This is a great question and definitely something that was challenging this year. I’ve found that above 18-20 hours per week of training my appetite inverts - as training load continues to climb I typically don’t feel the desire to eat as much. This effectively resulted in body fat (measured using In-Body Impedance setup) dropping from 6.4% Mar 2018 to 3.1% Feb 2019. While not a perfectly accurate measurement method, this was a good indicator that loosing weight is essentially loosing muscle.
First a few general approaches I try to follow:
Eat before my first workout of the day (banana, bagel, breakfast bar). This at least gets me started with calories coming in.
First Endurance Ultragen regularly after morning double or triple workouts.
Evening shake with meal replacement powder, milk, ice cream and sometimes some fruit. This is a little bit higher in fat and gets me through the night without waking up starving.
During the week my days end up breaking down as follows:
Monday + Wednesday: Class 4pm-8pm
Tuesday + Thursday: Class 9am-8pm
Friday: Class 11am-1pm
Monday, Wednesday and Friday are pretty manageable as I am home based with access to food/training stuff until leaving for campus in the afternoon. Tuesday and Thursday I eat breakfast on campus and then bring bagels, snacks, and some type of leftovers for lunch and dinner. I typically just end up carrying around a second workout/food bag on those days. I think in general recovery/sleep/nutrition is an area I could realize performance gains if training solely as a “full time” pro. That freedom really allows workouts to be properly spread as opposed to stacked due to scheduling constraints and gives time to prepare more complex complete meals.
I was tracking you and sounds like you raced really well, congrats!
How did you come up with your caloric intake on the bike? I target 3.5 cal per kg per hour on the bike. Given your weight, that would put you at 273/hr, but you were 436. Is there a calculation you used to come up with that? Or you just go by feel in training and determined that’s what you needed?
The plan I put together for the bike came from a few different directions. In general, I was approaching the bike as a necessary step to setting up my run. In that sense, maximizing calorie intake and nutrition was important.
I had a few constraints I was working with:
No special needs
3 bottle cages
My original target was 80g of carbs per hour and I let that drive the initial plan and liquid nutrition. That was made up of various products I’ve either found sit well or I enjoy the taste/texture of plus on-course Gatorade Endurance. On top of that initial plan, I added “breakfast” at the start of the ride and a candy bar at half-way, which bumped me up to the final 95g/hr.
I knew I always had the option of reducing intake if my stomach was upset, but ended up with no problems and ate my way through the bike leg. The low intensity of the Ironman bike seems to really help on the digestion front. By really packing in the calories/carbs on the bike I felt I could get by on a much lighter intake on the run, which is where my stomach is typically the least happy.
Congrats on the race! I think that you may have biked a bit with my friend, Lucas who finished one spot ahead of you overall. I think you finished the bike before him, but he probably passed you on the run.
That swim volume is pretty crazy for a non-swimmer. You swim more in a week than I do in a month!
Sure, I’m using this one: Sworkit - Ab & Core Exercises
Thanks for the link to the core routines. I’ve generally been doing the same set of core exercises and have been meaning to mix things up.
You also mention twice weekly strength and stability work that’s not heavy weightlifting but “dynamic strength” (in quotes because I’m not really sure what that is). Would you be able to share some details? I was lifting a bit over the winter, following a program from ECFit Boulder, but now that I’m building up volume I’ve found my body doesn’t handle weightlifting as well as when I was doing less. Given the amount of volume you’re doing I’d be really interested to hear what kind of strength work you’re able to do that’s supportive of your S/B/R rather than hurting those other workouts.
And more than anything – Congratulations! That was a killer performance I could only dream of.
Congrats on the performance and thank you for a detailed race report!
Quick question: is peeing 2 times on the bike an actual proof that you are well hydrated? May be a different topic, but still…
In terms of what constitutes peeing ‘a lot’, I usually tell athletes it’s not a bad thing to pee once on the bike in a half-distance event, possibly twice in an Ironman. This tends to show that you’re drinking a reasonable amount but not massively overdoing it. Much more than that and I’d say it’s a sign of either taking in too much fluid, or insufficient sodium within that fluid to retain it in your body. http://www.220triathlon.com/nutrition/how-much-should-you-pee-during-an-ironman/12766.html
Sure - I can try and elaborate a bit. This definitely isn’t my realm of expertise, so mostly conveying what I’ve done versus why I’ve done it.
Some examples of the types of exercises included: lunges, squats, dumbbell press, single leg Romanian deadlift, Bulgarian split squats, box jumps, etc.
Typically leading into big races the workouts will be more stability focused - single leg/single arm, band work, etc. However, when there isn’t a big race just around the corner workouts will be a little more intense with some circuit work and machine work (leg extension, leg curl, squat machine, etc.).
I know quite a few athletes that work with ECFit, often while recovering from injuries. They seem to have good success with those programs. Perhaps it might be a matter of making sure you are doing the correct program at the correct time in relation to your races/goals.
Thanks! Glad people are enjoying the read and info.
I’ll tackle that one - I think this is probably a bit of an athlete dependent thing.
I had two comparisons I was basing hydration assumptions on:
1 - Ironman Arizona: I only had to go once at the very end of the bike and then not at all during the run.
2 - Long training rides: I almost never have to go even over the course of a ~4 hour ride plus brick run.
Based on those comparisons having to go twice on the bike plus again in the first few miles of the run was a positive indicator of good hydration in my opinion.
Congrats on the great race JT. Any regrets running the disc rear given the crappy Santa Rosa roads? At any point did you wish you had a bit more compliance of the Enve 8 out back, or did the tubeless at 80 psi work out just fine? Debating setup with a friend for Santa Rosa 70.3 next month.
None at all. To be honest I’m not sure I could tell a difference between a disc and spoked wheel from a ride feel/compliance perspective. I’d say the tire type and pressure are far more critical. I rode a 25mm tubeless setup at 80 psi and would run the same setup again.