Anyone ever done a triathlon before?

[korn469]

One of my friends is doing a triathlon in September, and she wants me to do it with her. The event consists of a 1.5K swim, a 58K bike ride, and a 10K run.

I am in decent shape. I try to weightlift and jog right now. I bought a bike on Monday, and I've been biking as soon as I wake up. I'm not a very good swimmer, but I do have a pool at my apartment.

So have any of you ever done a triathlon before? If so do you have any training tips? Tell me about your triathlon experiences. Also could you please share your training regimen? Thanks guys!

[KrazyHorse]

I've never done a triathlon before, but from personal experience and from my cousin (who used to do triathlons) the bike ride is going to be the worst part. A 1.5k swim is not that far, and if you're a runner, the 10k is not too different. The bike ride is real ****ing hard in terms of muscular endurance if you're not an experienced bike rider.

[Flubber]

I'll disagree with Krazy a bit here. I trained for a triathlon from a starting point of being a decent/good biker, ok runner and a poor swimmer. I ended up not doing the tri due to an unrelated hockey injury to my back (sidelined me for months) and haven't gotten back to it due to my young chilren.



My tips

1. Concentrate on the swim. If you come out of the water completely exhausted, your biking and running skills and training go out the window You must learn to be an efficient swimmer.

2. Train up to a base level of proficiency in each sport for few weeks and then add practicing the transitions. This is less about the equipment change and more about getting your body used to the switch from one motion to the other. Many find the switch from the bike to the run to be be particularly disconcerting. IN practice if you do a brisk 30km bike ride and do the fast transition to a 2-3 km fast run, you will get your body accustomed to the change. Do not go to a tri without having practiced this a few times

3. If your event will be in open water, do some open water swims-- Find a tri training group so you can deal with others near you and recover if kicked etc etc-- If your location has colder water, absolutely look into getting a wetsuit. Even in warmer climes a wetsuit is a good idea-- it can actually help your swimming form

4. Consider some bike-run events as training. It gets you into some competition without the swim-- Again I started as a poor swimmer so that is personal prejudice but it is a common one since only a minority of tri athletes start as swimmers

5. Consider targetting doing a sprint event a few months before your bigger event. Those are about half your cited distances . That gives you an achievement and positive experience earlier in your training. Otherwise you train for little personal reward for what seems like a long time OR you go in the 1.5-58-10 when you aren't really prepared and end up having a miserable experience. The sprint ones are short enough that you should do ok with even basic training but it gives you a real measure of how close you are to doing the longer event in an enjoyable way.

There are numerous published training regimens so I won't try to replicate those here but the reality is that it has to fit your life. My regimen focused on my swimming weakness and I was in the pool about 4-5 times a week for hard or recovery swims. A lot of the early swims were basically me learning to be able to swim 500m and then more without a stop -- 60 lengths without stopping is far more than most non-swimmers can do.

I biked less frequently but longer (ie at least one 100km ride a week) with usually two shorter rides ( some were on my trainer where you can do an intense workout at specified cadences etc etc-- Try one legged pedalling-- it really rounds out your stroke.) Training runs went as high as 10km but for time purposes (and the fact that I enjoy running least) I focused more on intervals, hill climbs, working on stairs etc .





I will get back to it. Despite now having two young children, my current job gives me more time off than I have ever had. Last weekend I was out on my bike and I am feeling that bug again. But I went for a swim and agghhhh-- 10 lengths in succession ( a mere 250 metres) felt like a huge accomplishment

Good luck

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Flubber
I'll disagree with Krazy a bit here. I trained for a triathlon from a starting point of being a decent/good biker, ok runner and a poor swimmer

I don't know. I'm a good runnedr and I guess I've always been a pretty decent swinmmer, but unless you;re an experienced bike rider that **** does weird stuff to you. I biked 75 k cold a few years ago and my legs were ****ed up for 4 days afterward, but even when I jumped in the pool without ahving smwum for 5 years, I put down 1.6 k (1 mile) in 24 mins with no problems at all.

[Eli]

but I do have a pool at my apartment.

[FrostyBoy]

KH, I bike a lot too, I usually don't have leg problems like you mention though, do you think it might be just an individual case?

[korn469]

Originally posted by Eli

but I do have a pool at my apartment.

I put in that tidbit to explain I do have a place to train for the swimming portion. Though I am a piss poor swimmer. I've came close to drowning at least three times in the New River, and I had one scary experience in the ocean a few months back. This worries me far more than the biking or the running portion of the event.

[FrostyBoy]

you don't want to be drowning out there, I doubt anyone will notice you

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Sn00py
KH, I bike a lot too, I usually don't have leg problems like you mention though, do you think it might be just an individual case?

75km cold is too much to start. Biking is very repetitive in a fixed position . I have cycled a lot over the years and if I have taken even a month off, I ease back with 4-5 very short rides (20-30km).

[Kontiki]

Everyone I know, including family members who have done several triathalons, say that the swim is the hardest part - especially if you aren't already a borderline competitive swimmer.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


I don't know. I'm a good runnedr and I guess I've always been a pretty decent swinmmer, but unless you;re an experienced bike rider that **** does weird stuff to you. I biked 75 k cold a few years ago and my legs were ****ed up for 4 days afterward, but even when I jumped in the pool without ahving smwum for 5 years, I put down 1.6 k (1 mile) in 24 mins with no problems at all.

I won't call BS but krazy I hear you are a smart guy. Do you not realize that that is an Excellent swim time? I did a look at recent local Olympic distance triathlons and did you know that a 24 minute time over 1500 metres (100m less than you did) would have beaten all but TEN of 121 competitors in this one

http://www.picksbrain.com/bearspray/2003.txt

and your pace of 1:30 per 100m is faster than all but 2 people did in this 500m sprint event -- of 285 competitors. So you were faster on average over 1600 metres than these people were over 500m-- and did it with no practice

http://www.multisportscanada.com/Results/06T3Overall.txt

Or this one where I think one guy beat your pace (of 183 people)at a 1500 m distance

http://www.multisportscanada.com/Results/05ChapOlympicOA.txt

Now the pros are much faster than you ( 17-18 minutes seems common at 1500m) so you aren't claiming impossible feats here

**************

Two qualifiers: I believe all these are open water swims but all are lake swims so waves, currents and tides are not in play . Second, some of these swim times may include the "transition" to the bike (the sprint distance example for instance). But the fact remains that even adjusting a bit for that, if you can swim even 1500m in 24 minutes (rather than the 1600m you claim) you would be in the top 10% of the athletes coming out of the water in most local triathlon events and easily in the top half even if you go crazy in how much you adjust for open water and transition issues.

So my questions are these

1. Will you admit that you are full of crap? or
2. Are you simply not smart enough to realize what a kick-ass level swimmer you happen to be?
3. Or was your time or distance a "typo" perhaps ??

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Kontiki
Everyone I know, including family members who have done several triathalons, say that the swim is the hardest part - especially if you aren't already a borderline competitive swimmer.

Thats consistent with what the people I trained with said and with the bulk of the books, magazines and websites say.

But swimming seems to naturally come easy to krazy-- see my previous post for details

[DanS]

A 75 km bike ride cold is excessive (there's no good reason to do it). If your legs aren't killing you, your ass is.

[Kontiki]

It's not a question of whether it comes naturally or not - it's not the fear for most people is that they simply can't swim a mile without drowning - it's that swimming takes so much more out of you than the other activities, regardless of what kind of condition you're in.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Flubber

1. Will you admit that you are full of crap? or
2. Are you simply not smart enough to realize what a kick-ass level swimmer you happen to be?
3. Or was your time or distance a "typo" perhaps ??

The results you posted are some ****ty swimmers.

http://hopkinssports.cstv.com/sports/w-swim/stats/031107aaa.html

That's division III college women's results.

They all put down 1500 m in ~17:20 (so I was ~30% slower on the same distance)

On running at my peak I was competitive at 5k with the women's running team (also DIII). My PB for 5k was 18:07

Now, when I was younger (12 and below) I swam competitively at a local level for a little while. I still have pretty good form. What I don't have is the physique to drop 30% off my swim time (despite lifting regularly).