Accepting that working full time, being in a relationship, having a kid, and having a social life outside of sports means I just can't hit 100% of my potential was the best thing I ever did. Also, finally admitting to myself that I can't improve swimming, biking, and running all at the same time. It's allowed me to shift several workouts from "must" to "nice" that puts me in a much better head space. That being said...

If you didn't get up so early, could you go to sleep later - and would that make evening workouts more doable? I need a ton of time in the morning to be ready for any hard efforts so mornings I generally reserve for easy, shorter workouts (the stuff that requires little to no mental energy). I don't like midday workouts but in season I block a slightly longer lunch 1-2x times a week - it's the only way I can swim enough when not just maintaining. All that means my "must" or hard workout is left for when I get home and I try to limit that to 45-75min during the week...hopefully I can get that done right away (getting to work early typically means leaving by/before 5) but if not, it takes some mental effort but it's doable after kiddos bedtime.

Midweek I usually go for an 60-90 minutes before work, then 45-60 minutes pool afterwork. Weekends have been the longer 2-3 hour workouts to get between 10-14 hours a week in.

Mondays I take off and usually catch up on my laundry, meal prepping, random house work. I'm looking forward to the break I have planned after my A race in May.

Get to work around 8:30 and leave work around 6:30. So definitely not insane "law" hours by any means (compared to many of my friends who went the corporate law route). In fact, I have a "unicorn" job IMO. I make great money for the low billing requirement and they are all okay with me being the "triathlete" and taking off a Friday here and there to go race across the country.

Nevertheless. I live 3.3 miles from the office. When it was lighter outside, I would do easy runs home from work. It sucked running with a backpack, but once the time change occurs, I'll probably resume that practice again.

Also, there is a treadmill in the basement of our office building. It's not amazing by any means, but I've done a few runs done there. I just hate the treadmill.

The pool hours generally are the big limiter. I can bike/run really any time. My pool's lap swim is 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM and then 7:30 PM to 8:30 PM... So that makes me really do my quality swims at 6. I would generally try to do my rides/runs at 4:45/5 AM. But doing 8x800s on the track to a 20x100m all out set in the pool doesn't do me any favors. In that case, do I try to fit the track session at night? (more of a rhetorical). But this thread has highlighted one thing (which you point out clearly): efficiency. I will definitely start going earlier in the morning and see if that frees me up.

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

Yeah I would look into getting into work earlier so you could leave sooner (assuming that’s a possibility for you). That would help tremendously in getting a evening workout done. Also... what about working through lunch?

In general, there’s ALWAYS a way to fit in training.... sometimes you just need to be creative and/or make sacrifices. If its a priority for you, you will make the time to fit it in.

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blog

Real world stuff example - posted in humor, but real.

On the trainer yesterday after work and the session that I have been using to build base is 85 minutes total. With 10 minutes remaining I had to jump off the trainer, run upstairs and put the Chicken Parmesan that I got ready the night before in the oven, run back down and finish the last 10 minutes. Oh believe me I was thinking it was nuts to jump off with 10 minutes to go, but mentally calculating the amount of time that it takes to heat up the oven so that it would be ready for our rigid dinner time took precedence over my desires.

Dinner was ready on time and in the weeks and months ahead of building base fitness it is better share in duties around the house.

I imagine many of us struggle with being time crunched (with life, work, home), but we do what we gotta do. :-)
Also in reality, I am right on track with training and goals for this time of year. No sense upsetting the wife this early in the year. :-)

I like to sleep so the best schedule I have come up with is usually like this.
07:30: Wake up, walk the dog, eat
~08:20: work (home office, software developer)
~12:00 Workout 1 and after that lunch
~17.00 play time with kid
~19.00 half of dinner and walk the dog
~20.30-21.00 put kid and wife to sleep
~21.30-22.00 Workout 2 and rest of the dinner.

I have tried to wake up early, but that resulted in everyone waking from my alarm clock and grumpy wife ja child. So lunch and night sessions are the only way to train, work and spend time with family.

Hey mate,

I've got a similar schedule to you, here's what I do.

Basically I have 5 slots for exercise.

6am

On my commute in

Lunchtime

Commute back

Evening

I'm the same as you in that I hate that evening session, so I fit in where I can in those other slots.

So Hard bike easy run - I'd do the bike, then get on the train with my run kit, get off with 10k to go and run the rest of the way

Or swim and run - swim AM, take run kit to work and run home

Two hard bikes I may have to do am and pm

But you get the drift. Gym is always lunchtime and am. Hard bike is always am. Hard run is always am or lunchtime.

Sleep is most important, I'm in bed by 10, asleep by 10:30.

You cannot complain about training time if you live 3 miles from work and have normal work hours on top!

The commute savings time compared to the average is nearly an hour per day which is likely your entire training time deficit!

3 miles is also a great run commute distance as you can go short or add more after work. Run commute every day and you literally have your run training almost entirely covered.

Another lawyer here. Litigator, so my schedule is always bouncing around. I did your routine for around 6 months with my first coach, i.e., 2 one hour workouts in the morning. Like you, it required getting up extra early, and it just wasn't sustainable for me.

I'm working with a different coach who takes a less is more approach, and it's been markedly better. I'm not as tired during the day, my workouts are better quality, and I'm faster in all of my events.

I only do 2 one hour workouts two days a week. I have one rest day (Tuesday), and the other two weekdays are either a single one hour workout or a single longer workout of 1.5 hour, typically a bike.

Having a day completely off and then having shorter workouts on two other weekdays has made a huge difference.

I have medium-stress work and long commute. Somehow I'm going the opposite way the majority of people here: most quality workouts are after work. I guess it's a matter of getting used to. I started training in a running club that had evening track sessions.

Usually the schedule looks like this:
Wake up either 6:00am or 5:30 for swim because the pool is 15 min drive away.
6:15am-7:30am 30-60 min run/spin/strengths or 1 hour swim
7:45am-8am leave to work and arrive an hour later (I work on a notebook in the train, so I'm putting usually about 9-10 hours per day of work)
5pm leave work, arrive at home 6:00pm
6:15pm-7:30pm - quality runs or indoor bike sessions
8-10pm dinner, family time
10pm - go to bed.

Weekends usually doing something long or double before 10am-noon. The rest - family time.

This is maximum, which I can't always fill to the brim and still recover. Last winter I was doing 12-14hours (not even during the main season!) following this schedule for months and it was a mistake. This time I'm still not completely out of the hole yet and don't use all timeslots, watching recovery carefully. 6-9 hours/week.

I sometimes also do two workouts a day, but they are separated by a complete rest day before.

My current working hour is 09:30 - 18:30, and on a day with 2 workouts, I may have a morning swim from 06:30 - 09:00 and an evening run from 19:15 - 20:30. My commute time depends on the time of the day if the express bus is available or not and also if I use my motorcycle.

To do one such day, I have to get up at 05:15 and make my breakfast at home, and after finishing my run, I have to make and eat dinner, and do my daily stuff (including making financial and training logs, and preparing for next day's work) and not at least 23:00 I can get on bed, so it is not possible for me to have consecutive days like this. Before this day I get to bed by the latest 21:15 so I can have 8 hours of sleep, and preferably 20:15.

So I consider morning and evening workouts exclusive on consecutive days, i.e. Wednesday morning excludes Tuesday evening.

I'm the same.. it takes me an hour to get the plumbing going and I hate training before I sit on the throne. But mine doesn't always go clockwork so I push through with the training as scheduled anyway. I think you are losing a valuable hour of sleep or training just waiting for nature to phone you up. Your body will get used to it. I'd give that a try (for example, get up at 5pm, start training at 5:15 .. etc. the bm will happen later, the pipes won't get permanently clogged, trust me!)

Also, how many days a week are you doing double sessions? I'd only do back to back sessions if it was bike and run... while other days I'd do swim in the morning, then run/cycle at lunch or evening. Or just a single quality session or rest day. I hate training after work (got zero energy) so now I always plan to start the day with a workout, with a possible second one at lunch ... I know that it might be hard to get a lunch time workout but if you're able to plan the week ahead so that you can do that - it'd be better than forcing everything in the morning. If it's a struggle then the training will not be sustainable.

Get a VASA trainer. 30 mins a day as soon as you wake up

Then coffee and your bike workout

Or put it in your office or downstairs with the treadmill. 30 mins a day gives you 2.5 hours a week. Add in a weekend swim in a real pool

That's not sustainable mate. You may have 1 or 2 good seasons, but will very quickly burn out. I suppose it depends on what you want out of triathlon. Do you still want to be racing in 10 years? If so, you need to find a training structure that doesn't leave you feeling exhausted. If you are brain dead tired, training will get old real quick. What about having certain days when you cram in more hours, So you might have 2 working days when you get up a bit earlier, do 2 sessions, get in 3 hours. The other 3 days are 1 session and you get more sleep and rest. You can go hard at the weekends?

Interesting thread, but cloy wrote all that 1 1/2 years ago...

Oof, I feel you, this is a tough challenge. I have tried a couple of ways. My most successful was when I started consistently incorporating swim and bike workouts into my commute:

• Swim in the morning on the way to work 2-3 days a week. This allowed me to have a workout done and be showered for the workday, and I usually swam for 45 minutes or less so it wasn't ridiculously early. To-go breakfasts were prepared beforehand, coffee made first thing in the morning and was cool enough to drink by the time I was done swimming. I would wake up, pee, dress, and be in the car within 15 minutes. Bag was always ready to go the night before. Swims were done fasted and I would eat/drink coffee after.
• My swim days would be my doubles, and I would run. I prioritized running at lunch, which I was able to do most days I wanted to. On the days I couldn't, I would run right after work from the office or stop and run a trail on my way home. I knew that if I waited until I got home, my odds of doing the run went down drastically (I have two kids).
• Bike commute the other days. I would usually bike 4 miles to the train in the morning, which was thankfully downhill so it was real easy. Then I would bike the 30 or so miles home in the evening and would normally incorporate a workout as best I could. This works great in the summer where I live and we have enough bike infrastructure for it to work well. I would also sometimes add mileage to make this my long ;aerobic workout of the week.

I also tried swimming in the evenings after putting my kids down to bed. This worked ok, but really hindered the quality of my swims as I would frequently get foot cramps within 1500 yards or so if I had run or biked earlier in the day. The nice thing is swimming doesn't get me nearly as amped as running and biking so it was easier to sleep after a late night swim. I have also tried running or doing trainer rides late in the evening but 1) I'm less consistent at doing these at the end of the day, and 2) It's difficult to get a good night's sleep, especially if I needed to do a workout and got the HR up there.


I was also able to barely scrape together a 70.3 plan by swimming two days a week for one of my races. Basically a longer weekend session and a weekday drills session. This did NOT make me a better swimmer, but it did give me the basic ability to get through the swim. That was a bonus race for me and I didn't have any goals other than to do it, so it worked in that situation, but I'm not necessarily recommending it :)

When I was a runner, before crossing over to Triathlon, and before having kids, I would do evening workout. My wife work until about 7PM most nights so I get home or to the track by about 6:00-6:30PM and life was good.

As soon as my kid was born, my evening workouts died. They just didn't work. My family all sleep until about 7AM and I had to be to work by 8:00 AM so with the commute I would be lucky to see them for a few minutes before I left. Then when I got home my kids were be in bed by 7:30 - 8:30 PM so if I went running at 6:00 or 6:30 PM I would be getting home about the time my kids were going to sleep. So rather than ever seeing my kids i started to get up to start workouts at 5-6 AM in the morning. That way i could be home and getting ready for work at 7:00 AM when the rest of the family was getting up and it didn't take anything away from time with them.

I have thought about doing workouts are 9:00 PM at night after the kids are asleep, but that doesn't work. The theory is great but in practice is fails. First I eat dinner at 7:00 PM and a meal 1.5-2hours before a work out not good for me. I do better in the morning when the stomach is light. Those evening workouts resulted is side stiches almost every time for me. Also it was nice to have time after the kids when to sleep every evening to talk to my wife. She wasn't going to get up early in the morning for that so I I worked out at 9:00 it cut into time with her. Also the gyms that I go to are open from 5:00 AM to 10PM. When I am leaving the home at 9:00 to get a swim in that going to be a problem, but leaving at 5AM in the morning works great.

So, there is a reason that everyone does morning workouts. It is just the best way to fit things into a working schedule with a family.

When I crossed over to Triathlon I started to do my two-a-day workouts over my lunch break. That limited me to a 30-35 minute workout but I could swim for 35 minutes for 5 days and that would still give me mornings for cycling and running. Or I could swap a morning run with a long swim and do some 35 minute recovery runs at lunch.

Morning and lunch are NOT the only way to do things. It has works for me though. It doesn't cut into work or family. It does cut into the social life though. Evenings are my social time and instead of staying out to midnight as I could as a younger man I have to be home by 9Pm so I can finish chores around the house and still get to bed at a reasonable time so I cam be up at 5AM the next morning. Most of my fiends are the same way though. They don't plan weeknight activities that will run late anymore. They do things on the weekends.

I work lots of hours, have kids, and other passions. When training for long distance tris, I do one workout a day during the week, and then 2 a day on the weekend. It has worked for me…..I have had success, and stayed healthy for 16 ims, and 30+ marathons. I know most will disagree, but it is not written in stone to do 2 workouts a day. Do what works for you in your life! Enjoy!

Been doing two a day training pretty much forever. Im out running by 6 then its a quick breakfast, shower and an hour drive to my office.
I ride Immediately after arriving home in the evening even though Im usually dog tired. I just change clothes and do it. The fatigue goes away after I swing a leg over my bike.
Get home, eat, shower then its pretty much off to bed to start it all over again the next day...........