From 11:55 to 11:00. What does it take?

Triathlon Forum
1

I did my first Ironman at Ironman Arizona in November last year and finished in 11:55. Before that, I had about 2 years of HIM experience, the first year with very poor training and the second with good training.

I did a lot (a LOT) of long & slow distance work for IMAZ (I was on the Mark Allen Online program) but am now doing Endurance Nation’s “advanced” HIM plan for Wildflower, Auburn, and Vineman 70.3 in hopes of eventually breaking 5:00 for a HIM. My Wildflower last year was 5:30 but included a poor swim performance that I still can’t believe I put out.

My IMAZ race went like this:

Swim: 1:14 — This was surprisingly good for me because I’m a terrible swimmer. I have good form, I’m told, but it’s taking me a long time to get faster. At the moment, I can swim 0:45 50s on the minute or 1:40 100s on the two minutes until the sun goes down, but I’ve been slacking and only swimming masters 2x a week.

Bike: 5:52 — I paced this really, really easy. Every lap I took a 5 minute break, as well. Although my bike is my strongest of the three sports, I paced it very conservatively knowing that the run would make or break me.

Run: 4:39 — I felt great, actually, for a large part of the run. I had mad blisters, though, because my socks fell out of my transition bag (I assume) and some incredibly kind soul let me use their backup socks which, unfortunately, rubbed my feet raw. I spent 10 minutes at a medical tent waiting before I could get some duct tape put on the main blister. I finished the run feeling strong and kind of wishing I had pushed harder. I’ve since been working a lot on my run and currently run 5k time trials at 20:52 (down from 21:33 two months ago).

Next year, I’d like to try my hand at another Ironman (perhaps Arizona or Vineman). What would it take to get my time down to 11:00, flat? Is that an unreasonable goal? Perhaps something like 1:10/5:30/4:20? Or, hell, should I aim even higher? 10:30?

Edit: It’s also worth mentioning that I’m 24 now, so I’ve graduated from the 18-24 AG to the big ugly 25-29AG.

2

I’m currently in 2:05-2:10 oly form and hoping to finish next IM in sub 12.

Think it depends more on how much loooong stuff you’ve done during training than how fast you can nail that 5km TT (unfortunately).

Would be interesting if someone has comparative times between oly, HIM and IM.

3

2:10? Wow – I’m still languishing in the 2:20-2:30 range (although I haven’t done an Olympic race since the middle of last year). I finished 7th of 27 in my AG at IMAZ when in short races I’m usually middle-to-front-of-middle-of-pack. I guess I’m not built for short races!

I’m curious if there’s other people out there like that—mediocre at short distances but much better at long distances.

4

I went from 12:19 (with 2 flats) at IM Florida in Nov 2006 (1:06, 6:20, 4:45), my first IM, to 10:48 (1:00, 5:42, 3:58) at IMAZ in April 2008, my second.

The first one I ‘followed’ the Be Ironfit book by Don Fink plan. I say followed because I never did any of the interval/z4 stuff on the bike, just did the hours prescribed. And I started to do the speed work/z4 stuff running until I injured myself (achilles tendinitis), then just did the time prescribed, managing the pain/injury. I did all the workouts for the time prescribed, but never did much speed work in the last 2 months.

The second one i had a coach and included more speed work, tempo training, and power work.

For the swim, I had my stroke looked at and dropped about 6 minutes going from an ocean wetsuit swim to a lake wetsuit swim. I did a little more swimming before IMAZ, but most of the swimming was the same, 2-3 masters workouts a week and a long ocean swim or two forcing myself to hang on the feet of people faster than me.

For the bike, I did trainer workouts for intervals, hilly rides to build strength, and long rides with some tempo and hills in them.

For the run, I did hill workouts/track workouts every week (alternating hill one week, track the next). Also some tempo sections in the long runs.

I also weighed 10-12 lbs less for the second IM and was injury free for the second (for the training and the race), where the first I was battling a bad case of Achilles tendinitis, that I knew would have me shuffling after 2 hours of the run from the pain.

The first IM I had no real pacing plan, the second one i had a very specific pacing plan dividing the bike and run into thirds and going easy/moderate/hard. I negative split every leg of IMAZ.

5

sub 12? I’m a 2:10 Olympic’er and a 9:49 IM’er. You underestimate yourself.

6

I went from 12:53 to 10:47. It took cooler weather, better nutrition, and much better bike fitness (even if I had significantly worse swim fitness).

I’m not designed for hot ironmans. I can admit that. If there’s a huge difference between short race results and long ones I would look at pacing, nutrition, and if you’ve done the long work. It sounds like you have done the work though.

Dan
www.aiatriathlon.com

7

sub 12? I’m a 2:10 Olympic’er and a 9:49 IM’er. You underestimate yourself.
9:49 is awesome!! Doing IM in a month and race strategy will be for a 11:30 (1:10+6:00+4:20). On oly, it is usually 21:30+1:05+0:40.

8

sub 12? I’m a 2:10 Olympic’er and a 9:49 IM’er. You underestimate yourself.
9:49 is awesome!! Doing IM in a month and race strategy will be for a 11:30 (1:10+6:00+4:20). On oly, it is usually 21:30+1:05+0:40.

For me…
Swim 1:12 swim with a best olympic swim of 28:20
Bike 5:4x(3 times) with a best olympic bike of 1:07:30
Run: 3:50 with a best olympic run of 42:22
IMLP06 PR 11:07 best olympic 2:23

You time goals are way too conservative, unless you are setting the bar low so the goal is easy to achieve.

For my first IM I told everbody(family and friends) 12 hours yet I thought I could achieve near 11. I finished in 11:45.

I think you should easily have a sub 11 in you if the weather meets your liking. I predict 1:00+5:40+3:50+0:15 in Ts for a 10:45. Let us know how you do.

9

May be obvious, but don’t take breaks on the bike. how many loops in IMAZ (2, 3?) that saves 10-15 minutes right there.

I’ve only raced one IM but here is my advice to train and race:

Ride…ALOT.
Get skinny (relative)
Don’t be afraid to have an “aggressive” (relative) time goal…IF you trained for that time goal. Oh yeah, and keep it to yourself.

I’m a believer that your body will carry you if you’ve gotten your body ready to carry you. Sure, you could have GI problems, whatever. Big deal. It’s not like you’re trying to win the thing (or even qualify with the times your looking at). So dream a little and go for it.

to give you example (granted, it’s only one race) but I wanted to do 1:02, 5:30, and 3:30 at IMWI in 07. I did 1:04, 5:30, 3:36. It was under good conditions, but it was no accident. I trained to hit those numbers. You can train to hit yours.

10

2:10? Wow – I’m still languishing in the 2:20-2:30 range (although I haven’t done an Olympic race since the middle of last year). I finished 7th of 27 in my AG at IMAZ when in short races I’m usually middle-to-front-of-middle-of-pack. I guess I’m not built for short races!

I’m curious if there’s other people out there like that—mediocre at short distances but much better at long distances.

My best Olympic is a 2:22 on a hilly bike/flat run.
I went 10:29 this past summer at Beach2Battleship.
I biked a LOT last summer and I ran at least 5 times a week last year to get to that point. I feel I had a 3:30-3:34 run in me but eeked out a 3:55. So it is doable.

11

Rather than give you my personal analog, I’ll give you my homogenized view. To get from 12 to 11 hours at the IM distance takes a much stronger bike leg. The saying goes, you need to develop a nuclear arsenal for the bike and then never use it. In order to produce results in the IM level, you need to be able to run the whole mary, which requires you to get much better at cycling. In addition to long rides you need to be throwing up weeks of strong road milaage (~ 200), with a few weeks of spike training. Intervals are a must on pretty much ever ride. Bricks to follow to learn proper pacing. Then it’s just fuel and execute. I think Going Long would be a good read for you at this stage in your development.

12

What it took for me to go from 11:30 LP07 to 10:40 LP08 on a much harder day was training with power using an EN plan. But then you can read all that and many other similar stories on the EN forum.

However, from reading your story you may be able to drop an hour with just better execution. Never heard anyone suggest taking 15 minutes worth of “breaks” during an IM bike leg and having socks is just plain helpful in not getting “mad” blisters;-)

13

It is not difficult, but it does take some dedication. Between me and 3 other locals I trained with, all of us finished IM CDA 2007 between 10:35 and 11:10 or so. Within those times, no splits were stellar or poor. Three of us were 1st-timers & capable of sub-5 hr. halfs. The fastest guy had more experience and is faster (4.5-hr. half)
Looking back, I would ballpark training at 10 to 20 hours a week for 4 months, with 20 being a “very big” week and 8-10 as a “rest week.” So 12-16 hours was typical from March through May. The breakdown was also what you would expect: 50% biking; 30% run & 20% swim. In total, we managed maybe 4 or 5 weekend rides of 80 to 110 miles, 4 or 5 long runs of 15 to 20 and only a few swim workouts over an hour. Beyond those, most midweek biking was just a couple hours at a time (or less), runs were 5-10 & swims 45-minutes or so. Training paces were 17.5-19 mph for extra long rides (depending on hills and conditions) and we all run 8-9 minute miles 80-90% of the time. If all of this sounds doable, then so is 11 hours if the conditions are favorable. Good luck!

14

From my legs to your eyes… My first IM was CDA '07 (1:14, 6:02, 4:14) plus transitions
for an 11:49 Total time. IMAZ in 2008 was (1:01, 5:37, 4:04) for a 10:52. I know just what you have ahead of you.

For both races, I followed a coaches plan of about 10 hrs /week, with peak weeks of maybe 14 hours, and I’m
45 years old. Equipment was basically the same, although I got a wetsuit that fit me (accounting for most of
the improved swim split) and faster wheelset.

We also seem fairly similar in that I was scared of the distance my first IM and went really conservative
in almost all phases…despite over a dozen 10+ hour events in the past (double centuries and Ultramarathons plus a
few 24 hour MTB events as relays).

For my second race, I was relaxed and knew that I could push a little harder all through the course without a meltdown.
You detailed 30 minutes easy of wasted time…once you learn how to fuel your body there is no need for rest breaks
even in an IM so you are halfway to cutting an hour right there. Cut out the breaks, toss an extra pair of your favorite
socks in your transition bag and put a little more grunt on the bike and you’ve got it.

I have heard many other stories about people who have cut an hour from IM#1 to IM#2…it sounds like you have learned
a lot about yourself in the first race and it seems likely that you’ll nail it next time around.

Good luck!

.

15

Thanks for the replies, everyone! As it stands, it looks like there’s nothing really special I have to do to get to 11:00. I just need to push all three events in training like I have. I’ll probably go with the Endurance Nation plans because I’ve really been having fun with their HIM plan. It’s nice being prescribed lots of fast stuff instead of endless hours of slow riding. I think either method works, but EN’s method just works with less time and more fun.

As for weight, I’m 150 at 5’9", so I’m already on the skinny side. Think Frank Schleck, not Lance Armstrong. :slight_smile:

I knew that my rest breaks on the bike at IMAZ were probably needless, but I did them anyways because my #1 goal that day was to have a good run and because I had never done an IM before, I had to take it super conservatively. Now that I know what I can do, however, I’ll take more risks at IM #2.

I’ve accepted that I will never be a strong swimmer. The number of hours it would take to get me to 1:05 or 1:00 is just not worth the 5-10 minutes I’d save. Maybe if I ever get close to breaking 10 hours at an IM, I would give it a go, but otherwise I’d much rather bike and run outdoors than stare at a black line at the bottom of a pool for hours on end. Looking at IM results, it seems like there’s plenty of sub-11 hour guys with swims far worse than mine.

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Hang in there, I tell clients it takes about 3 years of consistent IM Training to get it right. It is a different beast to figure out. But nothing works better than a consistent training base over time. Unfortunately, I really feel there is no short cuts or secrets just consistency and you have time you are young!

17

Tyson,

Some good, some could be better advice here. I strongly encourage you to ask us, and the team, in the Endurance Nation forums for our input. That’s what you’re paying for after all. In addition, proper race execution is huge at the IM distance. Free speed. There is a lot the team can teach you.

18

Rich is your coach and you ask here?!?!

There’s your problem. Rich is an excellent coach. Get your butt off this tri soap opera forum and work with your coach!

19

I bought the plan but couldn’t afford to pay the monthly fee for the EN forums (which I rarely ever visited, anyways), so I’m no longer an EN member, per se. All forums are marked “private” and I can’t see them when I log in. That’s why I asked here. :slight_smile:

20

I bought the plan but couldn’t afford to pay the monthly fee for the EN forums (which I rarely ever visited, anyways), so I’m no longer an EN member, per se. All forums are marked “private” and I can’t see them when I log in. That’s why I asked here. :slight_smile:
Ah…very well :slight_smile:

The Book, EN IM Racing System, Parts 1-4, Fan us on Facebook, join the group for your race that we have created there. Then come to our pre-race talk at your race (we go to all of them). We’ll get your head screwed on straight.