So the big day is done, you’re feeling sore but satisfied with the way things turned out. Your next step is to get your body recovered and ready to train again. If you’re done for the year, well I guess you could just work your way into the off season and enjoy your free time. But, if you’re looking to race again within a couple months you’d best get going on that recovery. A few things to keep in mind are your need for good calories, your need for fluid, and your need for rest. The good calories are easy, get your fat and salt craving out of the way if you must, but get back on the wholesome food bandwagon as soon as you can. Your body is most likely severly damaged and the only way to bring it around is with good quality nutrients.
You also can’t forget about hydration. Drink crazy amounts of fluid (non-alcholoic and non-caffeinated preferably) in an effort to flush your system of all the toxin build up and breakdown you’ve suffered from race day.
An Ironman is a long day, that is for sure. Even the best are out there for at least 8hrs. Most seem to come in around 10-14, then the survival group, out there exercising for 15+ hours. It’s next to impossible to account for everything that’s going to happen on race day when you’re dealing with that amount of time. Even 8 hours is a ridiculously long training day. Here are some things to ponder.
Hunger at mile 90 of the bike, what should I do? Getting hungry at mile 90 of the bike is not a good sign, it generally means you’ve undershot your calorie intake and have some catching up to do. How are you going to do that before getting off your bike and running a marathon? Answer: slow down so your heart rate lowers and you can digest properly, take in a bunch of food and gradually get the pace back up. Ideally you would catch that problem before mile 90 as it can often be hard to eat at that point of a race.
What happens if you can’t eat solid food anymore? You need calories, so what is your plan going to be on race day? Can you drink Coke for the remaining distance? Are gels your weapon of choice? Can you force a banana down? Have your answer ready as best you can so you know how to deal with the problem.
As triathletes we tend to forget the importance of keeping our core and lateral leg muscles strong. By doing the exercises in the video you engage a range of run- specific stabilizer muscles. This can help prevent injury – namely hip, knee, and ankle injury (provided you don’t over do them when just starting out!) - and give you that much needed structure for finishing strong in the last 10 kilometers of a long distance triathlon.
Staying injury free is key to a successful season, and to progressing year after year as an athlete. Taking care of the little things, and doing core stability exercises will help save you a few painful trips to physio 4 months from now.
Watch the video to take a look at this exercise. You’ll want to start on the ground and move up to the Bosu Ball once you’re comfortable. It is generally best to do this in front of a static object like a wall or tree so you can have something to focus on. It will help your balance in a big way.
#1. Start with both legs, just like a squat.
#2. Move to one leg at a time, same motion as a squat, keeping your hands out in front.
#3. Bring your free leg and your opposing arm up. Just like a run stride. Then go through the motions of a run stride (or semblance thereof).
#4. Repeat on a Bosu Ball. You will definitely want to master a simple double leg squat on a Bosu Ball before trying it one legged. Doing the two legged squat without shaking or wobbling will let you know when you’ve got it – focus on engaging the muscles in your lower abdomen and pelvis if you find that you shake a lot. It will help.
#5. BE CAREFUL. You are putting your knees at risk with this exercise, especially on the Bosu. Best to start within the framework of a squat rack until you know your knees won’t give out on you. Hold on to a rail and master the balance before squatting low.
A great way to monitor your improvement and work on appropriate pacing strategies is to set up training loops. Depending on the length of your ride or run you would ideally cover the loop between 3 and 12 times…or more. This then gives you a tremendous amount of data to look at and see where you start to slow. If you keep track of your average HR and lap splits, you can also compare week to week or month to month to ensure you’re making gains in your training. There are a few different ways to go about tracking your loops:
#1. Peg your HR at a particular level and just keep running or riding while taking splits every lap. You’ll most likely notice a drop in time after every loop – but the fitter you are the less that drop will be and the faster your overall time will be at the conclusion of your chosen distance.
#2. Start slow and get faster throughout. This is a great way to learn how to pace properly. If you can do the first loop in 10 minutes, try and drop a few seconds every subsequent loop until you hit your last lap. This will take practice, no doubt, but it will give huge insight into how hard you can actually ride or run at the beginning of an Ironman leg and sustain that pace right till the end.
Those of you who follow Chuckie V’s blog know that he advocates walking as part of your training – time on your feet equals time in the training log. You’ll help strengthen your feet, and if you think about proper form you can also engage your glutes and back muscles much like a run stride.
Our number ONE reason for incorporating walking as part of our training is for those three days pre-race that you always end up spending on your feet. No matter how much you plan it out, have everything ready, and set aside time for naps and relaxation – you’ll most always end up walking and standing on your feet 10 times longer than you had anticipated. There’s the registration line up, the walk to and from your parking spot or hotel that you thought was only a mile away, the mandatory athlete meeting, bike check in, groceries, finding a restaurant, picking up a piece of gear your forgot or finding your favorite gel. All that on top of the time you spend checking out the course and going through your pre-race routines. It’s tiring!
So, add some walk time to your training. Don’t substitute a run or ride with walking unless injury is at hand, but use it as some extra credit training. I bet that 15 minute drive to work through town is only a 25 minute walk at a brisk pace. Once or twice a week in addition to your normal routine is all it would take.
There is no question that having the best, and usually most expensive, equipment can benefit you on race day. However, if you have limited financial resources to devote to Ironman Triathlon, these are our thoughts on where best to spend your hard earned money.
When you look at the time you spend riding in an Ironman it is tempting to spend a bunch of money on a fancy new bike. A great bike does make a difference, but keep in mind the overall goal is to hit the finish line as fast as possible, not to roll into T2 so you can brag about your fast bike split. You may want to hold back on the $3000 wheel set and the 200 gram savings of the carbon bars so you can spend that money elsewhere. Here are our suggestions:
1) Food. Don’t cheap out when it comes to food. By lots of healthy fruits and vegetables, organic preferably. Eating race food on the bike and run from time to time is also important, but try to fuel with whole foods most of the time in training. A diet of energy bars alone hits your wallet and is far from optimal nutrition wise.
2) Coaching. With the $2000 you saved on a wheel-set, you can afford yourself a good coach for 10 months of the year. This person should have the knowledge to guide you to your best possible result. There are a lot of online programs out there that provide you with very limited personal feedback and individual support. A good coach will help put the three sports together saving you years of making silly mistakes until you get it on your own. The difference between the best wheels and some good wheels in an Ironman is maybe 10 minutes at most. The time savings from training properly under the guidance of a coach can be hours.
3) Massage and Recovery. We still place this piece of the puzzle well above the top of the line equipment. If you need to cut some financial corners, don’t do it here. Getting to the start line healthy is your number one priority. Having a professional treat those niggles and develop a core and stability routine to supplement your triathlon training will go a long way to helping you avoid injury and will enable you to train hard every day.
4) Unless you live, train, and race in Hawaii you’ll need a wetsuit. Overall fit and flexible shoulders are the most important things. The highest-end suit may not fit you the best so try a bunch on. The big races generally have demo booths set up, a great way to find a good fit.
5) Train hard and consistently. It only costs you your time and it’s time well spent!
With the high training volumes that go into preparing for an Ironman, skin irritations are inevitable. Chaffing, sunburn, blisters and the dreaded sore red skin around the saddle area are common examples. If you have sensitive skin and have had to squat in the bushes on a long ride, contact dermatitis from mystery plants can also be an issue! Watch out for poison oak! Penaten cream – a product that you will likely find in the baby products section of your food or drug store (it is used for diaper rash) is one of the best all-around creams out there to help heal and prevent skin irritations. I apply it to my skin wherever the chamois may irritate – it really helps your sensitive areas from getting sore and red (helps them look more aesthetically pleasing too!), and can prevent saddle sores. It works well to dry up blisters, sooth and heal sunburns, and it stops itchy skin from itching pronto. I’ve had the same container for over 5 years now and it looks like it has hardly been touched, but it gets used daily. It lasts a long time, and a little goes a long way. Add Penaten Cream to your Ironman recovery arsenal, your skin will thank you.
Today’s post is a long but Heather the science geek wanted to shed a little light on all of this antioxidant stuff that we hear about and give a bit more in-depth background to support the take home message: eating plant-based whole foods, not relying on antioxidant supplements, is paramount to your recovery and will help you soak up all those hard Ironman training sessions.
A paradox in metabolism is that while the vast majority of complex life requires oxygen for its existence, oxygen is a highly reactive molecule can damage living organisms by producing reactive oxygen species (ROSs – nasty things like the RUSs in the Princess Bride). ROSs are highly reactive ions or small molecules that have unpaired valence shell electrons. Huh? what? Basically they are just hyped up molecules that have all this energy and want to react with stuff so they grab at anything… say lipids in the membranes of your mitochondria. Enough unquenched, super excited, ROSs nipping at things and you can get cell death. Because of this, organisms contain a complex network of antioxidant metabolites and enzymes that work together to prevent oxidative damage to cellular components like DNA, proteins and lipids. Reducing agents, (I’m double-O-carotene) like Beta Carotene and vitamin C neutralize ROS’s and prevent them from causing damage – “leave that cell membrane alone, it’s me your after!”
In general, antioxidant systems either prevent too many nasty ROSs from being formed, or remove them before they can damage vital components of the cell. However, just like all ‘zee Russians’ aren’t bad guys in Bond films – some reactive oxygen species do have useful functions in cells, such as signaling. The function of antioxidant systems is not to remove oxidants entirely, but instead to keep them at an optimum level.
Working on run form is important. With these 3 simple drills you can teach your body to improve your run stride and efficiency, as well as muscle activation patterns. They don’t take long, 5 minutes at the most. Throw them in as part of your warm up, during a recovery walk/jog, or at the end of a long run.
About this site:
These triathlon and endurance sport related tips have been compiled by Heather and Trevor Wurtele over the years of their progression from working age-groupers to full time professional triathletes. Heather is now a 4 time Ironman Champion and top 10 World Championship finisher. Trevor has an Ironman PR of 8:22 and a 2:51 Ironman marathon.
So the big day is done, you’re feeling sore but satisfied with the way things turned out. Your next step is to get your body recovered and ready to train again. If you’re done for the year, well I guess you could just work your way into the off season and enjoy your free time. But, if you’re looking to race again within a couple months you’d best get going on that recovery. A few things to keep in mind are your need for good calories, your need for fluid, and your need for rest. The good calories are easy, get your fat and salt craving out of the way if you must, but get back on the wholesome food bandwagon as soon as you can. Your body is most likely severly damaged and the only way to bring it around is with good quality nutrients.
