Tri / Triathlon / Triathlons - do they float your boat?

Jesus... 37m 10k? That's frigging fast. Well deserved 1st.

I did find it quite rewarding when people on the HIM distance bombed past me doing 40+km AVG and then I proceeded to pass them twice after they blew out.

So…hang on… you did extra as you didn’t feel the course was long enough?!

British tri used to list an acceptable % for long distance race legs to be short/long and I think it was 8%, couldn’t find the source today…

It is always difficult to make distances exact, even with dead turns on closed roads, Estonia was 500m long on both the bike and run, I didn’t mind the bike, but the run was upsetting!

Both Challenge Samorin & IM Warsaw bike course was around 5% shorter than anticipated. Challenge London was advertised as middle distance, but it was organized as an 80km course from the get go (before Challenge takeover), and ended up being a smidge under 80.

Congrats to those racing in the past week or so, some very impressive results!

My Challenge London went meh. I havent put half the preparation into it than I wanted since Warsaw, but hey I had a fun summer. The swim was really really nice actually, averaged 2:15/100 which is on par with my previous openwater swims when its not choppy. I was gonna take this race leisurely, change to a proper bike suit, then running gear instead of trisuit. in T1 the toilets marked "MIDDLE DISTANCE ATHLETES ONLY" were ziptied shut, wasnt very well received by the athletes...
Bike course was a bit annoying with road quality around excel, otherwise OK. No markings to show distance to aid station.
Then I started running, 6 laps for a half marathon. First lap went great, second lap went OK, and then I had a choice. I can dig myself into a hole and finish it while straight up not having a great time, but for what? Its not even a middle distance race so its not like I did another half ironman. It would be my 3rd slowest half marathon (out of 4, ever), and I know full well that I dont have enough miles in my legs to do this proper.

So after 2 laps on the run I just hopped the fence, checked out my bike, chalked it up as a stronger training session, and went to have icecream. It was a good day :) But now more determined than ever, prep started for next year... :D

Haha, I didn't want to feel I'd cheated and not made the distance. To be honest the bike was so within my limits I'm not worried about the 7km short (probably less than that due to the accuracy on the turns). I was lapping at ~12mins anyway.

BUT... I've never run a marathon. I've only ever done two halfs a long time previously due to frigging injuries. I've also always said the only marathon I ever intend to run was at the end of an IM... so to not do the full distance? Nah... I had to. It was only 2.5km (though I did have to walk it as my quad DOMS were so severe already by that point). Worth it...

The 8% bit makes me feel a lot better about the bike though thanks ;)

Aaaahhhhh @kiskubai. Love having the understanding of yourself to call it off, that's a commendable mindset.

I'm much less intelligent/mature. I've totally hobbled myself. My body is such a mess I currently cant stand up from a chair/the toilet without both arms, can't walk in a remotely normal pattern and can barely cycle (definitely no hills).

Any training plans links for 70.3?

Will be next summer and needs to be swim heavy, I Am not good at it.

Others will be better qualified to advise on best plan to follow but I’m doing my first 70.3 on Saturday and followed the bike/run sessions from the intermediate plan from the Don Fink book, with my own swim training, which broadly speaking was:
Mon - pool swim (winter)/sea swim (summer)
Tue - sea swim (summer) and 1 hour run with tempo or threshold intervals
Wed - sea swim (summer) and 1 hour z2 brick (45 min bike 15 min run)
Thur - coached pool swim and 1 hour bike with tempo or threshold intervals
Fri - sea swim (summer)
Sat - long z2 bike (with 20-40 mins tempo at the end as you near event) straight into 15-30 min z2 run
Sun - 30 min z2 bike into long z2 run

I live opposite a pier so I swim most mornings for my own sanity but some weeks I could not get in the water at all if conditions don’t allow, but there are swim sessions in the book too

I just did 2x a week 1 hour sessions. But I am not as fast a swimmer as the others (1m50/100 over IM distance, limited slightly by injury).

I followed the 4 'biggest gains' in swimming technique from Joe Friel's triathlon training Bible.

Basically do a few months of focusing on technique before you start focusing on going long. Improving your technique will make you much more efficient and make swimming long much easier.

The whole book is written for those with some training/sports knowledge, but I found the swimming section really concise (can send photos if you want).

The book is well worth a pickup if you're intending on training long term.

I picked up the joe friel book used off Amazon for £7 last week

Perfect! That’s my idea is I learn to swim first.

Note I can swim, just not swim swim.

Anyone got any innovative ways to carry spares on the bike? Picked up a small saddle bag this morning from the lbs but it won’t go near my bike (saddle too far forward and aero seatpost too wide).

Only have 2 bottle cages and plan to have a bottle in each.

Voile straps?

Do you have room for a top tube bag behind the stem?

Atm I’m looking at just taping stuff to my bike in random places

I should have said, race Saturday, travelling tomorrow, working today. So my options are limited

Can you just wrap a tube in leccy tape and shove it under the saddle? Will obvs be clamp mechanism dependant. Or tape it under the stem or to the bottom of a bottle cage.

This was my plan but there’s limited real estate under there. I was thinking of taping to stem/between aero bars, might be best option! Or just stuff the tube/levers/co2 in my pocket and remember to take it out in t2

I the absence of a better solution I had one of the rapha essentials cases with my spares in my bag in t1 and shoved it in my tri suit pocket…

If you can get a behind the saddle bottle mount you could use a spares bottle or just a cut open and taped up bottle back there for spares…

Crisis averted, mate had a saddle mount I could borrow!

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Nice! Probably make you 1w faster!!!

Worth an elastic bank and some tape to keep it in though, not like you need super quick access and rear mounted cages are excellent at ejecting bottles on innocuous bumps…

Arrived in Cork, registered, bike racked.

Weather is biblical, hasn’t stopped pouring rain, 130kmph gusts. Nice conditions to leave the bikes racked outside in!

As of midday swim has been moved further into the bay and still planned for 1.9km so fingers crossed it stays that way!

70.3 postponed by a day and planned to be run alongside full distance. Unfortunately for me I can’t stay for the race tomorrow so I’ve collected my stuff from transition and need to reconsider my options.

This was to be my season ender and probably my only realistic shot at a middle distance race for a few years so I’m feeling a little deflated. Looking at the road conditions I think they totally made the right call but it would have been nice if they sent the email at 3 or 4am and we could have stayed in bed rather than getting up to shovel the porridge in. Most were in their wetsuits and walking to race start by the time the email landed.

Oh shit that really sucks. Weather is awful this summer.
Hope you find one more race to end the year on a high

I’m not going to lie I’m a bit fed up of targeted training now, kept the focus on this since January and was looking forward to kicking back for the rest of the year more than I was looking forward to the race itself. I don’t know how I feel about dragging it out for another month and a bit, but I’m in great physical form atm so it feels like a massive waste not to

Only a short while to Lava Lanzarote tri.

Proper Gasque course…

Ah mate that sucks. Really sorry to hear. Good luck in finding a replacement.

If not - do a solo effort? Not the same but better than just nothing and letting all the hard earned gains fizzle away.

My plan was to do Cork 70.3, take a week off, then spend 8 weeks upping mileage to do Dublin City marathon (mate has a slot he won’t use).

Now I’m completely torn. There are local sprints 2 and 3 weeks from today, and a well known very challenging Olympic on 30th September, which would allow me to salvage something from this season, but doing those would mean ditching some important long runs leading up to DCM, most likely ruling it out.