Years and year ago, Coach Tom (one of my former coaches) recommended that I pick up a copy of Philip Skiba’s Scientific Training for Triathletes. Coach Tom described the book as, “the best book on triathlete training that I have ever read.” Coach Tom is not one for hyperbole so I ordered the book immediately by express mail. Continue reading
Over the past ten years or so, there’s been a gentle tide change in the way that coaches approach training for long-distance running. While it’s most often talked about in terms of running, it has application across all endurance sports, so this change definitely affects duathletes and triathletes as well.
There, I said it. I know that there will be many people who will applaud and many others who will scowl at the idea. But it’s something that needs to be said because I think it’s an epidemic and does a real disservice to our sport.
Back in 1998, while I was pouring over my latest issue of Owen Anderson’s Running Research News, I came across a really interesting study on recovery that fundamentally changed the way I did some workouts for years to come. Continue reading
I have had a coach on and off for the last 10-15 years now and I have some pretty strong opinions about how to get the most bang for your buck out of the coaching experience.
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When I was a young guy still in my thirties, the first coach I hired was Rick Niles after reading his book Time Saving Training for Multisport Athletes. In retrospect, some of the ideas that I learned are even more applicable to older multisport athletes.
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A few days back, I had a marathon weekend racing Duathlon Nationals and Seafair. The next day (Monday), I was curled up in a fetal position on the couch and occasionally making cow-like sounds (memo to self: take such days as vacation or sick days). I felt only slightly better on Tuesday. A moderately hard (but failed) workout on Wednesday and an easy day on Thursday… maybe finally I’m ready to hit a hard workout. And so that workout would be 2 x 30min at FTP or higher with 5min recovery. I rode this one with my friend Mary. Time escaped us and I was only able to get one effort in, but it was both comfortable and 10 watts higher than it should have been. If I raced with this much energy on the weekend, I would have been unstoppable. Obviously, at least for that day, anaerobic threshold (AT) was not my limiter.
So what’s going on here? Simple, it’s just basic training effects and supercompensation. According to Pete Pfitzinger, there are some basic rules to the timing of training effects. The bottom line is:
Last year, I made it onto TeamUSA for ITU Long-Course World Duathlon Championships (Powerman Zofingen). I trained all season really hard, averaging 40+ miles a week of running and 200+ miles a week of cycling. I didn’t race more than a half dozen races. I hated my life and I barely spent any time with my wife. While my endurance was fantastic, my speed sucked. Then, three days before the race, I severely strained my right soleus while jogging the running course of the race and my season was over.
After the race, I spent a lot of time looking back over my race history and I remembered that I tended to be happiest when I raced a lot. My all-time record was racing in 23 races in one season. While almost all of these races were lower-priority “B” or “C” races, they all still brought a greater sense of satisfaction to my athletic season than my one or two “A” races. And, as Zofingen had proven to me, putting all of my eggs in one basket puts my overall happiness in a very precarious position.
The Athletic Time Machine 
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