Howdy, Stranger!
Categories
Pirate Mentors / Mentorees 2011
The materials in this website are in no way intended to replace the professional medical care, advice, diagnosis or treatment of a doctor, qualified personal trainer, therapist, dietitian or nutritionist Runners's World, Part of the Hearst UK well-being network © Copyright 2017
Comments
Melli - I found deep admiration for my slow cooker while training this year.
Yum!
Becky, I have no clue about the rest of Tri other than "swim a bit, cycle a bit", but I'll happily help you with running if you want.
My IM ambitions are on more of a 5-year plan than a one-year one at the moment, but I'm going to enjoy doing some little pootles for now
I was kind of kidding about the cake stops in my post
as I didn't want to come across as being too serious or up myself -tris are a fun pastime for me, and given that I'm still learning, thought it would be pretty rich to try to come over as some tri-guru! ho hum, lesson learned! In reality, the cake stop tends to come after the hard miles. Mebbe I'm not cut out for mentoring unless I can express myself more clearly 
lee the pea, that'd be great! There's often a group of girlies of varying abilities go out of a Saturday round east lothian, borders, etc.
I quite like cake stops - for me they have a place in keeping me interested in cycling year round. I knock them on the head for the last few months of IM training though.
Group rides are good too - for company and again keeping the interest up - but as you race alone - you have to train alone or at least in a small gang - theres no point expecting to sit on someones wheel for 112 miles.
Was refering to the Woodbine but got slightly confused by the Gindleford cafe because also a very nice place after night on the moors making shapes. Not that that sort of thing goes on up there and farmers never sort out free parties your honour. Mmm and Norfolk arms in the morning and that little cafe in bakewell.
Don't worry about the surgery. Don't forget I had a infected broken rib Autumn/winter last year and still did ok after going up a couple of noches in my belt. Just worry about getting better after the op.
meface
a good place to start is the Don Fink book, (be iron fit) or something like that. Heavy on daily plana but light on why
Gordo / Friel 'going long' is very readable, good on monthly strategy / why, light on daily plans...
Beginner triathlete has some free plans for IM. Little Ninja had some of these she paid for, and I put them into a spreadsheet to get an idea......
re plans, most revolve around long slow distance with 1 long run, 1 long swim, and 1 long runper week, with 1-2 shorter sessions per sport per week.
The long sessions build up to say 1h 15 m swim, 5-6 hr ride, 2-2.5 hr run, (but you have 6 months to get there) 3 weeks of increasing the distances, then have a recovery week.. and repeat. Depening on your fitness level / aims for the day, then that could be enough, or the start of build training....
Plans last from 20 - 30 week. Anything longer and its easy to get bored later on when you should really be going for it.
Pirates that have started from a low fitness level will have a good idea what is needed to be done from now till official plans start...... and will make good mentors for those people starting there....
Melli - very true, I guess I forgot that lots of folks decide to do an IM from zero. I guess I'm too cautious - and struggle for "me" time to ride long.
Becky - I feel your foot pain. I had a big neuroma issue last summer, cost me new bike shoes, pedals, trainers, work shoes, every day shoes................it still plays up a little but not too bad, I can run long on it again, but I have no feeling now in a small area (but the doc said thats all an operation would do anyway).
Build it up slow for distances and train smart instead of hard. If you cane it every day you will brakedown.
LN,
I know but I probably want help with the bit that everyone has said they don't want to help with. The training plan.
So no late night wibbles, I know I can keep going for the duration, I know I can finish. I just want to maximise the benefit from training. I don't expect something for nothing - training is hard and long - but I also know that with extra effort in the less you can get more than with less in more. What? I did the marathon using the FIRST 3-days per week program.
Predicted swim time at the moment would be 1:25. Bike time at Swashbuckler (flat) 02:38 for 50 miles. My background is running (well rugby and drinking really) but I am probably more naturally suited to cycling than running. I only did 136 Miles in 4 weeks bike training post VLM in May for the Swashbuckler and only 163 on the bike up to that point. I have done 1000 miles on the bike since then.
Could ask HappyChap but I see enough of her already and prefer to use her for tea and biscuits.
I can put together my own running program no problem but struggling with a Tri-training program for IM although have been reviewing BT plan.
Honestly I would prefer a female - it is just less "who has the biggest bbq" - have had previous coaching type relationships which have worked better that way. Playing rugby I have had fitness coaches, dieticians, phsycos etc. - these have proved more productive when female led rather than male led. Less chest beating etc.
mefaceYou are clearly strong on the bike and reasonable on the run
I would reccommend some swimming tho
Wow - I do a bit of work and put a post together and the thread moves on.
OC - thanks
I have the BT plans, I have Joe Friels book and understand the training philosphy. I guess I either need to get Don Finks book and pick one that works on my limiters
- Cycling endurance
- Swim Speed ( swimming for 1:30 isn't that hard to train for)
- Run Speed (at 15 stone I am not the quickest)
Currently clocking up one masters swim per week, open water every two weeks for a long swim. Cycling commute averaging 100 miles per week. Biggest peak was 150 miles in a week. Longest ride post swashbukler was 40 miles but have been focussing on lots and often rather than long - which I know must come. Running I can handle.mememeface
Like the book because it explains muscle memory and also body line.
Meface,
the base training should be long and 'slow' (although the slow is relative...)
Its pretty easy to knock up a basic plan.... making it fit around your real life is way harder.....
Read everything you can find, buy lots of books, (£12.95 v £xxxx for a road bike, £380 for entry etc etc ).
A basic training plan should be quite easy to sort out....... then get it validated by your mentor of choice.
I did lots of reading last year.......
You can also use various software tools to help plan. I think Garmin do something, I use triblogs but there are 3-4 others out there.
then there is also outlook or excel......
OC
The books are easy. Shooting myself in the foot by revealing my source: you can get them in the library - I have renewed Friels book about 6 times so far! Local library doesn't stock them but Surrey has a reasonable stock and for 50p they will order them in from any Surrey library.
8-Iron - I will have to give them back but the turbo came with a wheel support. Although I doubt they have a specific fine for rubber tyre mark on cover!
Maybe I am lazy but the BT plans are a dogs breakfast of a layout and there is no executive summary. They just start with the details and don't break it into the phases that Friel talks about. It most likely has the phases in it they just don't show it. As far as I could tell they don't even show the 1, 2, 3, Rest weeks. Therefore it just seems to be a 140 training sessions. Many running training schedules have better layouts.
Fitting it into real life is not that hard - I managed to train on 25 days in July and 14 already in August. Lots of 17-mile each way bike commutes.
Garmin & SportsTrack + Run Saturday are my preferred technolgy fix.
Plan:
Sorted (now just to mail a possible mentor)
meface
Bimey, some of these mentors are going to be made to work hard.
Meface you seem to be wanting a coach, not a mentor?
I had a mentor for my first, and it was just someone I could chat to occasionally and informally about my concerns - not a free (and unqualified) subsitute for a coach...! The Fink plan is a perfectly good starting point, and written by someone who probably knows a lot more about coaching than most on here - though as Bassy has pointed out, when you're starting out, you don't need rocket-science style coaching - swim a bit, bike a lot, run a lot has also worked for many!
Surely the richness of what a pirate mentor can offer is in the more normal-human-being aspect of how to deal with not being able to do every session of an ideal plan, and in the little tips for race day? Nor is it necessary to have a mentor, I'm surprised it's number 1 on your list.
I certainly wouldn't claim to be any kind of expert, but have read enough theory to know that saying you trained on 25 days in July could mean anything or nothing - quantity isn't everything, and Train Smart might be a better number 3 than Train Hard.
Just my thoughts, good luck with it!
DTB UCP - It was in response to OC's comment about fitting it all in around life. Which I do seem to manage to do - if anything I did too much but the weather was great - what can I do?
And the number was order of completion rather than priority. Mentors are limited resource and the good ones should go first in an effective capital market. The plan would not be snapped up by someone else. Therefore given I can't do two things at once I thought mentor first, then plan.
Fink's plans probably are good but that bloke Friel suggest more emphasis on personal limiters. So it is more how to tailor the plan to my limiters. A 20 week plan doesn't see me starting until March so I have plenty of time to address limiters before then. Or they could tell me I am talking b*llocks and JFDI.
Right enough for tonight. Will start work on that BT plan and try to resolve it into something with a storyline rather than a chemical equation.
meface
We are a year out from Regensberg and 11 months from outlaw!!
If youve entered Regensberg/are thinking of entering outlaw do the following now....
bassy's free mentoring advice
Start swimming. Its hardest to master cos its technical, I should know, 3 years and Im still crap. Get lessons booked, go to them, learn things.
Ride your bike a bit, an hour or two a couple of times a week to get used to being in the saddle. Go to your local bike shop and ask them if they do a run from the shop or know a good beginner friendly club. Get riding, its the quickest way to get bike fit funnily enough, solo, with others, who cares at this time, you just need to be on a bike to get some riding in before you go into base training 30 weeks out, so you arent starting from scratch. Spookily you will get better, and the more you go out the better you will get. You dont need to bust your arse just yet you want steady sessions to build a bit of base fitness
Running. Go running. go with your neighbour, the dog, a club, just run. Steadily. speedwork and stuff can come later.
Thirty weeks or so out go into proper base training. Consistency is the key... regular sessions not 4 days off ram it all into 3 days.
Twenty weeks build, bit of speedwork, more specific sessions and the odd brick
Ten weeks peak.
job done.
Please take heed of this next line or ignore at your peril.........
Do not OVERTRAIN. you will feck yourself right over if you do, and it may not catch up with you straight away, but it will catch up with you in the end, fact. Voice of experience here. One day off a week, thats not a day off with a bit of swimming, its a day off, and dont chase missed sessions.Numerous books/coaches/mentors/experts will tell you the same thing.... rest is as important as training.
If you want your sessions sorted for you so you know you are on the right track, and someone who looks at your feedback and correlatesyour next block of training, hire a coach, cos thats what they do.
If you want to know how hard your (possible) mentor is/does/was training pm and ask them, but allow for the fact they may have been training for some years so can handle harder sessions.
Its really not that difficult....You get out what you put in at maximum, and less than you put in more often than not. So meaningful sessions that acheive something are good, crappy junk miles aren't. So as has been said already if you are going group riding get a group where you are doing a bit of work.
There are many people on here who train smarter/better/ more efficiently than me, but if you have family/kids you need to factor that in, as they will be a limiter on your time.Making your sessions count is vital if time is limited.
So in summary
book swimming if you cant or are a poor swimmer now, like NOW
PM a mentor who appeals based on their posts. And listen to them, they know more than you, cos theyve done it. Thats why they are the mentor!
Dont be offended if they say no. They may not have the time/inclination to help you. They may be helping people already and you are asking for a favour.
Do not expect them to sort your training plan for you. They have their own to sort. Want tailored plan, hire coach, want advice/ comment based on experience ask them.
There you go. A whole free block of mentoring.
It is far to far out to be worrying about next years race, January is the time to focus on a plan. But start building some basic fitness and skills now.
What Bassy said...
Plenty of time until Jan to get sorted out, you don't need a training plan as of now... all said for those looking at the BT training plan, it's worth a look. I did Roth on this plan.