2011 Triathlon Season is Set

The first half of my Triathlon Training plan for the 2011 season is officially done. Since my speed increase over the season (at least that’s the goal) I typically hold off on completing the details of the Build and Peak phases until I’m about halfway through my third Base phase. That said, Base 1, 2, and 3 are done and uploaded in the triathlon training schedule section. If you’re interested you can take a peak.

Of course, before I was able to work on those details I had to map out my 2011 race schedule. As you know, that’s the “fun” part of all of this; figuring out what races to enter, scheduling test races and all that stuff. For me it basically boils down to this: The Philadelphia Triathlon will be my first “A” race of the season. I actually wanted to do the Spring Washington DC race the weekend before, but my wife had an issue with sharing our daughter’s birthday with a triathlon, so Philadelphia it is. The month before, though, will be my first major trace; the Columbia Triathlon in Maryland. Because it’s so early in the season and it will be tough to get in any open-water swimming before the race I’m making it a “B” race, so I won’t be doing too much tapering before the race.

Both those races are Olympic distance triathlons. By the end of the season the goal is to bump up to the 70.3 distance. In September I’ll be doing the Savageman tri in Deep Creek, Maryland and then ending the season with the inaugural Iron Man Pocono Mountains 70.3 here in PA. Throughout the season there will be a few sprint and low priority Olympic distance triathlons, as well as a number of local 5K’s to use as run tests. The cool thing about the 5K’s is that my wife will be participating with me in a number of them. It’s nice to finally be able to share the fun!

The other major highlight for the coming season in the Warrior Dash in Jim Thorpe, PA. It’s a 3.5 mile Adventure Race in North East, PA. My wife and brother-in-law already committed to entering it with me. Now I’m just trying to round up some people at work to make a huge party out of it.

Overall, 2011 looks like it’s going to be a lot of fun!

Turkey Trots & Weight Loss

Tomorrow morning will a total role-reversal for me. Instead of racing and having my wife there to cheer me on; I’ll be doing the cheering for her. My wife entered herself in a local 5K Turkey Trot and has spent the past several months preparing for it. And tomorrow morning we get to see the payoff. No matter what, I must say that I am certainly proud. After several failed attempts at weight loss and exercise fads I was pretty skeptical, but she proved me wrong. She actually stuck to it this time, and in the process dropped some weight, which was her ultimate goal.

For this exact reason, this is why I’ve always been a huge proponent of setting non-weight related goals in order to actually lose weight. A great way to lose weight is to make weight loss an indirect benefit of another goal. That’s exactly what I did and I was able to lose 30 pounds over the course of a year. How did I do it? I focused on being fit enough to finish a triathlon, not losing 30 pounds. The great benefit of triathlon training is that is involves preparing for three different disciplines; swimming, biking, and running. For me, that meant I was able to do a variety of workouts, that way I didn’t get bored doing the same thing day in and day out.

While I chose triathlon as my sport of choice, there are many others out there that you may want to take advantage of. However, setting the goal of finishing any type of race will likely yield the same results. Think about it this way: If you set a goal of participating and finishing a race, then you’re locked into at least 5 months of training. This is simply because the race season starts around May. During those five months your workouts will shift from being a “chore” to becoming a habit, and once they become habit, they are much, much easier to maintain. In turn, the likelihood that you’ll loose weight and keep it off increase dramatically.

And the whole, “habit” idea is where my wife is at this point. In fact she’s already searching for races in the spring. Maybe one day I’ll be able to talk her into triathlon!

Triathlon Training with a Toddler

As I write this blog my wife is driving our daughter around the neighborhood in an effort to put her to sleep. Three straight nights of sporadic sleep have caused us to resort to, “the drive.” But it’s times like this that really put everything into perspective. It’s so easy to get immersed in training and block out nearly everything and everyone around you. But life is about balance, and my wife and daughter have taught me that. Sure I still get frustrated when I miss a swim session because my daughter kept us up all night, but the fact is; it’s only one workout. Chances are my body will benefit from the rest anyway.

The other cool thing about our daughter is she doesn’t judge. As athletes we can often be pretty hard on ourselves, especially after a big race. For example, even when I have a great race, somehow I still pick out the things I did wrong. Of course, part of that is so I can improve for next time, but the fact is, I often don’t relish the positive stuff enough. My daughter helps me do that. No matter what, she’s there with my wife at the finish line to support me.  It’s a great thing to have, and it helps drive me on the long workouts and races. I won’t lie; training with a toddler around is an insanely difficult thing to work around. Especially one that seems to run on no sleep, but in the end I’m sure it will make me a more focused, balanced athlete.

Smooth Swimming

The other month I mentioned I came across the website, www.swimsmooth.com. After about two months of incorporating their tips and guidelines I’ve already shaved about 7 seconds off my 100 meter time! I freaking love this site! I was a pretty good swimmer, but I kinda hit a wall. No matter what I did I couldn’t get faster. Well, that was before I came across this site. With it’s help I was able to tighten up my technique and become a much more efficient swimmer. I still have a long way to go, but I’m certainly excited about getting there.

Adding Plyometrics

By now most triathletes understand that the off-season is a great time to incorporate some new and different workouts into your triathlon training arsenal. Like many of you I’ve added some traditional strength training throughout the winter months; concentrating on the legs and back. The other thing I recently added was plyometrics. I started reading a number of articles about the benefits of these workouts and quickly became interested. Then I realized within my wife’s stack of P90X dvd’s there was a disc dedicated to it… lucky me!

So far I’ve gotta say; I love it. Just a couple of weeks doing the P90X workout twice a week, I can feel a difference. My legs feel a little more responsive and “snappy.” We’ll see what kind of dividends it pays with my run time in the spring. I highly recommend trying to incorporate plyometrics into your off-season training. At the very least, do some research and at least work in some drills before your runs. You’ll be glad you did.