On the bike especially, time and perceived effort tend to be much better to keep track of than distance, where wind, road conditions, bike type, group rides etc can change distance a lot for no change in effort.

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Kat Hunter reports on the San Dimas Stage Race from inside the GC winning team
Aeroweenie.com -Compendium of Aero Data and Knowledge
Freelance sports & outdoors writer Kathryn Hunter

Have 2 IMs and one HIM under my belt training by time/effort so cannot really compare it against using distance as a measure. Having said that my thinking has always been that many of longer distance plans are based on time/effort because they are often tied to HR zones and the goal of avoiding injury leading up to the event whereas if measuring the run by distance (for example) I personally would not be as disciplined staying to a HR I want if I needed to go out and knock out a 10 miler...I'd focus on the 10 miles and everything else would be secondary. I could go too fast, strain something, I could be just fine and find that after 10 miles I would still need to knock out another 10 minutes compared to a time plan I might have used, etc.

That is not to say that HR is the only way to train but it does seem to be the most popular/supported for us age groupers.

From my experience I think you'll see the distances you're putting in against the effort (HR for run, power/virtual power/whatever for bike) and be pleasantly surprised by how that distance grows under the same effort over time.

If memory serves there are some good arguments for the physiology of it all as well (something to the tune of if you're running 2 hours at Z2 it's not that taxing to run 3 hours at it in a race etc..it's more about the adaptations by sticking to the plan leading up to the race). Before I talk way out of school on that topic hopefully Desert Dude or others with the training history can chime in.

Starting my plan for Steelhead tomorrow and doing time/effort again for what it's worth.

Also worth mentioning is I race for the fun of it..you will not find me on the podium but rather having a beer watching the podium..if you're looking at these races competitively I thought I should mention that.

I'd vote for starting out training by time rather than distance, specifically to make sure that you are giving yourself sufficient recovery time between workouts. Your distance covered for a given time should increase as you get in better shape. Of course everyone is going to be different in how they respond to their training, so you should be monitoring and adjusting as you go along to make sure you are prepared to cover the race distances by the time you do the race.

Good luck,
Mark

I've no idea how slow I am as I do everything indoors on a trainer with power and don't measure distance

I think time for the bike and time and / or distance for the run are both fine

I extend my long run by 10-15 mins / week then cut back and won't run more than 3 hours once irrespective of distance covered

Bike is all time at a percent of ftp

The only thing that I would add is that if you're going to base training on time, then you need to base it off of realistic race times. Too often I see people who race a 16 hour race reference the training of someone who races many hours faster. For example, someone who is shooting for a 7.5 hour bike in an Ironman reference an article of someone saying their longest ride is only 5 hours (but race day ride sub 5). Or referencing Potts who's longest run is 2 hours, even though that's likely a 20 mile run for him, when that person will barely get 12 miles in that amount of time. Just make sure the prep matches the race.

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