware also, of the bottomless pit called IM training...to the new initiate...the task can seem so daunting that the impulse is, as you allude, to do more and more training...just to make sure...

That isn't to say minor adjustments to training and schedules shouldn't be made when necessary...thats why you should document everything...

Listen to TriBriGuy...........My first IM I did not know any better and followed my plan. Finished OK. Next year took the advice of 8 to 9 centuries ect.... three 3 hr runs. I can due that now but at the time I just did not have the base(did not even understand what base really was)ended up training hurt and struggled. You set a great goal. ENJOY yourself,experience and grow,learn.............Have fun. You can have coach ect.. but with IM you just have to do to understand,you really can not compare it to a half IM. It is unique

Most of our local tri club folks do that same weekend routine: ride long(ish) on Sat and run long(ish) on Sun. I personally don't agree with it, I think you need to be able to run off the bike. I do bricks. Long bricks. Two of them a week (the shorter of the two at race pace and the longer at slower than race pace). But, and this is the kicker, aside from a swim between each brick, I do no other workouts per week. I see little point in doing a run or a ride less than two hours long at this point. If I were do add one more workout, it'd likely be a swim or a 2+hr ride. Probably the swim, I like to swim ;-)

As for the swim with swimmers, ride with cyclists and run with runners, it's true. Makes a huge difference. The triclubs I have seen locally are pretty social, which is great, if you want/need more friends ;-) But if I want to be a better swimmer, you can bet my local masters program will be far harder and I will get far more feedback than I would get from the triclub coach. Ditto running and riding.

My many cents.

AP

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

TriBriGuy makes a really good point, about motivation and about doing the training that is best for you. It is soooo easy to just follow the local export's advice, but you will have to tailor any "plan" regardless of who it's from... because it's not designed for you, to deal with your limiters, strengths, and designed in a way to keep you motivated.

One bad session can demotivate you. Example, my last Thursday brick, the run was a total sufferfest, I bailed early. My motivation really dropped after that workout. I had to watch a lot of TdF and old IM tapes to get my going again, mentally. My brick today should have been mentally devastating, esp coming on the heels of Thursday's piss poor session, but it wasn't, I ran longer (27k) than I have since I was pregnant (2004 May marathon was the last longest run for me).

So you need to know yourself and know when to adjust, either up or down or call it off.

My pet peeve is when you miss a planned session and then you try and "make up for it" by cramming a bunch together. Don't do that, easy way to get injured or overtrained.

OK, enough babbling. Off to have a beer. :P

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

Hey, good going! You sound a bit like me. Having done my first IM this year I can offer a bit of personal experience. I did a number of firsts in my lead-up to IM, including my first 100k ride, my first 100mile ride,
my first 3.8k open water swim....

I can see that if you are already a well trained and adjusted athlete, eight or nine century rides would be a good idea, but from my base, that was just not possible. I ended up doing three in my build-up.

My program was built in three 10 weeks blocks, with a one to two week rest between each block. I'm looking at my training records, and I was so diligent in the first block, Ok in the second and really struggling in the last. As in the race, don't go out too fast: its a long long way. If you complete the training then you should be able to do the race. The real competition is to be able to do the training. You will find gradual adaptations far easier than subjecting yourself to all sorts of shocks, so gradually build the distances, but don't be a sissy about it.

At this stage you're allowed to stop for water, food, the call of nature, or even to admire the view. There will be plenty of mind-numbing, crotch rubbing four to six hour race pace efforts to come. The last ten weeks were real tough and I got to the two week taper wondering if I would ever recover. I did, but it was only in the last couple of days before the race. As they say, better 20% undertrained than 1% overtrained. The biggest challenge is to get to the start line without injury and illness. If you stress your body too much too soon it will let you know and you will lose a lot of training time.

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Those who know do not speak, those who speak, do not know.

Wow,

A lot of really good advice. Thanks tons guys and gals.

To someone that asked about my background...

Jan 2004, I was about 50lbs overweight. Got out, started running and by March 2004 I'd lost about 40lbs. I decided I wanted to do a Marathon. During my training, in Aug 2004 I decided, heck, why not do an Ironman! I started swimming in addition to my running. Jan, 15 2005 I did my first Marathon. (4:46). I knew I'd need to have some sort of gauge to see where I was so I started training for my first 1/2 Ironman (Rock and Rolllman -- 6hrs 52mins -- June 5th).

That's it in a nutshell.

Something else to keep in mind. I'm slow. (if my times didn't already say that. :) The only thing I'm fairly fast in, is the swim. On the bike, on the hills around here (Macon, GA) I'm lucky to avg 15mph. On the "run" I'm lucky if I can sustain 10, ok, 11-12min/miles for long runs. I've started simply walking the hills lately and running the flats. We have some STEEP hills here where I live.

One thing I think I need to maybe stop doing, is riding with the local bike club. These guys are only going 35-40 miles and love to set a grueling pace. (We were doing around 19-20mph avg when I was riding with them). I need to simply go slow... and log the distance.

Anyhoo... TdF is about to finish up. :)
Thanks again for the advice gang.
Trae

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Trae McCombs
TSR - Sponsored by the Masses. Racing for the hell of it.
Ironman Finisher 2005 -- 14:09:18

"One thing I think I need to maybe stop doing, is riding with the local bike club. These guys are only going 35-40 miles and love to set a grueling pace. (We were doing around 19-20mph avg when I was riding with them). I need to simply go slow... and log the distance."



I disagree. I certainly don't think you ride in a group every ride, but once or twice a week, depending on recovery.

You're biggest limiter is being new. I don't think logging hours at 15 mph is going to do all that much for you. In my opinion, the IM is going to be a test of mental perserverance for you more than physical. In otherwords you are already physically close to being able to finish, riding 10 100 milers at 16 mph or 1-2 isn't going to give you much of a difference in physical performance - so why waste your time and piss off your wife? Do the distance once or twice to know you can cover it, ride once a week at 3-4 hours, and do a group ride as much as you can and still be recovered enough to do the long stuff.

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"What the mind can conceive and believe, the mind and body can achieve; and those who stay will be champions."

I agree with jackattack here, keep riding with the club for now, but in the last 10-12 weeks pre-IM race, you will want to switch over to more tri-specific riding i.e.: time in the aerobars, longer slower rides, etc. Of course you can occasionally skip a club ride and go for a slightly longer ride on your own, maybe an hour longer to start... but the club rides help break up the monotony of training alone and will build your fitness quickly.

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS

jackattack and AndyPants,

Great bits of advice. I can see how trying to stay with the pack, even if I get dropped can only help me mentally. (And if I can manage to stay with them!!!)

I also like the idea of 'Doing the distance so I know I can do it'. That seems like great advice.

Maybe since I've done a 70 miler, next week I should push to an 85 mile ride, and then break a century(100M) the week after that. Then, that would give me about a good 6 week "break" before I had to do a 70mile(4hr) ride according to the schedule. That let's me know a.) I can do the distance but b.) without pissing off my wife. ;)

I really want to get a trainer so I can try and log some time EARLY in the morning. I hate going over 11am on a Saturday with my workouts as I like to spend the rest of the time with my 2 daughters. With the trainer, I could get up, hit it early 4:30am or so, and then be done by 10am. I'm also trying to keep some energy in reserve so I am not just a bump on a log and "hanging around the house" but I can actually play with them.

So... I could go faster on the bike, I could go faster on the run, but I feel it would drain me to the point where I'd be useless the rest of the day. My goal is, do the training, get the health benefits, and then be there for my daughters during the day so we can play! (they are 4 and 2)

Again, some great advice guys, Thanks so much for your time.
Yours,
Trae

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Trae McCombs
TSR - Sponsored by the Masses. Racing for the hell of it.
Ironman Finisher 2005 -- 14:09:18

Good plan, I have a 17mo old daughter and some days I am so cooked I can hardly play with her and I don't like that... I'll be glad once this race is over so I can spend more time with her ;-)

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"How bad could it be?" - SimpleS