We’ve all heard this before, and it makes sense. It’s sound fundamental advice. Unfortunately, it leaves me with somewhat of a dilemma:
I’ve always thought that the bike was my strength as I come from a cycling background. Mountain biking before it exploded in the 90’s, and transitioning to road racing right around the time mountain biking became cool. After being passed by a fully loaded paperboy and his grandmother going uphill however, this is clearly not the case.
So what is my strength? It’s not the swim. I don’t completely suck in the water, but holding 100’s (LCM) @ 1:45 is pretty challenging for me.
It ain’t the run. My run sucks. Once upon a time my 5k PR was in the low 20’s, and my 10k PR was in the low 40’s. I’ve since gotten much slower.
So what is my strength? I think it’s my taper. I can sit on my ass the week before a big race and it doesn’t bother me at all. Putting my feet up and resting is oh-so natural. I can carbo-load like a mofo. There’s absolutely no threat of me going out and laying down a wickedly hard ride or run too close to an event - it just don’t happen.
So to the distinguished members of Slowtwitchia, I pose this question: How can I race my strength?
I sure like your training plan better than I do mine Asking this question in a forum full of bloviators like me and the rest of the tri-geeks, you’re going to get a million different suggestions
Me, I’d determine what my specific “limiters” are (the reason why I can only hold 1:45s in the water, for example) and then design a plan for getting faster on the 100s. Any “limiter” work is going to require a fair amount of effort, though, and it’s not going to be fun, sometimes.
Think you can taper?! Nobody can hang with me on the taper and nobody should even dream of trying to match my revovery. I developed a 26 week taper program and a 26 week recovery program. Both are available for a nominal fee.
I look at % placement in a large race. For example, in my last large 1/2 IM here is how I placed in my AG
Swim 12/80
Bike 54/80
Run 31/80
Total 33/80
You’ll notice the big disparity here, I was 12th out of the water and then promptly passed by 42 people on the bike. I ended up repassing some of the people on the run. Since that race, I’ve put swimming into maintenance mode and focused all extra energy on the bike. My run training is about the same, but if I’m ever squeezed for time I’ll drop the run in favor of getting in all my bike workouts.
I look at it this way: compared to “specialists” in each sport, I’m a slightly above average runner, an average cyclist (better at time trials than crits; but still consider myself average), and a slightly below average swimmer.
My strength is I can be consistently mediocre at all three sports over the long haul. Consistency is the key. I have the mental and emotional strength to keep going no matter how rotten I feel inside and no matter how bad it hurts. I don’t have dramatic peaks and valleys of performance. I go at a relatively even pace and nothing fazes me - not the competition, not the course profile, not the weather. I don’t fight, I roll with it.
I’m of the mindset to just accept my weaknesses and move on - sure, it’ll never make me great, but I don’t have to spend time doing something I don’t always enjoy.
My weakness is the swim and I go into my race knowing it, planning for it and accepting of it.
At IMCDA I was 210/266 AG on the swim, 121/266 on the bike and 68/266 on the run. My IMAZ training is all about the bike because I know I can make significant gains there (and improve my run at the same time). My run is pretty much maintenance mode in training.
I could spend a boatload of training time on my swim and get what? maybe 10 minutes off my time? To me, it’s not worth it. Besides, I like having to pass people all day.
I just went thru the same process, thinking on what to work on next. My AA IM-Race had the splits 1.02/5.05/3.32. This autumn i did some lactate-testing in all 3 sports with some suprising results…
Running LT was around 160bpm or 4,15min/km, Biking LT was 150bpm or 300W. The real suprise was the swim, after the warmup i had already passed my LT! And the splits/100m were not that impressive either (LC):
1.50 135bpm
1.46 150bpm
1.45 155bpm
1.40 160bpm
Not that much speed gain for the extra effort… BUT, I have a decent stroke and potentially could swim faster if my muscle had the aerobic stamina… I would also be less tired after the swim and have more energy to bike/run. Anyway, my strategy is to swim. I’m planning 20 000m weeks swimming, some speed work on my running to raise my LT and just maintaining my bike strength (2-3hours/week). So this is my plan the next 3 months, after that I have to build volume on my bike again for the next season.
Asking this question in a forum full of bloviators like me and the rest of the tri-geeks, you’re going to get a million different suggestions 