Tri4Kona2014

Thursday, July 7, 2016

Post 134 - Ironman race performance thoughts

So far this week has been decent – working from home has been brilliant, I have lots more time, I’m easily getting 10 hours or more in bed every night now, I go out and sunbathe at lunchtime (getting sunlight on your skin is really important for health and wellbeing), there’s a lot less stress, and I’ve even managed to follow quite a lot of the Tour de France in the background.

My sniffles seem to be clearing up, which is great, but I can still feel something is not quite 100% with my right knee (and usually it’s my left knee that gives problems!) Saying that, I’ve managed an hour on the turbo trainer and a 30-minute run so far this week, and my knee didn’t restrict or limit either of these, so hopefully it will be OK.

The main topic of my blog this week is to post about a question I put to a couple of different internet forums at the end of last year, when I was thinking about 2016 and making plans, and wondering how I could improve.

Basically, I’m trying to work out how I can improve my Ironman running. I believe that if I could run to my potential in an Ironman, I would qualify for Kona. My standalone running PBs are as follows: 5K – 15 minutes. 10K – 32 minutes (OK, I lie, 33 minutes, but I have no doubt I was in 32-minute shape). 10 miles – 54 minutes. Half marathon – 71 minutes. Admittedly most of these PBs were done in 2005-2006, but I was back in 32-minute 10K shape in 2015. I’ve also run a 35-minute 10K in an Olympic-distance triathlon in 2015, and this was on an undulating trail. So I’m not a bad runner, but I’m really not a great Ironman runner and not a great long-distance runner.

I know a bit about Ironman bike pacing and nutrition, but not much is ever said about Ironman swim pacing. So I wondered if I was swimming too hard in the Ironman, and if this was coming back to bite me later in the Ironman race. I put this to a couple of different online triathlon forums (TriTalk and SlowTwitch). I had no idea what sort of response I would get, but I ended up with 16 pages of thought, advice and ideas…!

I condensed the 16 pages down into what I thought was the most useful or relevant (for me) information, and it is summarised in the blog post below (edited into sections). It's all interesting, and I have taken some of it on board and applied some of it. Thanks to everyone who replied!

QUESTION (written at the end of 2015)

Hi all. I am assessing next year and how I can improve in an Ironman.

My question is, how “hard” should you swim an Ironman swim? I am wondering if I swim too hard, and then pay for it later in the Ironman race.

Background and information relevant to this question:

I am trying to qualify for Kona and my previous splits look like this:

IMUK 2011: Swim under 58 minutes, bike 5:55 (on a cheap, badly set-up, poorly-fitted road bike), run 3:22 (course about 1.5 miles short).

IMUK 2013: Swim under 56 minutes (course probably a bit short), bike 5:30 (on a good well fitted TT bike), DNF run (got to 16 miles and then uncontrollable diarrhoea)

IM Wales 2013: Swim 61 minutes, bike 5:53, run 3:34

IMUK 2014: a write off

IM wales 2014: Swim 64 mins (rough sea), bike 5:43, run 3:50something (fell apart in second half)

IMUK and Wales 2015: both write offs

My 1500m pool time (in-water start, 25m pool, no tumble turning) is just under 23 minutes.

In normal Ironman training I manage to swim twice a week, 3000-4000m per session.

On the bike, you can work out your FTP and then ride to a pre-defined percentage of that value to optimise your bike-run split times, but swimming is not factorised into this. I guess over-swimming could ruin your day and you wouldn’t even know it until well into the marathon.

If you were to take your 1500m swim time as a “swim FTP” (in my case, 22:50 for 1500m = 1:31 per 100m), how much slower should an Ironman swim pace per 100m be? Obviously this would assume a non-wetsuit Ironman swim, without wearing a swim skin, in calm, warm-ish fresh water. How would wearing a wetsuit affect this Ironman swim pace?

Or another crude way to measure it would be to say that if I rode 3:59 for a 100 mile bike time trial and notionally designated that 10 out of 10 for effort (i.e. rode as fast as possible, tank completely empty by the end), I’d say my Ironman bike effort level would be about a 7 out of 10. If my 1500m swim time trial was 10 out of 10 for effort (i.e. destroyed at the end of it), what level of effort would the Ironman swim feel like?

Any thoughts would be welcomed, many thanks!

Some people asked for more information, so I did go into more detail about different aspects of my Ironman racing, pacing, nutrition, hydration and training. Some of the responses below are based on having this further information. The "full treatment" is below:

MORE INFO PROVIDED (again written at the end of 2015)

Thanks for all the replies everyone. To answer the main queries that people were asking (and this is going to be quite a long post, so please stick with it)

Full Ironman history:

Ironman UK 2011 (before a full-time job) – M25-29 - done on rubbish, cheap bike, badly fitted, didn’t have a clue, 11th in age group, good enough to plant the seed but ran out of money and couldn’t afford to try again.

Ironman UK 2013 – M25-29 - now working full-time, got a new expensive bike, was winning my age group with 10 miles left to run, started explosive vomiting and diarrhoea with no warning. Possible food poisoning/body not liking hotel food (greasy roast potatoes, sloppy veg and greasy chicken). Collapsed, game over, ambulance etc. Lesson learned, bring own food. Also likely I started too quick in the run – was on 3:20 pace at half distance, so probably started the run at 3:15 pace… lesson learned again.

Ironman Wales 2013 – M25-29 - a few weeks later, not fully recovered, finished 5th in age group. 5th had been good enough at Ironman UK a few weeks previously. But slots only went to 4th in Wales. Some slots “roll down”, because some people decline their slots for whatever reason – already qualified, for example. Usually a handful of slots roll down. Went to the roll down ceremony. No slots rolled down. Gutted. Marathon pacing slowed, but this was probably my “best” Ironman marathon.

Ironman UK 2014 – M30-34 - I moved up to a tougher age group. I trained hard and was very fit, far better than in 2013 (I know this from the numbers in training and warm-up events), I was hoping I’d be close to the pros. (2013 100TT in 4:14, 2014 100TT on same course in same conditions in 3:59. So 5:30 IMUK bike from 2013 would translate to sub 5:20 for 2014 I thought. 2 weeks before the race, had a sports massage. Ended up in hospital for 3 days with horrendous leg infections. Went to the race anyway. Had nothing. DNF (Did Not Finish).

Ironman Wales 2014 M30-34 – not fully recovered, went in desperation more than anything, trying to salvage something from the season, the wheels came off halfway through the marathon when I was in 6th. 6th would have done it. I couldn’t hang on. I don’t know where I finished. I was 29 when I raced this race (was 30 a couple of months later) and my finish time would have qualified me in the 25-29 age group…

Ironman UK 2015 M30-34 – went through the 7-month build-up again, was optimistic going into the race. Monsoon conditions, freezing cold, windy. I was frozen, and my power output was terrible. Bad circulation in my frozen hands meant I couldn’t feed myself nor drink (both essential…) This sounds like excuses, I’m not making excuses, it wasn’t my day, but I’m skinny and don’t go well in the cold. I train indoors in 25-30 degree heat, I go well in warm conditions, not in cold.

Ironman Wales 2015 M30-34 – trying to salvage my season, didn’t feel well the week before the race, ending up vomiting uncontrollably for about 15 minutes in the swim while hanging off a lifeguard canoe, literally thought I was going to barf my guts up, got frozen, got brought ashore, game over.

Other triathlon history – 2 x Olympic triathlons. 2:04 best on good bike but had a problem with my pump so rode at 70psi rather than 110psi. Swam 22 minutes, biked just over an hour, ran 35mins (it was a trail run and was mucky and wet).

Other running history – ran 1:11 half marathon without a clue, off 25 miles per week, and no taper, on a freezing cold wet day in north Scotland. This was 9 years ago. Got my running back to this level earlier this year and ran 33 minute 10K on a cold and wet and hilly course in north Scotland (so would have been sub-33 on a better day/course). I can run 60/70 minutes hard, with no problems. Anything above that wrecks my legs and takes ages to recover from. I haven’t got great biomechanics and seem to get leg fatigue quite quickly after half marathon distance (maybe I’d be better suited to half ironman, but Kona is the goal).

I’ve never been coached but have read a lot and listened to running clubmates before I became a triathlete and have tried to apply theory and lessons learned to refine my training to do what I think is necessary with the time I have available (not in a tri or cycling club due to time constraints).

I’m just a fraction over 6 feet tall and race weight is approx. 68kg (I don’t aim for this weight, that’s just what my equilibrium weight is when I’m training properly). I don’t limit my food intake when I train but I do eat very good and clean food). So I am very lean. Maybe a reason why I seem to struggle with the latter stages of the run in an Ironman, but can blitz an Olympic from start to finish and run really strongly (34-35 minute 10K in an Olympic tri).

In “full” ironman training I would average 6-8k swimming per week (2 sessions), 8 hours on the bike (4 sessions), and 25-30 miles running (4 sessions per week), I’d do this for 2 weeks than have an easier week, then repeat the cycle for 6-7 months. Rarely have massage, but do lots of stretching/core/weights work.

In previous years (2013, 2014, 2015), I was basically doing:

2-3 hard swims per week (1 continuous, 1 intervals/drills with paddles/floats)
4 bikes per week (1 hour hard, 1:20 intervals, 4-5 hours and 1 hour single leg drills)
5 runs per week (1 fartlek or tempo (30-50 minutes), 1 long (2 hours), 3 easy)
Weights, core and stretching about 4 times per week.

I did this in 2013, 2014 and 2015 for 6-7 months starting in January and ended up being completely burned out by the summer. And have never put it together in a summer Ironman.

In 2016 I intend to do the following:

2 swims per week (1 hard, 1 easy)
2-3 bikes per week (1 hard (intervals or hard tempo), 1 long, 1 easy)
3 runs per week (1 hard (tempo or intervals or long), 2 easy)

I will be eliminating 3 hard sessions per week, my key in 2016 is to stay fresh and trust that what I do will be enough. Let's see how summer 2016 will go...

Ironman UK and Ironman Wales have very slow, hilly bike courses, poor roads, loads of tight twists and turns, no rhythm, often windy, no good aero stretches. Don’t underestimate how slow they are. Sub-5 for a pro would be a very good time on these courses. I reckon if 2014 had gone to plan, I’d have done 5:20 at IMUK bike. Sub-10 at Wales would give you a shout of winning your age group. Sub-10 at Bolton would give you a shout of an age-group podium.

My Ironman race calorie intake is based on roughly 50 calories per gel, 350 calories per energy bar and 500 calories per litre of energy drink. I have never talked with a nutritionist but I have read a lot online and based my Ironman race intake on stuff I have read.

Pre race breakfast – porridge with honey, raisins, chia seeds and a few nuts – approx. 400 calories
Pre-start gel – 100 calories
T1 gel – 100 calories

Bike (let’s say 5 and a half hours on the hilly UK/Wales course)
2 x gels per hour and one portion of an energy bar per hour = 1100 calories from gels and 1500 calories from bars. Plus another 700 calories from energy drink (2 small bottles), plus 2 small bottles of water, plus 2 small bottles of zero-calorie electrolyte drink.
Total bike calories = 3300 calories
Total bike liquid intake = 4-5 litres

For the bike, I seem to be averaging around 600 calories per hour, and 700-900ml liquid per hour (mostly water)

Run (let’s say 3:20 run) 2-3 gels per hour with water = 833 calories, plus let’s say another 500 calories from pretzels and energy drink = approx. 1300 calories for the run. Probably would take on board something like 1.5 litres of liquid (mostly water, some energy drink/coke towards the end). I am always absolutely so horribly hungry on the run, but I’m almost always very hungry, food just seems to burn off immediately. I eat dinner and 20 minutes later I’m hungry again.

For the run I estimate that I average around 400 calories per hour and 500ml liquid (mostly water) per hour.

Total calories for the Ironman from liquid and gels and bars from just before swim start (not including breakfast) until race end = 4800 calories.

Data for my bikes is sketchy. I have no data from 2013 as I didn’t have a heart rate monitor nor a power meter. I had a heart rate monitor in 2014, but no power meter. I had both in 2015.

In 2014 I did 3:59 for 100 mile TT and my heart rate average was 160bpm. Pacing was very slightly off (average went from about 25.4mph to 25.0 in the last hour) but it was a good showing.

The only Ironman bike power data I have is for 2015 at IMUK but this was a total write-off as there was a freezing monsoon on the bike and I completely froze (don’t deal well with cold and do most of my training indoors on the turbo in 23-27 degree heat – I do what I have to do).

In 2015 I biked 5:58 in IMUK. In 2013 I biked 5:30 on basically the same course, and in 2014 I thought I would bike 5:20 or better based on the 3:59 100TT in 2014 and 4:14 100TT on the same TT course in identical conditions in 2013, but the 2014 IM was a write off. TSS for IMUK 2015 (for what it’s worth which isn’t much) was 292, IF 0.70, normalised power 215 watts, average power 201 watts, average HR 142bpm, variability index 1.0697, normalised w/kg = 3.16w/kg, average watts/kg = 2.96w/kg. But this was so far from a true reflection of a “normal” Ironman bike that it is almost useless data, because I was so cold and could not get warm.

My FTP in April earlier this year after 3 months of focused training was 324W in the 20 minute test, which gives 307W for an hour. This was on a turbo trainer indoors. I’d like to think I improved on this by May/June, but I did another test in the summer time in my room and despite the fan and the open window, the room temperature was 28-30 degrees and the test didn’t go well, and I dropped off dramatically. One thing I need to do for 2016 is more biking outdoors on my road bike.

For the IM bike, usually the pace doesn’t drop off too much in the second half, when I have done a “good” IM bike, I have felt pretty good throughout, but obviously you are keen to get off the bike after 70 miles etc. One thing I have noticed is that my heart rate drops 10bpm when I get up from the aero bars into a more upright position, but my power stays the same. I don’t know why. My bike was fitted by a really good fitter and my position is a conservative Ironman position, not a ridiculous aero position. I’ve posted about this on forums, and most people say that their heart rate drops when they get down into the aero position. I’m the opposite… I have recently widened the elbow pads to try to open my chest up and I will see if that makes a difference. I hope it will, because there’s a big difference between riding at 145bpm and riding at 155bpm.

I don’t have a 200m pool time, but based on interval sessions I have done, I would like to think I could do 200m from an in-water start without tumble turns in a 25m pool in 2:40, but this is purely an estimate. If I remember right, I’ve done a 400m time trial in something like 5:40, no tumble turns, 25m pool, in water start.

The second half of the IM run is always horrendous for me. Standalone, my running is pretty good. My Olympic tri running is also pretty good. I’ve never done a half ironman. My Ironman running is terrible (IM marathon PB is 3:22 but the course was 1.5 miles short, so my actual ironman marathon PB is 3:34 (albeit on a hilly twisty Wales course). But in one of my Olympic triathlons, I outran a guy who has run sub 3:05 in an Ironman.

Any further opinions would be welcomed…

Responses are below:

SWIM

If you draft well in the swim that can help a lot too. That's a lot of free speed.

It is not good if you are tired after the swim. And it becomes even worse if you are also a little undertrained on the bike as well. Good FTP and running speed might not overcome the tiredness!

As for the swim, it’s a low tempo. It's slightly harder than easy, so is the bike, and to a lesser degree the run. You not going easy, but it should never ever feel hard at all until the last 10 miles of the run when fatigue sets in. Through the whole swim and first 80-90 miles of the bike, you should be telling yourself to slow down.

In particular this guy asks: "Am I swimming too hard?" My answer is yes. "With the swim volume you are doing- almost any speed (even slow) would be a little too hard. And you are not going slow." I was a collegiate swimmer. But- if I did a 56 minute swim, and was only doing 8000m/wk (on my hard weeks) - I would be pretty tired afterward. And if I then did a hard bike? - I would be even more tired. (And every 112 mile bike is hard for me- I only do 8 hrs of mostly easy cycling per week). I might be able to hold shit together, if I had ultra-marathon running type run training under my belt. (But a max of 30 miles/wk doesn't meet this requirement).

I typically swim in the 1:05-1:08 range for IM but I'm literally just going through the motions to get to the bike. I could invest another 3-5hrs per week training to get down to 60min but I think that time is better spent elsewhere for me. The IM bike shouldn't be HARD for anyone that has put in the training time. It may be boring and tiring but if it feels like you are going hard then you're in trouble come marathon time.

Honestly just one extra hour a week of swimming would probably be enough.

People really don’t pay the swim the respect it’s due.

You're not coming out of the water in the lead so it's a time to not lose any time, find a decent small group and draft. Be prepared to put in a good effort at the start to find that group and maybe put in an effort to jump up a group, but you don't really want to tow others, so probably a steady 6/7 with periods of 9.

But as a coaching point and judging by what you say I’d spend a lot of focus on going at 1:30ish pace but making it as easy as possible. So work on efficiency at that pace and so that your 3k sessions are all at 1:30 pace. Then hopefully it will be easy to hold it for 3.8k.

You should practice your open water skills to death. Drafting, sighting and making sure you swim in all weathers is absolutely essential.

Make sure you learn to swim in a group comfortably and accept sometimes it’s better to draft in a group and be a bit slower than to go it alone and have them catch you before the exit.

My guess is that you are short on both the bike and the swim training volumes.

Your swim effort will have a limited impact on the rest of the race,...as long as you don't red-line all the way through.

BIKE

Even with power monitoring you still may be over-doing it on the bike.

I suspect even pacing on the bike is a major factor and going out too fast on the run. IM is often about discipline.

The number one culprit when someone with good running ability runs poorly is execution on the bike. Nutrition could also be a factor. He has a power meter so that is unacceptable.

You shouldn't need to pee on the bike at all. When I KQ'd at Frankfurt in 2013, I didn't pee at all during the race, I drank to thirst, but obviously my thirst reflex seem to work.

As for peeing on the bike, I would suggest a max of 1 if you really hydrate

I think you should carry less weight on the bike

I've always viewed the first 45 mins - 1hr on the bike more critical than the swim intensity.

Get the nutrition going early, get the HR down ASAP and settle into smooth, efficient pedalling with no hard efforts and you will probably 'recover' from slightly overcooking the swim.

IMO going 10-15 watts below race intensity over this first hour pays you back over the duration.

Doing a couple of fasted, low intensity morning runs (1 for 30 mins, and 1 for 1hr 15 or so) and then starting my long weekend bike fasted was one of the key changes to my qualification by giving me a new ability to use fat as fuel. I kept the number of hours (average 12 per week the same) and only other change was a weekly over-geared turbo session. Before, despite normally having a cast iron stomach, I was always too reliant on carbs. You definitely increase your fuel quantity by being more fat enabled.

RUN

Point being, your Kona success or failure is not going to depend much on your swim, but rather how well you run off the bike.

You have to figure out how to nail a strong run.

Change your whole race focus to: "the race begins at mile 15 on the run" up to that point, cruise... If your last 11 miles of the run (really your last 6) are strong, you will make up a bunch of places and THAT'S where you will KQ.

Relative to your half marathon run training, are you putting the miles in to allow you to run a marathon close to your potential?

Putting together a good run is the key.

Are you doing enough long training runs as your 100TT seems fast compared to your IM times, so over biking doesn't look like an issue. This only really leaves nutrition or lack of run conditioning to explain your poor running. Running a 1:11 half is excellent, but it doesn't predict a fast marathon unless you've conditioned for the longer distance. This will be even more important when running a marathon after the swim bike. In essence, I doubt the problem is with the pace you swim at.

25-30 miles per week running seems extremely light for someone trying to KQ.

This guy should be able to run low 3 hours or faster in the IM if he reaches his potential.

I also reckon that rather than banging out swim/bike/run all year, you need to put in a run focus to develop your run endurance. Now is a good time to start. The key to this is not to run fast, google Maffetone to get an idea, but don't be a slave to his arbitrary rules. When I've done it, I've run every day, building up to an hour, but capping my average HR to 120bpm (my max is 172, IM run HR 130). You will find that your speed gradually creeps up over the weeks. Once it stops creeping up, you have probably got a decent aerobic endurance for running and can build in more swim/bike. I've found that once you've built this endurance, it stays with you for quite some time, so just repeat each winter.

Build up some run specific strength to help with the tail end of the ironman run. It’s about not slowing down and being strong is what helps there. Run every day. Even 30mins.

The leg fatigue could just be that you're not well conditioned for more than half marathon.

NUTRITION

You could be over-doing the nutrition, so I would experiment with less.

Your bike Calories at ~ 2.2g/kg of CHO are on the order of at least 50% if not more than most would consider reasonable. The liquid may well be high as well for cold conditions. Your experience with diarrhoea might be related to over-consumption of both.

If you’re hungry starting the run, then you didn't eat enough on the bike or weren't pacing evenly and burned through a lot of glycogen.

He is taking 600 cal (I thought 300) per hour on the bike, likely with very high protein in the energy bars…probably 600-700 calories of protein and 1500 of solid food…that is crazy, and unnecessary.

Related to the nutrition advice here - your race nutrition plan is something you should absolutely have developed and dialed in during training. I do very few long steady rides at IM effort but I take advantage of those opportunities to practice my nutrition using the same products and amounts I would for racing to see how it works. You want to find the max calories your body can handle comfortably but that takes some trial and error. It's best not to find those errors during a race :) I go into IM with a very specific nutrition plan knowing how many calories and how much fluids I'm targeting throughout the bike. That doesn't guarantee nothing will go wrong but at least I know it SHOULD be okay because I've done race simulations to develop the plan.

You appear to be having too many calories on the bike, which will result in your body rejecting them when you get to the run. You need a calorie range from 272 - 467 per hour.

It does seem a lot of energy intake on the bike. 467kcal/hr is ~117g/hr which still seems quite high when you consider that most people would top out at 60-90g/hr when trained on a product.

3300kcal over 5.5hrs is 600kcal/hr = 150g/hr. Bleurgh.

I have done similar and paid for it!

I'm using the simplest possible calories in Maltodextrin/fructose. Start including bars and fruit in that and it probably lowers the possible intake as the stomach has more work to do. I too learnt this the hard way, a portaloo is not where you want to be on a hot day in Lanzarote.

I'm no expert but isn't that a lot of liquid to be taking in on the bike?

You clearly have the bike and based on TT times are not nailing it too hard that should have a detrimental impact on the marathon. However that is what is happening. Therefore, my tuppence is your nutrition.

Your carb intake is very high. Unless you have a cast iron stomach, it is likely too high. Hence why you likely can not execute the run you are capable of.

But yes, somewhere you are doing something wrong given those stand-alone times for the bike and run. Nutrition? Eating too much? Running too hard too soon? Hilly courses where you pushed too hard on the hills?

Regarding nutrition, you have to understand some of the physiological limitations to digestion during exercise. Your body needs blood to digest food. But it also needs blood to carry O2 to your muscles and to cool your body (or warm it in v cold races). The harder you work, the less blood you have available for digestion. So what happens when you have too much food in your stomach when the body has not enough blood available for digestion, is it just rejects the food out the back door which is what you've experienced.

All I have read/heard on podcasts over the last three years would suggest that you are over eating/drinking.

I'd second the suggestion to read Waterlogged to at least start thinking about your actual need for water and electrolytes. And just maybe the run might get to be more comfortable

TRAINING VOLUME

I don't see the need for rocket science.
Here we have a guy who is doing:
1) Less swimming than he probably should
2) Less running than he probably should
3) He might be doing enough cycling. But certainly not more than enough. (Does such a thing even exist for the Ironman bike).

Sure - if he perfects his nutrition, pacing, etc., etc. he MIGHT be 30 minutes faster.

But if he just added an extra 1 hr of swimming, one extra easy run and maybe increased his long run a little (or added a second run that day)- he would be 30 minutes faster anyway.

THEN - if he were to perfect his pacing, nutrition, etc- he might win the AG race- not just merely KQ.

I don't necessarily agree. Sure he COULD be training more but I don't think his training volume is the primary reason why a 1:11 half marathon guy (granted it was 9 years ago) is running 3:30+ for IM. He should be able to easily go 3:20 off the training he outlined assuming he doesn't completely dick up his bike pacing and nutrition.

If you want to KQ, you need to aim for double your volume at peak times.

Maybe you need double that volume but I certainly don't and wouldn't blindly prescribe it to any athlete I coach. His average is about exactly what I do for my 8-10 week race prep block. Of course we know nothing of the specifics of those workouts but that is sufficient volume for me to podium and KQ.

I'm pretty confident he can improve his performance significantly without any increase in volume. I'd want to improve the quality of his training and maximize his race execution first and then decide if more is necessary. That's just my personal approach. Some people feel it's all about volume. I simply don't have time to train 30hrs, plus work full time, maintain my relationship, and still be able to recover and absorb that much work so I focus on quality over quantity.

15-18 hours per week should be enough, so tweaking a few things here and there should be all you need to do regarding training. It sounds like a coach could help, but you also seem to be training pretty sensibly too, especially knowing your limitations re injury. It really does seem to mostly be coming down to race execution therefore.

15-18hrs per week is plenty. It has to fit within the rest of your life.

EXECUTION

This has nothing (ok very little) to do with training Swim Bike or Run. He is a 1:11 HM and 32 10km but can't get below 3:30 at IM marathon. That's execution, he's bonking.

It's all about execution, which is poor, because you just don't know, which is what a coach is for.

To me based on your information, it's solely based on lack of experience. Your stand-alone numbers are so much faster than your IM numbers, you just need more experience. I would start playing with your nutrition and pacing for both bike and run during your long training sessions to find something that works better for you. As a stud runner, you should be able to bike your brains out and still just cruise and easy 3:15 marathon. If you're actually in 32 10k shape, 7:10s are cake walk and shouldn't even feel like you’re running at all for first 18 miles. Heck that's probably your easy training long run pace...

Of course, weather is a huge factor for you so if possible pick a better more reliable weather race that suits you. Or if you're stuck with crappy weather stuff, train in crappy weather to prepare yourself mentally and determine your best attire for the conditions.

IM is a long day even if you are going under 10hrs and it definitely takes some mental toughness and focus to take advantage of your physical abilities.

You have a lot of latent talent, and are a coach's dream. I'd love to coach you.

With your speed, you will qualify for Kona. You just need to find the formula right for you.

I have nothing to contribute to this, other than to say that when he pulls everything together in a single race, a Kona spot looks nailed on.

So, my advice would be:
- consider a coach
- learn to draft in the water
- dial in your nutrition
- ease up more on the bike
- start the run no faster than 3:30 pace for the first 15 miles
- find a warmer, flatter IM to race
- slightly up your run training volume while lowering some of the intensity

ALL THE ANSWERS

And for anyone that’s interested, the full 16 pages of replies, unedited, are below. Food for thought!

I would increase your swim frequency if you can. IMO swim frequency beats out one or two big days of swimming each week. And make sure you do work in the water, don't waste time with too much easy easy swimming.

In general - you don't want to burn too many (or any) matches in the swim. I would make your goal to get as fit and fast as possible in the water and swim at a pace and more importantly and effort that leaves you feeling fresh coming out of the water.

I did my first Ironman this year and training wise I was able to hit 20 x 100m on a 1:40 interval coming in around 1:24 and would do a lot of my easy swimming around a 1:32-1:35 pace. Swam a 1:00 and felt very in control the entire time.

You are clearly a pretty good swimmer. As such, as long as you are swim fit, you could push reasonably hard in the swim without much detriment to your overall race. Equally, however, as long as you swim sub-60 mins you will still be comfortably in the mix (come T1) for a Kona slot. Point being, your Kona success or failure is not going to depend much on your swim, but rather how well you run off the bike. You have had some solid IM runs, and the ability to run fast is key for a KQ. "Strong swim-bikers" (who are weaker runners) generally do not qualify for Kona. Great runners who can avoid losing too much time in the swim and have strong bikes will KQ.

So I understand your focus on the swim - you want to trim time wherever you can, without burning matches - but really your swim won't play a major factor in your effort to KQ, IMO. Instead you have to figure out how to nail a strong run.

Sure - maybe you could back off the swim effort a touch, but this is not likely your issue. If you draft well in the swim that can help a lot too. Are you a good swim drafter? I swam 65 mins in my last IM and I was cruising at a very easy pace, mainly because I drafted teh whole way.

As to your run, I think 3:15 would be a more realistic marathon goal that should still give you a good shot at KQ. But yes, somewhere you are doing something wrong given those stand-alone times for the bike and run. Nutrition? Eating too much? Running too hard too soon? Hilly courses where you pushed too hard on the hills?

"Reasonable hard" is the right pace for an Ironman swim.
You could do 4000m reasonable hard without having good swim fitness. But you will be slower than a fit swimmer who is taking it easy AND you will be more exhausted than the guy who wins the age group swim.

I would train so that I can swim 4000m easy.
But race it "moderately hard."

Def learn how to draft well in the swim. That's a lot of free speed, esp in a mass start IM.
You could be over-doing the nutrition, so I would experiment with less.
Even with power monitoring you still may be over-doing it on the bike.
If you're a 1:11 half marathon runner you can't have too bad biomechanics!
Change your whole race focus to: "the race begins at mile 15 on the run" up to that point, cruise... If your last 11 miles of the run (really your last 6) are strong, you will make up a bunch of places and THAT'S where you will KQ.

Have you ruled out pacing/nutrition on the rest of the race?

Re nutrition, you have to find your own balance, but try experimenting when you do, say, a metric IM in training. A friend of mine who's now close to turning pro went sub-9 hours on 830 calories. He takes on no solids and only drinks UCAN, and take very few calories on the run (he's a bit of a freak!). You probably need more, and it will depend on other factors such as temperature, hills etc. but you may be over-doing it. Consider consulting with an experienced sports nutritionist. If you're trying to KQ you should not be guessing on nutrition.

Agree. My vote is for significantly over cooking the bike overall, regardless of not spiking power on climbs.

You do reference using power and not spiking the hills, so I assume your VI would have been a bit better than mine, but could it be improved? Burn a few less matches?

*Edit* - relative to your half marathon run training, are you putting the miles in to allow you to run a marathon close to your potential?

There is a minimum training volume theory for Ironman.
And that if you do less than that volume, the easiest way to improve is simply to reach that volume.
Do you think you are there?

I think for me the minimum volume is around:
Swim - 13,000 m/week
Bike - 8 hrs
Run- 70 k

My guess is that you are short on both the bike and the swim.

The swim is not very important. (It is only 1 hr in the race).
But it is not good if you are tired after the swim - not just a little out of breathe.
And it becomes even worse if you are also a little undertrained on the bike as well.
(8 hrs is a lot of cycling!)
Good FTP and running speed might not overcome the tiredness!

I can't recommend a strategy not knowing anything more about you. One is to take in as many carbs as you can (without causing GI distress); the other is training your body to be fat burning and then take in few carbs during the race. You'd have to try both to know what works.

For shorter races I use power a bit more than heart rate, but for longer races I tend to use heart rate a bit more. Either works as long as you pick a realistic target. There's plenty of posts on here about pacing

-are you properly training for the ironman?
-have you looked at your hidration/nutrition?
-what are your Olympic/HIM results?

Regardless of your ability and fitness, there are several possible strategies to employ on race day.

1. Go hard and hang on as long as you can. (possible, but stupid, trust me :-( )
2. Go at a moderate pace that you're comfortable with. Not too fast, not too slow, just right.
3. Cruise the swim, save your energy for later in the IM. You won't lose much time compared with 1 or 2 above, so chill, ease into the day and hammer the bike and/or run.

I've used all 3 strategies at various times. Twice I tried to go sub 60 minutes but conditions on the day meant I missed out by 2 minutes each time. My T1 time was 10 minutes, punishment for being an idiot. Other times I've cut back the effort and ended up just 2 minutes back, more than saving those 2 minutes in T1. You do the math ;-)

This has nothing (ok very little) to do with training S B or R. He is a 1:11 hm and 32 10km but can't get below 3:30 at IM marathon.

That's execution, he's bonking.

Putting together a good run is the key.

Maybe I've missed this earlier in the thread, but are you doing enough long training runs as your 100TT seems fast compared to your IM times, so over biking doesn't look like an issue. This only really leaves nutrition or lack of run conditioning to explain your poor running. Running a 1:11 half is excellent, but it doesn't predict a fast marathon unless you've conditioned for the longer distance. This will be even more important when running a marathon after the swim bike. In essence, I doubt the problem is with the pace you swim at.

For the bike, I seem to be averaging around 600 calories per hour, and 700-900ml liquid per hour (mostly water)

you have a lot of latent talent, and are a coach's dream. I'd love to coach you. Easy low hanging fruit to get you to where you want to go.

Lots of good advice on this thread, but the most important point is MauriceMaher's .... it's all about execution, which is poor, because you just don't know, which is what a coach is for.

To me based on your information, it's solely based on lack of experience. Your stand-alone numbers are so much faster than your IM numbers, you just need more experience. I would start playing with your nutrition and pacing for both bike and run during your long training sessions to find something that works better for you. As a stud runner, you should be able to bike your brains out and still just cruise and easy 3:15 marathon. If you're actually in 32 10k shape, 7:10s are cake walk and shouldn't even feel like your running at all for first 18 miles. Heck that's probably your easy training long run pace...

Of course, weather is a huge factor for you so if possible pick a better more reliable weather race that suits you. Perhaps, IMLOU which is almost always HOT or IMTX rather than getting screwed by freezing cold conditions. Or if you're stuck with crappy weather stuff, train in crappy weather to prepare yourself mentally and determine your best attire for the conditions.

25-30 mpw running seems extremely light for someone trying to KQ.

I suspect even pacing on the bike is a major factor. Going out too fast on the run. IM is often about discipline. Gauging what your capable of based on training metrics, evaluating how you are feeling during the race, then adjusting accordingly. IF your hungry starting the run, then you didn't; eat enough on the bike or weren't; pacing evenly and burned through a lot of glycogen.

As for the swim, its' a low tempo. It's slightly harder than easy, so is the bike, and to a lesser degree the run. You not going easy, but it should never ever feel hard at all until the last 10 miles of the run when fatigue sets in. Through the whole swim and first 80-90 miles of the bike, you should be telling yourself to slow down.

The number one culprit when someone with good running ability runs poorly is execution on the bike. Nutrition could also be a factor. He has a power meter so that is unacceptable.

In particular this guy asks: "Am I swimming too hard?"
My answer is yes.
"With the swim volume you are doing- almost any speed (even slow) would be a little too hard.
And you are not going slow."

I was a collegiate swimmer.
But- if I did a 56 minute swim, and was only doing 8000m/wk (on my hard weeks) - I would be pretty tired afterward.
And if I then did a hard bike? - I would be even more tired.
(And every 112 mile bike is hard for me- I only do 8 hrs of mostlt easy cycling per week).
I might be able to hold shit together, if I had ultra-marathon running type run training under my belt. (But a max of 30 miles/wk doesn't meet this requirement).

I'm definitely not a swimmer. I swim 2-3X per week and rarely go more than 3500ish per session. I typically swim in the 1:05-1:08 range for IM but I'm literally just going through the motions to get to the bike. I could invest another 3-5hrs per week training to get down to 60min but I think that time is better spent elsewhere for me. The IM bike shouldn't be HARD for anyone that has put in the training time. It may be boring and tiring but if it feels like you are going hard then you're in trouble come marathon time. Most of us should be in the 72-78% FTP range and that just isn't riding hard. That's why I'm curious to see where the OP rides - something just isn't right with his run splits unless he is completely mentally weak. IM is a long day even if you are going under 10hrs and it definitely takes some mental toughness and focus to take advantage of your physical abilities.

I see what you're getting at but mistakes in training and mistakes in execution aren't mutually exclusive, he said he ran 1:11…I missed that it was 9 years ago, I also misunderstood that he is taking 600 cal (I thought 300) per hour on the bike, likely with very high protein in the energy bars…probably 600-700 calories of protein and 1500 of solid food…that is crazy, and unnecessary.

So….it should be pretty easy to understand THROUGHOUT THE PROCESS what kind of shape you are in, there are a thousand ways and workouts (in all sports) to understand exactly where you are at and where you should/want to be going.

IE having a measurable outcome which validates process is important whether or not you train 6 or 30 hours a week. Once you understand this then you can (hopefully) manipulate training process in your favour. The choice of 6 or 30 hours is up to you depending on your goals and commitment/time available etc.

Basically I see mistakes in execution during races having a pretty strong correlation with mistakes in tracking and mistakes in training/rest/sleep/nutrition/desire etc.

Honestly just one extra hour a week of swimming would probably be enough.
8000m/wk - is like 15 miles of running, or 2 hours of cycling.
What's another hour?

Well- in this case a 33% increase in volume and frequency.

An additional hour of running would increase is run frequency and volume 20%.

If you want to KQ, you need to aim for double that volume at peak times. You also need to structure your season better (you shouldn't just repeat the same thing over and over for 6-7 months). Happy to discuss more over email just PM me if you like.

This guy should be able to run low 3s or faster if he reaches his potential.

Don't swim it as hard as I see maybe 1/3 or perhaps more of a typical Ironman field swim it. I see many staggering out of the water, eyes rolled back in the head, looking absolutely waxed! I'm thinking, "Good grief - just over an hour+ into this 10 or more hour day and they look maxed out already"

So you'd just tell him to start running 60mpw and riding 15 hours? You think just ramping up volume is the cure? I'd want to dig into what he's doing with the current volume before jumping to any conclusions. I know for a fact you don't need to train 30hrrs per week to KQ. I'm pretty confident he can improve his performance significantly without any increase in volume. I'd want to improve the quality of his training and maximize his race execution first and then decide if mire is necessary. That's just my personal approach. Some people feel it's all about volume. I simply don't have time to train 30hrs, plus work full time, maintain my relationship, and still be able to recover and absorb that much work so I focus on quality over quantity.

To be fair, I guess I train a bit more. Probably 10hrs on the bike and 35ish miles running per week but that's peak. maybe I'd be faster with more but that's a comfortable balance and it is absolutely sufficient to race IM well if you execute.

15-18 hours per week should be enough, so tweaking a few things here and there should be all you need to do re training. It sounds like a coach could help, but you also seem to be training pretty sensibly too, esp knowing your limitations re injury. It really does seem to mostly be coming down to race execution therefore. Re nutrition, you have to understand some of the physiological limitations to digestion during exercise. Your body needs blood to digest food. But it also needs blood to carry O2 to your muscles and to cool your body (or warm it in v cold races). The harder you work, the less blood you have available for digestion. So what happens when you have too much food in your stomach when the body has not enough blood available for digestion, is it just rejects the food out the back door which is what you've experienced.

So, my advice would be:
- consider a coach
- learn to draft in the water
- dial in your nutrition
- ease up more on the bike
- start the run no faster than 3:30 pace for the first 15 miles
- find a warmer, flatter IM to race
- slightly up your run training volume while lowering some of the intensity

15-18hrs per week is plenty. I'm not saying there might not be any additional gains to be made from upping the volume some but I'm willing to bet my paycheck that I (and many other coaches) can have you racing significantly faster without changing your current volume at all. Again, would 20-25hrs be even better if done smartly? Perhaps, but as you mentioned, it has to fit within the rest of your life.

You're not coming out of the water in the lead so it's a time to not lose any time, find a decent small group and draft. Be prepared to put in a good effort at the start to find that group and maybe put in a effort to jump up a group, but you don't really want to tow others, so probably a steady 6/7 with periods of 9.

The swim's not your problem. It's your run.

Either 1) you're not fast enough on the run because you're not a fast runner or 2) you're not fast on the run because you've overbiked or 3) you fall apart on the run because you've run out of energy.

You can perfect your swim to the point where you're getting out as fresh as a daisy, but if you smack yourself on the bike it's all for naught.

But in answer to your question, I believe it should feel comfortably hard

people, really dont pay the swim the respect its due.

Like for like Id say if you can "only" do 1:31/100 in the pool for 1500m then you should be looking at the hour mark at the very fastest (1:34 pace) and potentially anything up to 1:38 pace. Add a couple of seconds as its just the first part of a long race and you are looking at 1:40s! do you have a 200 and 400 pool time I can look at? I have a calculator to work this sort of stuff out!

But as a coaching point and judging by what you say Id spend a lot of focus on going at 1:30ish pace but making it as easy as possible. So work on efficiency at that pace and so that your 3k sessions are all at 1:30 pace. then hopefully it will be easy to hold it for 3.8k. plan to improve for the race, not what you can do now

Are you doing enough long training runs as your 100TT seems fast compared to your IM times, so over biking doesn't look like an issue. This only really leaves nutrition, poor run pacing or lack of run conditioning to explain your poor running. Running a 1:11 half is excellent, but it doesn't predict a fast marathon unless you've conditioned for the longer distance. This will be even more important when running a marathon after the swim bike. In essence, I doubt the problem is with the pace you swim at.

Open water in a wetsuit surrounded by other athletes, course distances not accurate, different water and wind conditions, different course challenges like current and wave changes etc and the pressure of starting the race - you do not want to focus on what times you should be doing. Your paradigm of the TT being 10/10 and 7/10 is a much better measure than timing.

You should practice your open water skills to death. Drafting, sighting and making sure you swim in all weathers is absolutely essential. Race day could see anything and I see from your races you got caught in the 2014 IM Wales swim just like I did!

Solid 1 hour open water swims on a lapped course should enable you to gauge your efforts in training so you can get your splits from each lap and see if your pace drops off. If it does you are putting in too much effort early on. Only you can learn your correct PRE - ?/10 - pacing strategy whatever you want to call it.

Find the level of effort that lets you get out of the water without dropping the pace, and find that level of effort in good and bad conditions. make sure you learn to swim in a group comfortably and accept sometimes its better to draft in a group and be a bit slower than to go it alone and have them catch you before the exit.

You appear to be having too many calories on the bike, which will result in your body rejecting them when you get to the run. I assume you haven't got a Powermeter, but would guess you IM power at about 200w. If you plug this into:

http://www.graemestewart.com/cycling-nutrition-calculator/

It give a calorie range from 272 - 467 per hour.

I also reckon that rather than banging out swim/bike/run all year, you need to put in a run focus to develop your run endurance. Now is a good time to start. The key to this is not to run fast, google Maffetone to get an idea, but don't be a slave to his arbitrary rules. When I've done it, I've run every day, building upto an hour, but capping my average HR to 120bpm (my max is 172, IM run HR 130). You will find that your speed gradually creeps up over the weeks. Once it stop creeping up, you have probably got a decent aerobic endurance for running and can build in more swim/bike. I've found that once you've built this endurance, it stays with you for quite some time, so just repeat each winter.

OK as thought a little over the hour should be ideal pace, like for like based on current times.

With wetsuit and good conditions you could probably get under.

on the run work on hills for some of them, do Cross Country of something similar. Build up some run specific strength to help with the tail end of the ironman run. Its about not slowing down and being strong is what helps there.

oh and run everyday as nobbie says. Even 30mins.

That's just a range to indicate what might be possible for different people. I manage towards the top end of that range, but I'm using the simplest possible calories in Maltodextrin/fructose. Start including bars and fruit in that and it probably lowers the possible intake as the stomach has more work to do. I too learnt this the hard way, a portaloo is not where you want to be on a hot day in Lanzarote

I'm no expert but isn't that a lot of liquid to be taking in on the bike? I biked imuk in 6:26 and drank 4 litres and weighed 82kg.

My penny's worth is that you should swim the first 300m/400m or so 'hard' then the rest 'moderate', with the odd 'hard' bit to catch good drafts going by. The idea of swimming the first bit 'hard' is that you will be swimming with people who are faster than you and so you will get a better draft.

What does hard mean? If you can do 400m in 5:40 all out then I'm guessing 'hard' is just under 6:00 per 400m and 'moderate' is around 6:20 per 400m.

My favourite session for learning these paces is to do 10x400m as 400m easy, then 3x 400m as (400m fast, 10s rest, 400m moderate, 10s rest, 400m easy, 30s rest). If you can only do two sessions per week, I'd also suggest something like 30 or 40 x 100m with 10s rest. Other than the first 5/last 5, do them at the fastest pace that you can sustain for them all (i.e. start sensible and don't slow down).

I have nothing to contribute to this, other than to say that when the OP pulls everything together in a single race, a Kona spot looks nailed on.

Now although IMUK and IMW are slow bike courses if you want to get faster you will either have to up the FTP (and that is likely to take more than 3 sessions a week ), and stay at a similar IF, or get more aero. Getting aero doesn't have to impact your run, overly aggressive and it is likely to but even so I would expect you at 68kg and a similar FTP to me to actually be faster on a hilly course but looking at your times it doesn't seem to be the case and I can only put that down to aero as I race at 5kgs over your weight.

For a pointer on that power (IMUK 2015) I would expect a sub 5:20 at IMUK.

For a little bit of comparison, between 2008 and 2010, I went sub 9 hours 5 times. Ok these were fast courses, Austria, Roth, Barcelona, Outlaw but at that time, my swim was around 56 mins, had a 100 mile TT of 3.50 and half marathon time of 1.15

Average times for the runs were: 56 swim, 4.40 bike, 3.05 run.

So, in reading your stats....it seems you are finishing rather than racing and pushing the pace.

Swimming, I was pretty much flat out...trying to hang onto feet. Ok not sprinting, but could not go any quicker.

Bike: Easy first 25 miles, but then was pretty much flat out

Run: 30k as fast as poss, then hold on.

It also sounds like a lot of fluid intake on the bike for UK-based races that probably aren't going to be blistering hot. I think if you rely too heavily on liquids for your fuel then you can have problems on a cooler day when you either aren't feeling thirsty because you're not sweating too much or you're forcing yourself to drink when you don't need to and it's just sloshing around in your stomach.

The leg fatigue could just be that you're not well conditioned for more than half mara, but if your biomechanics are poor then sort that out before increasing the mileage. The Primal3 guys in Dublin/Wickow are really good for that and they have a weekend workshop at end of Jan (I have no connection other than being a satisfied customer).

You shouldn't need to pee on the bike at all. When I KQ'd at Frankfurt in 2013, I didn't pee at all during the race, I drank to thirst, but obviously my thirst reflex seem to work. Do you feel thirsty and drink, or are you drinking because you feel you should 'stay hydrated' ?

all I have read/heard on podcasts over the last three years would suggest that you are over eating/drinking

If you were sitting around at home or in the office would you be peeing every hour which is approximately what this is? I think any sedentary person peeing this much would probably be due a test for diabetes

I'd second the suggestion to read Waterlogged to at least start thinking about your actual need for water and electrolytes. And just maybe the run might get to be more comfortable

IF is based on NP so that was near the 220 watts, even so the extra 19 watts isn't going to give you 40 mins +

Instead of looking for the cold weather as a reason, look at the data. 0.70 is a decent IM IF figure going harder on the bike might make the complete race even worse. I am not 100% sure it is wise to compare a 100mTT with an IM bike leg, you just might have done the improvement on the 100m TT with a higher power which you don't do in an IM.

As for peeing on the bike, I would suggest a max of 1 if you really hydrate, and to be honest this could be a cause of a bad time. Are you getting off the bike to pee (this wastes a min or so each time you do it), you are obviously drinking massive amounts (always means a heavy bike, and lots of time possibly out of the aero position, stopped at aid stations to refill).

I hydrate well on the bike and I am annoyed if I have to stop and pee just once. I would aim to need a pee in T2 and not before.

I think I should carry less weight on the bike,

Your swim effort will have a limited impact on the rest of the race,...as long as you don't red-line all the way through. As mentioned, concentrate more on good drafting skills and let those in front do the work. Sometime you might find yourself having to put a short effort in to 'hitch' a lift off someone else as you lose a draft or your draft drops back.
As a rough guide I'd say put an RPE of 90% TT (for lack of live data feedback). Also prep for the fast start with sprint intervals, so you can get on that draft.
Negligible affects on bike/run unless you TT the swim.

Firstly, with your speed, you will qualify for Kona. You just need to find the formula right for you.

You clearly have the bike and based on TT times are not nailing it too hard that should have a detrimental impact on the mara. However that is what is happening. Therefore, my tuppence is your nutrition.

Your carb intake is very high. Unless you have a cast iron stomach, it is likely too high. Hence why you likely can not execute the run you are capable of.

Do you do any of your training fasted or with a bulletproof coffee and therefore capable of using fat reserves on the Mara ?

Doing a couple of fasted, low intensity morning runs (1 for 30 mins, and 1 for 1hr 15 or so) and then starting my long weekend bike fasted was one of the key changes to my qualification by giving me a new ability to use fat as fuel. I kept the number of hours (average 12 per week the same) and only other change was a weekly over-geared turbo session.

Before, despite normally having a cast iron stomach, I was always too reliant on carbs. You definitely increase your fuel quantity by being more fat enabled.

All the best. I am sure you will find what works for you.

Tuesday, July 5, 2016

Post 133 - Last tough training week

This was my final tough week of training before a 2-week taper leading into Ironman UK. It’s unbelievable, I don't know how I have made it this far in 2016, with everything that’s been going on this year: with work, with all the redundancies, with all the threats of moving office (thereby making my commute literally untenable), with my consequent lack of motivation for training earlier in the year, with everything. The year has gone so quickly, but at the same time it has gone so slowly. And I still have two weeks left to go, and it seems like ages…

I had a rest day on Monday as usual, and the sore quad from last week seemed to have sorted itself out. I’ve been lucky with injuries this year, I’ve had niggles but nothing has really hindered my training in a big way. I say "lucky" - there's an element of luck, but maybe I could also say well-prepared, disciplined, adopting good avoidance strategies, not overtraining, doing my core work and stretching all the time, warming up and cooling down well, eating well, hydrating well, trying to sleep well. It all adds up and it all helps the whole.

I planned a final FTP (functional threshold power) test for Tuesday evening. This would tell me exactly where my fitness is, and will help me in deciding how hard to ride the Ironman bike. I did an FTP test on 17th May, 6 weeks ago, and hit 325 watts for a 20-minute all-out effort. I hoped to hit 330 watts this time around.

So I went into my pain cave (i.e. my bedroom) on Tuesday evening where my bike is clamped to its indoor trainer, did my stretching and warming up, and got going. The thermostat was reading 24 degrees in my room, and I had all the windows open and the fan going full blast in my face. 20 minutes of agony ahead. For the first 30 seconds, as I was settling into it, I was over 330 watts. But there’s no point in going too hard too soon and blowing up. So I settled into a wattage of just under 330, hoping I wasn’t overcooking things and hoping I’d have the legs to gradually increase my output in the second half rather than fading.

After 15 minutes my average was 328 watts and my heart rate was pushing 180bpm. I was maxing it out as hard as I could, doing everything I could to hold my output. The power meter doesn’t lie. You can ease off a fraction, but your power meter will show you up and you’ll drop from 330 to 290 all too easily. Keep the output. Could I hold it for 4 more minutes? Then 3 more? With 2 minutes left, I changed up a gear and my power went up to 340 watts. I thought I could hack it for 2 more minutes. Then one more. With less than a minute left, my average power hit 330 watts. I didn’t want to finish with less than 330 watts. So I hammered it to the end, heart rate in the high 180s.

Then it was over. I stopped my bike computer and collapsed over the bike. Oooffff. It took me a good few minutes to recover enough to sit up and look at my Garmin computer. I’d averaged 330 watts for 20 minutes at an average heart rate of 174bpm. Tough, tough stuff, but it was my highest ever 20-minute effort. Multiplying this 330 watts by 0.95 gives me an FTP of 313.5 watts (the theoretical maximum power I could hold for an hour). My current weight is about 66kg, so this gives a power-to-weight ratio of 5W/kg for 20 minutes, or 4.75W/kg for an hour.

Elapsed time 26:29, so it took me 6:29 to recover enough to take this photo

Why not just do the test for an hour, instead of doing 20 minutes and then applying a fudge factor? Well, 20 minutes is horrific, but you can recover quite quickly from it. Doing a full-on hour would take days to recover from, and would be way off the horrific scale. Plus, it would be quite dangerous to go so hard on the road, and doing an hour so hard on the turbo would be tedious in the extreme - it would feel like about 6 hours.

It’s interesting to compare my FTP and power-to-weight ratio with pros and elites. From the point of view of cycling as a standalone discipline, the following table gives a guide:

My FT power-to-weight ratio is currently 4.75W/kg, which puts me in the “excellent” category (hmmmm). To get to “world class”, I would have to either lose 16kg of weight (but losing that much weight would literally be impossible for me, and anyway, losing much more weight would mean I wouldn’t have the strength or energy to increase my power), or I’d have to gain another 100 watts (how on earth could I do that?! It took me 6 weeks of tough, tough training to increase my 20-minute power from 325 to 330 watts…), or a combination of both. Genetics are restrictive…

From the point of view of Ironman, the pros would typically hold somewhere between 3.8 and 4W/kg for the Ironman bike. For me, at 66kg, holding 4W/kg would mean an average of 264W for the Ironman bike. Not likely. I averaged 263 watts for the 100 mile time trial a couple of weeks ago and there’s not a chance I would have been able to run a decent marathon straight after that. For good amateur Ironman athletes trying to qualify for Kona, it’s said that around 3 to 3.3W/kg is a good guide. This would be 200-220 watts, and that seems reasonable…

I went out on Wednesday evening and did a fartlek run. Nothing too tough. A 5-minute warm-up, then 20 minutes of alternating fast and slow running, then a 5-minute cool down. No problem. Then I did some weights and core work. No problem. Then early to bed. No problem.

On Thursday, I had another rest day. No point in overdoing things at this point, there aren’t many more gains to be made. I had a chat with management at work, and they offered me the chance to work from home over the next two weeks, in the lead-up to Ironman UK. This is literally priceless, and goes a long way to making up for some of the situations I have been put through earlier this year by our head office. So that’s a lot of stress that I won’t have to deal with in the final two weeks – no commuting, no office, much less risk of getting ill, more sleep, more relaxed me, more time, better all around. Brilliant.

Rest day on Thursday - Jenga rocks!

On Friday, I left the office and the next time I go back to the office will be after the Ironman. I’ve no idea where I will be going back to, because there has been some fairly definite talk in the last week that the office will be moving within two weeks. To somewhere further out of London. So instead of 150 minutes per day commuting, it’ll be over 200 minutes. That’s ridiculous. I’ve been saying for ages that my days in London are numbered… Anyway, I’ll worry about getting through the Ironman first…

I went to the swimming pool after work and did 20 x 100m, each in 1:30, with 10 seconds of recovery. At least, that’s what I planned. By the time I had done ten repetitions, I was fading. Instead of holding 1:30, I was down a couple of seconds. The usual problem of starting too fast in the pool was biting. I was sneaking a few extra seconds of recovery. Instead of 10 seconds of recovery, it was 15. Not a great session, but I got through the 20 repetitions, and it was tough.

Then I went to the shop and spent a fortune on pasta, rice, vegetables, fruit, milk, porridge, chicken, turkey and salmon. And a very small bar of chocolate. I’ve got to know the guy in the shop. He sees what I buy every week. He couldn’t believe I had bought a small bar of chocolate. I told him that after the Ironman, he could expect me to be buying beer, Guinness, pizza, chips, pies, the works... I got home, did my single-leg bike drills on the turbo trainer, and got to bed.

On Saturday, I planned to do a “metric Ironman” – 112km on the bike (instead of 112 miles as in an Ironman) followed by a 26km run (instead of 26 miles as in the Ironman). The idea being that this session would be a good confidence boost, and hopefully not take too much out of me. Ideally I'd have done this session a month or more before race day, but circumstances haven't allowed it, so I hoped that 15 days before race day would be enough to allow good recovery. I want to be fresh and tapering well for the final two weeks, not knackered and recovering.

I didn’t feel great on Saturday when I got out of bed. I was very tired, and a bit sniffly. I knew that pollen levels were high, and maybe that had something to do with it, but also I’ve felt washed-out since before I went to Italy, and then I did a hard 100 miler, and then had to endure a trip to Italy, and then some more hard training. The body was tired and depleted. I didn’t feel terrible and I wouldn’t say I was full-on ill, but I definitely didn’t feel 100%.

For the metric Ironman, I thought I’d start with weights (to tire my arms and try to simulate how they'll feel after swimming 3.8km in the Ironman), then I'd do 3 and a half hours on the turbo at Ironman race intensity (220-230 watts) and then 16 miles of running in around 2 hours, again at Ironman race pace. I didn’t feel as warm on the bike as I usually feel, and ended up closing a window, but I got through three hours, varying my cadence and doing three efforts of 10 minutes at higher wattages, to simulate going uphill (plenty of hills at Ironman UK). I averaged 220 watts and 141bpm for the three hours.

Then I went out to run. I didn’t fancy a full two hours, and the more I ran, the less I fancied it. It was windy and I wasn’t warm, and the skies were dark and ominous, and I felt tired, and there’s only two weeks to go, and do I really need to trash myself running for two hours or more? After an hour, it started to spit with rain. The first stage of the Tour de France was due to finish soon, it would be good to see that. There was no point in running on, I wouldn’t gain any more by running any more, and I would need more time to recover. So after 10 miles, I told myself that was plenty, and went back to the house to eat for the rest of the day. I was back in time to see Mark Cavendish win the first stage of the Tour, and take his first ever yellow jersey.

Weight after 3 hours on the bike and 10 miles of running

Weight after refuelling and re-hydrating after 3 hours on the bike and 10 miles of running

I noticed that my right knee felt a bit sore. And I was still sniffly. Hmmm. I took some anti-inflammatories, went to bed very early and hoped for the best. I didn’t feel much better in the morning but went to the pool anyway to do my last tough training session before tapering. And it wouldn’t even be a “tough” training session, it would be sets of 250m, doing different strength drills with my arm floats, leg float, ankle band and hand paddles. I got through it, went back to the shop, bought more food, went home, and rested/ate/drank/watched sport on TV. I was a bit spoiled for choice – Tour de France, Formula 1, Wimbledon tennis, and Euro championship football. But that was it – all of the training done. Now just two weeks of tapering and easy training to get through.

I even had the pint of Guinness that has literally had my name on it since I won the Bristol triathlon. I texted my result back to my housemates and they texted me back a "well done" with a photo of a can of Guinness with a post-it note stuck to it with my name on it. This was 4 weeks ago. And I literally haven’t had any time to sit and drink it. So I finally drank it. It’s good for you, it has iron in it…

I should be really happy that all the work is done, and that I’ve got my fitness to a reasonable level. I have proof that my fitness is decent: a win at the Bristol triathlon, a 3:58 100-mile time trial, and a 330W FTP test. If you'd told me in January that I'd get to this level, I'd have taken it. But I know how quickly things can go wrong in the run-up to race day, and on race day itself. And I’m also worried about my right knee and my sniffles. Hopefully my sniffles will go away within a few days if it is a cold, and if the pollen levels go down, this should help (although I’ve never had problems with pollen or allergies in the past).

I am concerned about my knee though. Usually little niggles die down within a couple of days, but my knee has not felt right for a couple of days now and is showing no sign of getting better. I’m not sure what I can do about it either, other than rest it for a couple of days. I’d planned to rest for a couple of days anyway, so I’ll just take it easy, try to stay off my feet, and hope for the best…

So near and yet so far… so much effort put in, and it could all still yet come undone, but it could also be brilliant if it goes well…

Let’s see…

Training done this week was as follows:

Mon 27 June: Rest
Tue 28 June: 45 min turbo (20 min FTP test: 330W/174bpm: FTP = 313.5W)
Wed 29 June: 30 minute fartlek run
Thu 30 June: Rest
Fri 1 July: Swim 2.5km (20 x 100m, 1:30-1:35, 10-15 sec recovery), 30 minute turbo (3 x 3mins R/L/B)
Sat 2 July: 3 hour turbo (220W, 141bpm), 80 minute run
Sun 3 July: Swim 3.1km (12 x 250m drills)

Totals: Swim 5.6km, Bike 90 miles, Run 15 miles.

Wednesday, June 29, 2016

Post 132 - Surviving Italy

This week was all about surviving a work trip to Italy, with 3 weeks left until Ironman race day. The day before going to Italy, I did a flat-out, maximal 100 mile time trial in 3:58, having felt a bit rough in the few days beforehand. Such an effort massively depletes the body, leaving you a bit more vulnerable to picking up a bug and getting sick. In an ideal world, I’d have been able to take a few really easy, relaxing days after the 100, get myself well recovered, and well-positioned to crack on with the final training block before the Ironman.

But, the work trip to Italy meant a lot of stress – I’d be travelling with colleagues who had been ill during all of the previous week, and I’d be sitting in stuffy, manky aeroplanes, taxis, meeting rooms and hotels. Not what I needed. I know from past experience that at best, going to Italy leaves me feeling tired, washed-out and under the weather. At worst, I end up sick. So, the most vital things I brought with me to Italy were not the laptop and the work documentation, instead, they were my tubs full of raw garlic, raw ginger, chilli peppers, vitamin pills, kiwi fruits, bananas, apples and flapjacks. Desperate times call for desperate measures…

On the positive side, the weather was going to be warm and sunny and I’d have a bit of free time in the evenings to sit in a hot bath and sleep as much as possible. I just hoped so much that I wouldn’t end up getting sick so close to the Ironman.

I got up at 5:30am on Monday morning (having got up before 3am the morning before, for the 100), and I flew out to Italy. I had a row of seats to myself towards the back of the plane, and both seats behind me were empty, so no-one was coughing or spluttering in my immediate vicinity. I drank loads of water and the flight attendants probably wondered why I was going to the toilet so much. The view over the Alps was spectacular as usual – I’d love to live in some wee Alpine town, ideally in France, parce que je parle un peu de Francais (yes I know that should have an accent on it but I can't do it on this keyboard). We landed in Italy and then it was an hour in a taxi to our final destination. Then I stood outside in the sun for 20 minutes, upping my level of Vitamin D naturally. Journey survived.

On Monday evening I asked the hotel reception for a knife, fork and spoon, then I ate some of the ginger, garlic and chillis I’d brought, then tried to defuse the heat and pain they induced in my mouth with kiwi fruits. Then I sat in a hot bath for ages. Muscle recovery. Aaahhhhh. Then I had my dinner, and was in bed by 8pm. The hotel is really stuffy and I woke up on Tuesday morning with my mouth and throat and nose all absolutely parched. This leaves you much more prone to picking up infections. Not good. I drank water and turned the hot tap on full blast, put a towel over my head and breathed in the steam, to try to de-parch my mucous membranes. I took some vitamin pills, and had breakfast.

View of the Appennine mountains (hills?) from the top floor of the hotel

Then I had to get through the day. I had brought loads of fruit so was able to graze all day, and I drank lots of water, and went outside as often as possible to get some sunshine on my skin. I tried to sit as far away from coughers as possible. I just gritted my teeth and got though it and hoped for the best. I was doing all I could to stay healthy.

I got back to the hotel and decided to go for a very easy bike ride, maybe 30 minutes. They have old upright daisybell bikes in the hotel that you can borrow. The Appennine hills/mountains are not far to the south, and the countryside is nice. I didn’t make it as far as the hills, but I had a nice, easy, flat, relaxing spin on the bike, which turned into an hour. Oh to be able to do this on a daily basis, or commute like this. One day… I had stupidly forgotten to bring my sunglasses, so every insect in Italy therefore decided that my eyes would be good places to commit suicide.

Nice, empty, quiet, warm, non-polluted roads

I got back to the hotel, spent ages picking insects out of my eyes, had my delicious food (more garlic and ginger and chillis), took another hot bath, then created a home-made sauna – I blocked the bathroom door gaps up with towels, put the shower on full heat and full blast, and sat in the steam for 20 minutes. Then I had dinner and went to bed early again.

Two very different bike rides, just a couple of days apart...

When I got up on Wednesday morning, things were bad. Glands in my neck had swollen up, and my mucous membranes were absolutely parched again, to the extent that I was coughing up horrible, thick, dry, red, bloody phlegm. Uuuurrrggghhh. I steamed myself with the hot tap and towel again, ate vitamin pills with my breakfast, and wished I wasn’t in Italy.

I got through another day, and that evening I went for a short run. Actually, not a run. A shuffle. Then, it was the usual Italian bedtime routine: garlic, chillis, ginger, hot bath, home-made sauna, dinner and bed. But I couldn’t have another night like the previous night. I didn’t want my glands to swell up any bigger and I didn’t want horrible dry red phlegm in the morning. What to do?

What to do: I filled the bath with very hot steaming water, hoping it would help to humidify the room overnight. Then I took the two bins in the room, cleaned them, and filled them with very hot water too. I put one bin on either side of the bed, and then cleaned my teeth. I was about to get into bed when I noticed one of the bins was leaking and there was water soaking into the carpet. Feck it. Stupid leaky tin bin! I emptied it down the sink, checked the other plastic bin for leaks (all good) and went to bed hoping for the best. I was glad I’d noticed the leak, because if I hadn’t, all that water would have leaked all over my room and dripped onto people who were sleeping in the room on the floor below me…

One nice sunset photo, and one cryptic sunset photo

Because I had been drinking so much water during the day, I had to get up quite a few times in the night to go to the toilet, and every time I did this I had a drink. This helped to keep my mucous membranes wet, but it meant I slept badly as I was in a vicious circle of continuously drinking and continuously needing the toilet. When the alarm went off on Thursday morning, I was absolutely knackered, but not as parched as the previous two mornings. The swelling in my glands had gone down too. I was grateful that there were no more nights to spend in the hotel as I was flying back that afternoon.

I emptied the bath and bin, I steamed myself under a towel, I ate my vitamin pills and breakfast, and had my final morning with work in Italy. Then it was off to the airport. London was experiencing bad weather, so the inbound flight from London was delayed and we were late taking off from Italy. I didn’t have a great flight back. I was sitting with the window on one side of me, and some obnoxious, coughing, spluttering guy on the other. I didn’t want to be anywhere near him. I put the overhead air vent on full blast to divert his germs away from me, and he tutted and glared and coughed and spluttered. I looked behind and saw that the back row of seats were free. So I told him I was very ill and needed to sit near the toilets, and escaped from his vicinity.

The flight was late getting into London because of the rain, and all the trains were delayed because of the rain, and I was very late getting home. I went home via the osteopath and had another decent treatment session. My body is definitely a lot looser now, which is great. I had planned to do a short turbo/run session when I got back, but it was late (the trains were all fecked up too due to the rain), and I was tired, and it wasn’t a key training session, so I ate my dinner and went to bed. I’d been looking forward to this dinner all week - before I went I struck a deal with my housemate - I gave him my leftover pasta on Sunday night, and he would cook for me when I got back from Italy. It’s always nicer when it’s made for you… I recounted the things I'd had to do in Italy to try to get through it. In doing so, and watching his reaction, I realised just how far removed from "normality" (whatever that is) my life has become. But, I do what I have to do...

I had to think hard about what to do over the weekend. I was exhausted. The 100 miler, and travelling to Italy, and being on the knife-edge, had taken its toll. I had planned to do a hard swim and single-leg turbo drills on Friday, an early start for a 200km bike ride followed by a run on Saturday, and another hard swim followed by a long run on Sunday. But I decided I needed to tone that down. I would be asking for trouble if I tried to do all that in such a tired and depleted state.

So instead, on Friday, I decided I’d go to the pool and do a steady 4000m. I’d do the same on Sunday and make this a “long endurance swim” weekend. Two steady long swims shouldn’t take too much out of me. I learned that starting slowly makes the overall time quicker. I was able to glance at my watch at key intervals during the swims. Here’s a breakdown of my split times for the two swims:

Friday: 1500m in 25:20. 3000m in 52:40. 3800m in 67:20. 4000m in 70:55.

Sunday: 1500m in 25:30. 3000m in 53:30. 3800m in 65:15. 4000m in 68:40.

I was almost a minute slower after 3000m in Sunday’s swim, but in the final 1000m I was much quicker, not because of any effort to swim faster but just because starting slower means you finish faster. I didn’t swim either of these swims particularly hard, so to swim an Ironman length swim in a pool with no wetsuit in 65:15 is good. My heart rates were quite low immediately afterwards as well, definitely no higher than 150bpm. Maybe this is the way to do the Ironman swim, nice and easy, no pushing hard at all… Usually after the swim, for the first hour in the Ironman bike I am fighting to get my heart rate down from over 170bpm to under 150bpm. An easier swim would mean it wouldn’t get anywhere near 170bpm, setting me up for a better bike and run hopefully. I might lose a couple of minutes in the swim, but should gain it back in the bike and run.

I didn’t do any single leg drills on Friday evening and went to bed early, having decided against a 6am start the following morning for a 200km cycle as well. It wouldn’t have been a good idea as it would have been massively overdoing things. The 3:58 100 miler proved I’m in good shape, there’s not much more to gain now, but a lot to lose.

Instead on Saturday I had a much, much-needed lie-in and did a 2-hour turbo, with a “pyramid” of leg speed and leg strength drills. It was good: beneficial without taking too much out of me. I followed it with a short run. Then I did my weights and core work and had another early night. On Sunday morning I went to the pool and did another 4000m. I then ate and rested, and later in the afternoon, forced myself out for an hour of hilly running. I didn’t push too hard and ran just slightly quicker than 7 minute miles, up and down a lot of hills. Then I finished off with more core work and weights.

It seemed I had gotten away with things. I hadn’t got ill, I’d got through the Italy trip, I’d been sensible enough over the weekend to know to listen to my body and tone my training down. I knew I was in good shape, the 3:58 100 miler had confirmed that. I was really excited after my 3:59 100 miler two years ago, but I’m not as excited this year. I haven’t allowed myself to be. I know only too well how quickly things can go wrong. I just need a good final three weeks, and a nice day on race day, and for things to go well on the day for a change. Too much to ask? Hopefully not…

I’ll have one more tough week next week where I’ll do an FTP bike test to see what my power output is, and I’ll base my Ironman bike pacing on the results of this test. I’m already not looking forward to doing the test – you basically go as hard as you can for 20 minutes and it is not pleasant. I’ll also try and do a “metric Ironman” at the weekend, which will be a 112km bike (instead of a 112 mile bike as in the Ironman) and a 26km run (instead of a 26 mile run as in the Ironman). I’ll do these at race intensity and hopefully it’ll set me up well.

Saying all this, as I was going to bed on Sunday evening, knowing that Monday was a rest day, I felt that my right quad was sore. Hmmmm. It was sore enough for me to take two anti-inflammatories before I went to bed. It’s a big thing for me to decide to take anti-inflammatories. There was no reason for my quad to be sore, I hadn’t done anything out of the ordinary. And at the time of writing, on Monday, it still doesn’t feel right. and I've had another couple of anti-inflammatory pills. I hope this doesn’t turn into another major curveball at this stage…

Training done this week was as follows:

Mon 20 June: Rest
Tue 21 June: 1 hour bike
Wed 22 June: 20 minute run
Thu 23 June: Rest
Fri 24 June: Swim 4.1km
Sat 25 June: 2 hour turbo, 20 minute run
Sun 26 June: Swim 4.1km, 60 minute hilly run (6:52/mile, 149bpm)

Totals: Swim 8.2km, Bike 65 miles, Run 15 miles