I’ve been racing since 2013. I’m still pretty young. I thought the only way to get fast was through as much volume as possible - 2 sessions a day, 5+ hour rides every week. Whatever. You all know the story. I got moderately fast for an amateur. 4:10 70.3 PR?
I’ve stepped away from that focus a bit. Shifted to one session a day, only go to the pool 2x a week (compared to slogging through 4 sessions at least).
But… I’m not that much slower. In fact, I PRed a 13.1 (1:21) earlier this year. I also PRed my Olympic distance (2:01). I blew up completely for the only 70.3 I’ve attempted this year due to a number of factors outside my control, and I’m racing IMFL in November.
While I know the KQ is a lost cause (compared to other guys I know who are absolutely training the house down), but… is there a shot I can go sub-10 at IMFL on a schedule that doesn’t involve doing two-a-days all year long?
Has anyone else seen gains with less training? Just kind of surprised.
For context: 3 bikes a week - 2 medium-ish sessions and a super spicy 70 mile group ride on Saturday. 3 to 4 runs a week - dedicated track session, a long run, and maybe some speed work off the bikes. Swim? Eh. Haven’t lost much compared to when I was swimming 15k a week.
What you are now benefiting from is the base that has been built up with years and years of that volume. Everyone is a bit different, but roughly, after about 5 - 6 years of reasonably good volume, the need to keep maintaining that exact volume does diminish.
Generally with PR’s of 2:01/Olympic and 4:10/70.3 - I would say, with the RIGHT kind of training going sub-10 for a full IM, is very realistic!
I think you can definitely go under 10 at FL with a plan like that given your previous experience with the sport. You might consider keeping a few weeks of higher volume riding in the 6 weeks prior to the race — but I don’t think you need to go over 15 hours total training time.
Read up the post on here about the 9 hour training week one of the st guys potentially did. Be real though a one hour race is not the same as a 10 hour race.
I’m actually in the same boat. Maybe because when studies look at volume it also means there are more medium/high intensity minutes within a week. I personally think up to 70.3 volume to me seems kind of overrated as long as you are probably a <5hr guy/gal. With long distance I have no idea.
But… given your times on other distances imho sub 10 is not even a question but rather sub 9 or not
The volume will definitely help as you go up in distance. As far as speed, you can race a 70.3/Oly 99% as fast on 10hrs/wk as on 20 (obviously biased more toward intensity). The pros need that extra few %, which is why they do 30hrs/wk.
As others have said, sub-10 is not an unreasonable goal for IMFL…[color=hotpink]and that’s even before factoring in the bike draftfest.[/color]
First, its very individual. There was one dude that did 9:30 on his first IM and KQ’d on less than 10 hours/week (I don’t remember the exact numbers, but you get the idea). Clearly he is a genetic outlier with insanely quick response.
The big thing you need to think about is not fitness, its durability (or resiliency). You may have the fitness for a 10h full, but if you don’t put in the volume your muscles are likely to give up by the time you get to the marathon.
As mentioned already, much easier to pull off good half/oly on low volume/high intensity.
The right strength training might save hours of running/cycling though to build this muscular endurance.
Just a theory, no idea. And probably individual as well again.
Another theory for the thread: I think most weeks for AGers could be lower volume, higher intensity but it’s good to have a few weeks here and there that are high volume. Block training with shifting focusses, like 4 weeks VO2Max once/week, 1 week threshold focus, 1 week high volume
When I started triathlon I was doing the two-a-day thing and trying to get in as much volume as I could. After a few years I wove to the lower volume higher intensity plans. I saw quicker gains at the shorter distance races on the lower volume higher intensity training. I haven’t done any full Ironman distance races though. If I were going to do an ultra distance I would add more volume.