One random person's opinion: you should target hours instead of miles.

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Dimond Bikes Superfan

Yeah thats kind of why I asked that question to begin with, although I see more merit with time vs distance in biking or running as biking gives more variability with speed and the outcomes can be much different versus running.

And why 200, why not 150, or 225? What is it about 200 that is the "standard" that has been set?

Is that what the OP has seen through various different athletes to respond to best?

I guess that leads me to another question, is this a good blanket challenge for all to get a good training response out of, or just their personal opinion.

It was a nice round number when I was typing that post and far exceeds what the typical triathlete ran/still runs per month.

I've gotten fantastic results with athletes doing blocks of time at significant'y higher mileage. For instance I've seen people go from high 36 off the bike to high 33 off the bike from one season to the next. That's a game changer and race winning time drop. I've seen people drop 30-40 minutes off their IM run time, sometimes being the fastest runner in their age group by 5-15 min. hardly anyone has gotten injured when I get to control everything and most people avg'd 4-8 min faster in their half IM run splits through the season vs previous season run times

Training works. volume works. More is more.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

I see, but what about the previous questions I asked earlier....I just never got a response from them, feel free to pass on those already answered

Looking at the math of all this I have a few questions....

200 miles of running at an average pace of 9:00/mile is 30 hours per month, or 7.5 per week (just running). Given many amateur athletes highest volume weeks in the year might be 12 on the low end, up to 16-20 on the high end, is this a proper progression building in during the dark, cold, winter months? With 4x sessions of swim, bike added in plus 7.5 hours of running this build will get athletes to a minimum of 13.5 hours if they do 45 minute sessions of swim/bike added in.

How does one incorporate this into their week, with a 45 hour work commitment that has them on their feet and very active during the day working split shifts of 8-10 hours/day over a 10-14 hour period w/o commuting time factored in?

Do you consider treadmills to be incorporated into this?

How does one add in 4x/swims per week, when a 45-60 minute swim takes about 2 hours from leaving house/work to pool and back? Do you sacrifice a 25 minute minimum run to get this extra swim session in?

Would you recommend this for someone who has a previous month record of 120 miles but ZERO injury history? Any recs on running surfaces during the week, especially being in a northern snowing climate for not 6-10 weeks?

Why long run up to 2 hours? What's the value in a 2 hour long run versus 3 hours of running within a 12-24 hour time period?

What is your basic percentage of intensity distribution of run in a week? Based off HR, pace, or RPE?

Is this practical going into their first race of the season in May?

How does age factor into this. Would you chance this for 20 y/o m/f vs 40 vs 50, 60?

I don't disagree with anything you say, but I see this as borderline over the top of what many amateurs can practically do with the addition of life stress balanced into the equation.

What's the mileage in comparison for something like this in swimming and biking? If running is 200 miles a month biking must be like 2k

A lot of your questions that you asked fall under personal coaching. I can answer those questions but we'd need to move it off line.

Treadmills are fine

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

I like running.

I like really long runs

A two hour run equals 20km pretty easy running. That means 10km per day the rest of the week with 1 day off. That doesn't seem onerous on its own. Two 15km runs and two days off even.

With bike and swim it gets harder to schedule.

With bike swim and job even harder.

With bike swim job and family....damn near impossible.

In the snowy north it would require a treadmill I think.


I do see the benefits of it for sure. That's a lot of endurance points.

If you are a really good swimmer and can go into winter maintenance that would be good.

Ok, this is the last time I'm going to bump this thread unless someone has a question.

My previous best HIM run was 1:50. I started the full on ass challenge in October. Got to 50mpw by mid December and have been there since.

Yesterday at Galveston I ran 1:32 and won my age group.

Thank you desert dude!!

Congratulations! In addition to the 50 mpw how much swimming and biking are you getting in?

I don't know if I've posted previously, but I'm going to see if I can hold 50 for the next four weeks. I easily hit 45mpw, but getting in the extra 5 is actually kind of hard. I'm at 6x a week now... should I bump up to 7 or 8?

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

Thanks!

When I was building mileage I took my swim down to twice a week and bike down to 2-3 times a week. Once I got to 50mpw for a few weeks I went back to my normal 3x/w swim and 4x/w bike.

What does your week look like?

For 50 I was on a barryp 5/10/15 base, but when I could I added mileage to the easy 5 mile runs bumping them up to as much as 8.

Can you add 1-2 miles to 2-3 easy runs? That's only an extra 15 minutes on a run. That's probably easier than finding time to add an additional run.

Hey Sean what a race brother!!! Congrats!!! Were you using any certain plan on TrainerRoad or just picking certain workouts? Congrats again.

Thanks Adam!

I did the Oly base plan when I was building my run volume then moved onto the HIM build and specialty plans. I did the high volume build and the medium volume specialty. The only reason I didn't do the high volume specialty plan was they have a lot of 2hr rides during the week and I can't pull that off. I ride before work so 1.5hr is max I can do. I did add longer outdoor rides on the weekend than they had in the medium volume plan (in place of the ladder workouts) to compensate. The one big thing was I always tried to do the tempo brick work outside on my tribike. Otherwise I did all of the training on my road bike on the trainer.

Can you tell me what exactly you did?

Ive been building since feb for my 50mpw and last week was my first 50mpw. My legs are toast. Im also in TR build plan.

Tuesday thursday Friday saturday are bike with 8k run
Wednesdays are 16k run
sundays are 24k run
mondays are 8k run with swim
I swim 2-3 more a week but when I can cause of my work schedule.

Thanks and congrats on your AG win!

At risk of being shot down I will have a crack at answering some of these. I will consider myself educated if I do get shot down though -

'200 miles of running at an average pace of 9:00/mile is 30 hours per month, or 7.5 per week (just running). Given many amateur athletes highest volume weeks in the year might be 12 on the low end, up to 16-20 on the high end, is this a proper progression building in during the dark, cold, winter months? With 4x sessions of swim, bike added in plus 7.5 hours of running this build will get athletes to a minimum of 13.5 hours if they do 45 minute sessions of swim/bike added in. ' - It depends in reality. Do you want to improve your run or not? Sticking with around the 10% rule, backing off where you need too, slowing down where you need to, I'd argue most can get there with the correct discipline and right plan.

How does one incorporate this into their week, with a 45 hour work commitment that has them on their feet and very active during the day working split shifts of 8-10 hours/day over a 10-14 hour period w/o commuting time factored in? ' - Again down to the individual. From a personal perspective, I use my lunch hour at work as productively as possible for triathlon training. I will on occasion run to the pool on a Saturday morning, and will on occasion run off the bike. Long runs are performed on a Thursday night when my son has gone to bed. I endeavour to eat as a family, help with the bedtime, and then my wife knows Im out for the rest of the evening and she can catch up on her soaps.

Do you consider treadmills to be incorporated into this? - Sure, its running isnt it?

How does one add in 4x/swims per week, when a 45-60 minute swim takes about 2 hours from leaving house/work to pool and back? Do you sacrifice a 25 minute minimum run to get this extra swim session in? - You working on your run or the swim? Can you run to the pool? DD said it, this is where personal coaching plays a big part. For me, schedule and prioritisation is where a good coach earns his money. A lot of us, for the most part know what can make us faster, its how that what is built into our weeks thats key from a coaching perspective.

Why long run up to 2 hours? What's the value in a 2 hour long run versus 3 hours of running within a 12-24 hour time period? - Probably less than you think. Look at the bigger picture. There are some critics of mileage chasing, but, put simplistically, you get fitter by stressing the body, you either do that by running more, or by running faster. Its probably safer to run more, speed can be built in after. You dont nessacarily need to run faster in training to run faster when racing. The premise of this thread is based on getting your monthly mileage up, 2 hours straight or 1.5 + 0.5, wont make too much of a difference in the grand scheme of things.

Speaking from personal experience, I put some big miles in over winter 2015/2016, and was probably at my best running I have ever been. All easy miles, but I was continually in the high 40s to mid 50s. This year, I've left it late, and spent more time on the bike in the winter. Guess what, bikings up, runnings down!

Thank you!

So you are biking 4x per week? And have 3-4 swims a week too? I'm impressed that you built up to 50mpw while keeping those constant, no wonder your legs are toast!

I started at 30mpw in mid October and built to 50 by mid December. Prior to this my running was inconsistent during the summer and I only averaged about 20mpw (was doing cycle focus), in the winter/spring I was consistently at 40.

During the build from 30 to 50 I only prioritized running. I cycled 1-2 times a week and swam 1-3 times a week as I could. Once I got to 50mpw for a couple of weeks and was handling it well, only then did I increase my biking back up to 3-4 times a week.

The 1-2 cycles were usually a VO2 trainer road workout early in the week and a 50-60 mile ride with my cycling club on the weekends. Some weeks I only managed the VO2 workout and some I only managed the group ride. Some weeks I substituted a 1 hr endurance ride for the VO2 if my legs felt bad.

When I was ready to ramp back up the cycling, that's when I started the HIM high volume build plan. I was pretty discouraged when the FTP test to start that plan I completely died 8 minutes in and estimated my FTP to be 20w lower than it used to be. I sucked it up and got to work. By the end of build I got those 20w back. It was probably just my legs being shot from the stress of all the extra running, and less cycling.

Once I was at 50, my weeks generally looked like this:

M: AM swim, 5 mile recovery run at lunch
T: AM trainerroad VO2, lunch 10 mile easy run
W: AM swim, 5 mile recovery run at lunch
TH: AM trainerroad (either endurance or over/unders depending on week), lunch 10 mile easy run
F: AM swim or trainerroad endurance, then either trainerroad brick workout or 5 mile easy run
S: Either trainerroad brick workout or long ride
S: 15 mile long run

To give some perspective on the pace of the recovery runs, my marathon pace now is probably between 6:30-6:45. If my legs feel bad I still run those at 9-9:30/mile.

At first I think it was important for me to have those easy days on MW. Once I started adding some tempo to one of the easy runs, I had to move those to Wednesday (when trainerroad has the tempo scheduled). Then a while later I started adding some different speed/hill stuff to the other easy run on Thursday lunch runs.

To add even more miles some weeks I would add 2-3 miles onto the recovery runs and got close to 60 several weeks doing that.

I hope this helps, keep asking questions if you have them.

Could be a proper build up for some and not for others.
13.5h isn't a lot of training. Even for most triathletes and especially for the pointy end athletes, most with professional careers/kids/a wife/dogs/laundry/dishes that I typically work with.

Your question gets into the realm of what can work for me, it's not a general question that will benefit everyone it's a specific question. I suggest you re-read the posts I made early in the thread to better grasp the concept of the challenge.


This is a coaching question specific to your situation. For that I suggest working with a coach who can get to know your specifics and you two can come up with a plan. Or do a consult with a coach to have them answer your specific questions.

Treadmills are awesome tools, even though I've got groomed trails < 6 min run from my door, I still use the treadmill near weekly. If you search my posts, you'll see I'm a big proponent of treadmills and practice(d) what I preach. There's your winter solution.

In fact I'm heading to my fav treadmill after I type this, then going to the pool to do some more product testing for Kiwami.

This is a coaching question specific to your situation. See the above answer. It seems that you really need to talk with a coach. My take is that you're having a hard time reconciling the concept of a block of specific training focused on 1 thing vs incorporating this into your regular triathlon training.

2h for aerobic development. for most of the athletes I coach, 90min is no big deal, 2h is a bigger deal.

It depends.

There is a reason why you do this in the off season. If you want to run fast & race fast in May this, as Sean H, among others has shown, is practical.



From your questions I have a few take aways

1. you aren't grasping the concept of the challenge. I'd respectfully ask that you go back and read the original posts, and there are 4 or 5 iirc where I talk about grasping the concept behind the challenge, what it's designed to do, when/how to implement it.

2. There is a difference between doing a focused block on something and a more balanced tri training program. There is a time/place for a focus block and time/place for more balanced training and a time/place for lopsided but yet somewhat balanced training. It might behoove you to discuss your particular situation with a coach to help you structure things short and long term

3. You're stuck in a box with regards to your thinking about how/when to train. You situation is really no different than other people's situations that I and other coaches deal with on a daily basis. Weird hours, demanding job, family, dog/cats/kids/laundry/dirty car/grass that needs mowing etc. You may just need help seeing outside the box you're in to see the possibilities of when and where you can do things differently.

4. It can be borderline over the top for some and well under the borderline for others. You're taking your situation and applying it to triathletes in general.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Thanks for your reply.

So u started in October and completed the challenge in Feb/March? What sort of tempo mins/distance did you start with? And you mentioned another speed work during the week. Was it track reps?
Was the 1:52 half marathon open or HIM?

Ive been doing sweet spot base since Jan and now on my second in HIM build. When i say toast i mean its heavy to start but when im running im okay. Like last night i did phoenix 90mins tempo with trainer road and today my legs felt heavy but ran 16k (10miles) the same pace as everyday. I also run only on treadmill for family and time reason.

Yes I started ramping up the mileage in October. Got to 50mpw in mid December and kept it there until tapering for the race Sunday (3 weeks out 40 miles, 2 weeks out 30 miles). I should note that I did have some recovery weeks every 3-4 weeks where I only did 40 miles per week.

The 1:50 was my best HIM run, did it twice. Had never run a standalone HM prior. In Feb after I had already noticed significant aerobic improvement in my run I ran a solo half marathon in 1:25:56 or something like that and I paced way too slow to start. I figure with better pacing and race environment I was good for 2-3 min faster.

Tempo I started out with 2 miles within the easy run, then built it up to 4-5 miles. Also did tempo off the bike sometimes when trainerroad had it scheduled.

Speed/hills, the only hill I have is a .2 mile diagonal up a levee. It's about 2.5 miles over to the levee. I'd run over there. Sprint up it 5-6 times then run back to work. Other speed stuff I did was 4 x 0.5 miles, or 2 x 1 miles. These were all within an 8-10 mile easy run. Not on the track, but balls to the wall.

Thanks for answering my questions!
Ive followrd your IG accnt

Hey brian I have a question for you.
My runs are limited to treadmill 98% of the time cause of time and family restrictions. Am I missing any important stuff by running on TM? I am currently doing your challenge. I also add some hills on some runs. I use a garmin footpod to keep my distance close to accurate. Thank you

No prob, good luck with it!

What is your handle?

Treadmills are fine. They need to be between 1-1.5% to mimic normal outside neuromuscular motor patterning.

For instance the woodways I use 1.1-1.2% seem to feel like running outside. 1.5% feels uphill and 1% feels off compared to outside.

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Brian Stover USAT LII
Accelerate3 Coaching
Insta

Thanks very much Brian!