TXAgeGrouper wrote:
Ian, I don't disagree that a coach would be beneficial but I'm not sure the cost/benefit is justifiable at this point for me. I plan on dialing up my biking significantly as I get about 3 months out and going back to my original question, I was looking to get a coach's (or someone who has more knowledge than I do about training) opinion if what I'm doing made sense or should be altered. In terms of my race goal, it's to have the overall best time. I've somewhat conceded that my swim won't be great and therefore I don't think putting the majority of my training time into swimming to potentially save 5-10 mins makes sense. I'll make sure I'm fit enough to finish the swim and not be completely cooked, and then try have have a strong bike and run.
ianpeace is a really well known, very experienced triathlon coach who has coached many AGers and world-class elites successfully. I think he would qualify as the type of person you want input from, and sounds like he gave it to you.
His advice is literally spot-on, as I'll repast word for word:
"To answer this question directly - no, I would argue it's not a good idea for training for your triathlon, and it's not a good idea if you were just training for a marathon. In order to address how your training should be rolled out a coach would need to first identify your goal for this triathlon. "
And to make it even more apparent why he'd say something like that, quite a few sub 2:45 marathon runners who make the jump to IM get crushed on the run, with 3:45+ hr IM runs. Obviously this has nothing to do with their lack of running prowess/background, and everything to do with overbiking for their bike fitness, and just as importantly, underestimating how much of a toll a 80-120 min swim takes on them with their lack of swim background and huge underemphasis on swimming. Going in with poor swim fitness doesn't just lose you 10-15mins on the swim, it loses you 3-5x that in the back end of the race.
I'll also recomend you do what Tom_hampton recommends above - get ANY plan (or better yet, several of them - you can buy 3-4 books on Amazon with full IM plans for like $80 total) and pick one that suits you ability and schedule. If your training looks really wacky compared to their recs (am I'm sure it does, with 3 hard tempo runs per week which NO plan I've seen recommend), you probably should reconfigure.