Age groupers are novices. It doesn't take anything to be an age grouper. We're shit, through and through. Welcome to the club :)

You are an age grouper.

Sorry I should clarify - from novice to the top 3 in my age group.

3 out of 10

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Brooks Doughtie, M.S.
Exercise Physiology
-USAT Level II

??

In general, I would strongly caution against creating any goals for yourself based around other people's performances. In other words, Top 3 in your AG is relative to how other people perform. Setting goals that way, when you're just getting started seems fraught with pitfalls. It seems better to me to set goals based on your own performance gains and improvements. Even for experienced, seasoned triathletes I still think it's better to frame/judge your goals and expectations around your own progress and performance, rather than hanging everything on something you can't control (how someone else performs, or who shows up that day, etc.).

Unless you already are a decent swimmer (ex-club swimmer or current midrange masters swimmer), expect your triathlon result to drop substantially relative to your duathlon result.

But you're untested, and the world is your oyster; it'll likely take a few years of a lot more than 5hrs/wk of training top get a AG podium in a small local race, but it's eminently possible if you have the genes for it.

Took me about 3 yrs to go from 50% in a tri to the occasional podium in small local races (forget about national-class races, podiums there are by KQ-level guys commonly). In my case though, the bike and run were already near-AG podium level due to my running background (seemed to crossover to cycling super quickly in my case without a ton of training). The swim, though, was a friggin' disaster for me - in the several years it took me to start creeping onto the podium in M35-40 (and now 40-45), I'd say 85% of my improvement was from time gained in the swim, another 25% improvement of that time was from bike gains, and -5 or -10% decrease in run times as I became a more balanced triathlete with less run time training. I trained 8-10hrs/wk during the racing season, 6ish in the offseason.

If you started as a runner, maybe you can share with us your recent times at 5k, 10k, half, marathon, ... and your age.

This will help us evaluate your engine size, and consequently the amount of work needed to be in top 3 of any age group (if any chance).

One part of the answer is easy. Simply lookup prior year split times for each leg of the event you plan to do and compare them to your current paces.

Swim, go fish, got nothing for you.

Bike, I'd say I busted tail in 2 1/2 years to go from 200w to 300w at 20min and that's still not a power that would probably be enough to comfortably run off a bike and "top 3" anything. So.......you're likely years away there.

Run? I'll leave that to others, but that's a longer journey than the bike. Probably gains after the "initial thrust" are at least twice as slow as on the bike. Maybe 3x as slow. That's my experience anyway. I'm only mid 30's but still plenty old enough to be careful to not hurt myself. I almost did this winter.

Have fun, enjoy, and probably slow your roll a little bit and set some goals that are challenging but will give you some short term "wins" and motivation.

I am in a very similar boat that you were in when you first started lightheir....my running translated well to the bike, but I'm a rock in the water. My body can only handle 5-6 hours a week now, but no rush, not trying to get hurt. I just don't want to go a few years into this and see I haven't improved any. Like you said, I did see decreases after the duathlon once I started swimming - that was a pain in the butt. Oh well, onward march...gonna enjoy the journey. I'm in M30-34.

Thanks a ton for sharing your experience.

Get on a bike training plan and get your power up. That alone will be 5 hours / week.

Once your bike power levels off you'll have a much better idea of your podium potential.

Hey Wolf,
My 5k is at 22:30 (7:30ish min/mi) and my 10k is at 48:00 (7:45ish min/mi). Haven't built up to longer distances, since my goal is to be doing sprint tris. I'm 30 years old, male. Thanks for checking out my specs. My bike is at about 17 mph for 12.5 miles, flat course. No power meter yet unfortunately...

A big thanks to everyone else too. Liking the advice of not comparing yourself to others, I'm sure you can really get caught up in that, in the wrong way.

This is great advice and pretty much in line with how I approach my goals. I can sneak above MOP for full and half distance on a reasonable good day and in my local races I often podium in my age group. So I have a general sense of where I might finish. But I've finished out side of podium in my local races even though I had a really good race because other people had better days or faster people showed up. I just to focus on training hard and improving. I'd be pissed of frequently if I approached it differently.

I'd say with those numbers, you've got a tough road ahead unless you target the least competitive races for AG podiums, in the competitive M30-40 AGs. Very unlikely you'll AG podium in M30-35 or M35-40 without a big jump in training and performance.

To put in perspective, I was running 18:50 standalone 5ks and bike training in the 18-21mph range for flat 25ish mile ranges in my very start of triathlon coming from a marathon running background. Those numbers were enough to put me in the top 10% AG run and top 25% AG bike within my first year of triathlon which was as good as the podium guys in the run, and not too far off those guys for the bike in small LOCAL races. (I was nowhere close for national-class races for AG podium.)

The swim though - gawwd awful. I was literally bottom 5%-15% for my first 1.5 yrs in the sport, and I was trying to swim as much as I could and studied all the technique videos, even got some coaching sessions, etc. Took another year to get to 50%, and then 2 more years to get to the top 20%, where I'm pretty much stuck now, but happy with given my limitations of training time and life. I do seem to be on the much-less-talented side of swimming compared to most STers, though so there is hope for you!

In my experience my placements at local tris mirrored my placements in local road races. Didn't start that way initially, but as I became a more well-rounded triathlete, the results came. I came from a running background and could usually place in my age group in small to medium size local races. Have you placed top 3 in your AG in any local road races? If not, there's probably some work to do to place top 3 in your AG in local tris.

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"One does not discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time."

Find smaller races, they are out there

It took me 5 years to get onto a podium where the big guns didn't show up

Splatt: Not yet, and the fact that I have picked up the bike and swim have kind of backtracked me a little.

I got work to do, but I am looking forward to it. And yes, definitely looking to only do the smaller races for the time being.

lightheir: yeah, sounds like I got a few years before I begin seeing the types of results. Going to focus on smaller goals, work my way to the bigger ones that we're talking about...

you're a ways away from a podium. you might snag one based on low/slow turnout at a race, but it'll just be a fluke.

Just concentrate on the process for now, enjoy the training, build up your fitness, enjoy watching your personal times drop. Then eventually in a race you will notice that you missed AG 3rd by 13 seconds, and think you could have gone 14 seconds harder someplace on that course, thats when it starts to get fun.

5 hours is nothing in relation to the guys up on the podium. I was getting AG podiums on about 8-12 hours a week. I didnt get to overall podiums until 16-18 hours a week (local/regional sprint and olys).

I'm afraid improvements will be hard to come by at 5 h a week. I've had many years of fun with triathlon on that level of training, but I sure wasn't improving.

Another way to piece goals together is to understand your usual pool pace and try to match that in open water. If you are not used to / comfortable in open water, that might be something to chase for a bit. I'm 18 years in this sport and still don't actually feel comfortable with contact in open water, still can't swim straight worth a damn.

I hope you're working in regular, short, runs off the bike to get used to that transition? When I was completely whinging my training, I had a tough time adjusting to running after a hard cycling effort. So another measure for you could be how comfortable you get there.

Anyway, I had to hit twice your current training volume to see gains in my overall / AG standing. My 1st AG podium came after completing an iron distance race, by finding a super small local sprint race, where I could take all that fitness and "lay down the hammer" w/ reckless abandon. But peaking at 17 h a week is kinda overkill for general sprint tri participation, so you may not want to go that route.

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To breathe, to feel, to know I'm alive.

Thanks Tsunami/tfleeger.

I'm going to get my swimming up and overall training volume up slowly. I can see the consensus about 5 hours a week not being enough. I have even noticed lately that when planning my upcoming training week, that 4-5 hours is starting to fill up my planner pretty quickly. I feel the need that more hours need to be put in, in the right ways of course. I'll make sure to enjoy myself though, itd be stupid to burnout...I love this stuff.

Luckily I have little to no issues from the bike to the run. I mean I get tired due to the bike, but nothing like what I have heard others describe. I have noticed the importance though of doing both long and short distance training. I got caught up in the long distance stuff for a little and saw the need for mixing it up regularly.

I have been doing triathlons only for a couple years and I was kind on the same boat you are not long ago, I am 44 and started at 41 with almost no athletic background, I did a duathlon at first and I sucked on the bike so much I started training on the bike a lot harder, then I did a sprint tri and I sucked at swimming so much I started swimming three times a week... I guess what I am saying it is that there is something to be learned from "losing". In my experience your AG results are not a good way of measuring your progress because they depend more in who shows up to the event that your overall fitness, where I live I can get 3rd places on my AG on small local races but if I travel to Arizona or Colorado the whole scene changes, same personal fitness level, different results. In my case I try to bring my 5K time down a minute or my average speed in the bike up another mile by the end of the season, I feel that it is something that I can "control" rather that whatever everyone else is doing.

I noticed the biggest gains from extending my long rides and runs to 2-4 hours and 90 minutes respectively. When I moved from 5 hours/week to 8-10 hours/week of training, I went from top 25-50% to borderline AG podium for local races (getting a tri bike helped too). I agree that my placement is very dependent on who shows up. If a race hosts multiple distances with a diluted field, I'm much more likely podium than when there's only one race distance on the day.

FYI, my baseline fitness was a little better than your starting point. In my first triathlon, I biked 18 mph for 11 flat miles and ran 7:00 pace for the 5k @ 29yo. My swim is still awful.

Like others have said, don’t worry about podium for now.
Much of this depends on long hard work, background in the sports, and natural talent.
You will find that many in the top end of age group were stars in one or more sports in their youth and college years.

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Team Zoot So Cal