Specifically, I would be curious as to what anyone’s thoughts are about doing the full Vineman (August 23) as a training day for IM-FLA (Nov 8). That gives 11 weeks between. I just ran a marathon 2 weeks ago, consistently do 80 to 100 mile bike rides, and 4000m swim workouts. However, I have never done all of them together (did 3 halfs last year).
I was thinking if I did the Vineman without pushing too hard, it would give me experience in hydration, eating, how hard to push, etc. The obvious concern is how long it takes to recover even from a slower effort. And will that help or hurt my IM- FLA time?
BTW, I’m 43 and the fastest half last year was 5:24.
I’d agree with Francois. You could end up with a 100F (or generally +85F) day and fry yourself. I have a friend who always does the full VM relay as prep for IM FL. The past three years, she has done the full swim, the full bike, then has a relay partner who runs the full marathon while she goes for a short brick run.
Thanks Francois. Someone else I respect told me the same thing - make your longest workouts mega bikes with short runs after, or long double bricks (bike,run,bike,run) with short run segments.
Thanks Cathy. I do do a lot of long bike rides after an early morning swim workout. Not exactly the same ticket, but close. I actually thought about doing something similar but running the first 1/2 of the marathon. Although - not sure I want to spend the $300 to do a brick.
What I’m really trying to figure out is the fueling & hydration and the correct pace to allow a continuous run (or at least not too much walking) at the end.
Maybe a better question to ask is what is the longest workout people do when training for an Ironman and when in the schedule do you do it?
Just an observation: If you do a local Ironman event, then THAT would be your FIRST Ironman event. ;>
Seriously, though. The others are right. Don’t sweat being able to do the distance at FLA if your training is good. Sounds to me like you are having the age-old confidence waivering about being “up to the task.” Don’t worry. You’ll do fine. FWIW, NO Iron-distance race is a TRAINING EVENT in the context of preparing for another race. No matter how hard you go, its a tough day.