Trains, Travels

This year is all about the swim and the run. At least that was the intention. Two months gone and I’ve not run sufficiently or shown real commitment to the pool. My focus has been making myself train not the specifics of how I use that time. One sixth of the year gone can I really make the improvements I want?

Expectations were beyond my capabilities. I assumed I’d be running well in a matter of weeks and I could quickly settle into a heavy swim schedule. Neither proved true. My calf has remained injury free, but not running for four months leaves a lot of work. Unfortunately I’ve no excuses with swimming, it’s purely motivational.

As I assess the last month I appreciate how pointless declaring a run focus is when you’re not up to the load. I’m following my guidelines: being careful in the build up, not rushing. It’s frustrating. I’ll plan a return to running. To last summer’s big mileage days and the amazing sense of effortlessness. But the progress is slow.

I plot data and watch fitness grow. Slow, creeping progress. Beyond the charts and graphs I can feel the improvements. I start to imagine the possibilities. Double my run volume next week. Back to old training levels. Fitness will rocket; I’ll be ready to really train by March. Or April. Or possibly May.

The next day there’s a twinge or a cramp. A touch of reality. I accept I’m not yet as fit as I have been. I’m being tempted to rush again. The slightest hint of last summer’s fitness and I want to chase. An occasional uncomfortable reminder of the work to be done, of my relative frailty sets me straight.

This year is all about the swim and run. I seem to forget the year in that statement. I talk long-term, but think short. Suppose I continue down the slow path I’m on. It will take a while, but by June I’ll see signs of my run form. If it takes six months to reach where I’ve been I still have six months to improve.

Before I focus, before I can effectively work towards significant improvements in any one sportI need to be fit. Until then the notion of focussed training is largely irrelevant. I am unable to sustain an individual workload sufficient to make the desired improvements. I am able to handle a workload across all three that will build fitness. It won’t take me to the next level, but it’s a stepping stone.

As February closes I’m not the runner or swimmer I wanted to be, but I am better than in January. Where I lacked motivation I find it restored. I want to train; I miss it. Not because I need to improve, but because it’s fun. This is progress on the path to a better athlete. During the winter months I feared I’d lost the hunger. It’s coming back.

I am aware of two things: my desire to train and my need to be fitter. A sports specific focus requires a fitness beyond me. I may want it, but attempting to specialise only reduces the overall work I’m doing. The focus is swim and run so I bike less. But I can’t actually swim or run more. I’m simply doing less.

So I’ll plug that gap. Specialisation will come, but for now better to train productively. If I can’t run as much as I want I’ll ride more. Build fitness where I can. It may not have been the plan, but the plan was wrong. Sticking to it slows gains. I have an opportunity to effectively use my time and improve somewhere. Triathletes always have this choice: three sports. There is always somewhere to make progress.

March becomes a month in balance. Generalised fitness growth; further preparation on the road to real improvements. I claimed no interest in this season’s race performance perhaps I should stick to that. Race for fun and variety. Train for long-term improvements. And maybe test myself in Vegas at the end of the season. Let’s go with the intent of the plan even when the details change.

I’m happy for a few months of gradual development. I’d be ecstatic if July’s performances come close to last year. It might be possible, but I’m not rushing. I have to remember the time scales that change works on. Talk long-term, think long-term and act long-term.

• Tweet
• Comment

The last thing an athlete needs is additional stress. Training stress is a positive driving adaptation and building fitness. But you can have too much of a good thing. When you’re training hard and dealing with daily life it builds up. Stats are a prime culprit for adding unnecessary stress.

Beats per minute, Watts per kilogram, threshold pace. We can monitor and measure dozens of variables to quantify and qualify our training. They are a way to guide and improve our performance. We can use them to identify limiters, to address weaknesses and to train optimally. We can also use them to endlessly stress ourselves, to worry about progress and fear our season is already over.

I spent Monday’s post explaining how metrics like CTL and TSB can help guide the fine details of a plan. I’m not about to tell you to throw your heart rate monitor in the trash. I’ve invested far too much in my power meter to give it up. I encourage monitoring and tracking progress with these tools. Use them for motivation and to help you train effectively, but never let them rule you.

Obsessed we constantly watch and test our numbers. Identifying threshold pace, power or heart rate and using them as the basis for training. We chase higher values or longer periods at a given number. Every session trying for a little bit more. Who doesn’t like setting a new PB? It may only be a best average power for five minutes, but it is still new and still better than before.

Improvements take time, we can’t expect them every day we train. Sometimes our need to hit a target leads to disappointment. We test FTP and it’s lower than anticipated. We pushed hard, but never quite reached expectations. A set back. Training must be going wrong?

A single session rarely says much about an entire season. People have bad days. Whether they’re world champions or training for their first race. Nobody has a perfect record. What matters is the trend. When you’re consistently performing below par worry; when you’re plateaued and don’t seem to be shifting be concerned. One day or even a week doesn’t end a season. Look at the overall picture.

When you have an off day the question you need to ask is why. Don’t assume it’s a sign of poor fitness or training. It may be, but equally were you fatigued? Were you well fuelled and recovered? Pacing mistakes? Low motivation? There are many factors that influence how we perform. Don’t write your training off straight away.

It’s not all about how hard you work. It’s about preparing for when it matters: race day. Sometimes that means training hard; sometimes that means training long. A combination of intensity, volume and frequency is required. The mix of training will affect how your performance changes. As I build endurance and efficiency my threshold power may not improve much. If I test it I won’t be surprised by small changes. It’s not been my focus.

I’ve a principle that I listen to my body first and my training tools second. I track some sessions more closely than others, but never obsess. I’ve swum in pools with broken pace clocks, all I could do was make sure it felt right. I’ve spent hours chasing stronger cyclists wilfully ignoring my wattage. It didn’t matter I just needed to hang on. I track pace for my runs, but couldn’t tell you how to display it on my watch.

If I feel good I don’t hold back. If I’m struggling I do the best I can. Remember I wrote about following the intent of a session last week. Do that and over time the trend will move in the right direction. Fitness will improve as will your ability to deliver your desired race.

Whatever the numbers put the work in and on race day do your best. You may not be convinced. Training might not be what you imagined. There’s a tendency to focus on the negatives, the problems. Don’t miss the positives: the accumulated hours of work and the breakthrough sessions. Race day performance is the result of a lot of good and sometimes bad training.

• Tweet
• Comment

The last few months of training are best described as unstructured. Planning became an exercise in futility as I lacked the motivation to stick to a schedule. This seems to be changing: my former drive has returned and I’m keen to address declining fitness. I can’t say why; it’s just happened. Body and mind are ready to train.

Structured training presents some challenges. Balancing life and training is easy when you’re only prioritising one. Now I need to get the mix right: train enough to progress fitness, but allow enough time for work. As a fulltime athlete I could cobble a schedule together from basic sessions and rely on racking up the training stress. Train as much and as appropriately as possible, recover, repeat.

Updating my training logs on Sunday I considered the week ahead and how to continue the work I’d started. This is micro-management of training. Taking the sessions I need and finding how they’ll fit. Schedule both in terms of recovery and free time. I used the Performance Management Chart (PMC) to guide me; testing out the impact on fitness and fatigue.

A blank canvas. Day seven and after a good week my bike fitness (CTL) has picked up. Unsurprisingly if I do nothing for a fortnight all the gains I’ve made are lost. Sit on the couch, catch up on TV and by day twenty-one I’m back where I started. But I’m motivated. I’ve no desire to sit on the couch and there’s nothing I want to watch.

Run training is still limited and I’ve yet to track swimming in the PMC so I focussed on cycling. A total Training Stress Score (TSS) over 550 led to big gains last week. It’ll take more of the same to maintain the momentum. But I’ve a busy week ahead with plenty of athletes waiting for their own plans. I can’t ride long everyday. There are windows of opportunity: an easy club ride next Sunday and a long ride this morning.

These in place (with estimated TSS) I can shape the rest of the week. Long rides produce high TSS and easily boost CTL, but not enough for my weekly goal. I can’t afford more road time and anyway the forecast isn’t appealing. Much of this week’s riding needs to be short and sweet. Turbo time. I’m not a fan of indoor training preferring to get it over with. That means more intensity. Friday is a good opportunity to work on threshold: it fits in the schedule and my legs should be recovered to ride well.

I’ve room for a couple more indoor sessions early in the day to take me to my goal TSS. A plan was formed: two long rides then a few work-friendly turbo sessions. More intensity on the turbo and keep it steady for the long rides. I’m not yet fit enough to ride as hard as I was at the end of last season. I set my expectations on effort levels with that in mind. The priority is getting back into a routine and used to the volume of training.

I went to bed on Sunday satisfied I had a good week ahead of me.

This morning I felt fine. Tired from my first solid week of training, but generally well. Wet weather dampened my spirits, but with a friend waiting I hit the road. Rain proved a minor issue. My legs would not get going, they simply didn’t want to obey. Brief stints of reasonable riding would lapse into a casual, conversational cruise. We decided if we we’re going to have a chat it might as well be accompanied by coffee and cake. The long ride was over.

Frustration over my low morale and lacklustre session was abated when I plotted the charts for this blog. This morning’s Training Stress Balance (TSB) sat at -36. I’ve been a lot lower, but as I noted back in January below -30 is entering the territory of heavy fatigue. Especially considering my lower levels of fitness and the absence of run TSS from this figure. I feel tired because I am tired.

It doesn’t take much for me to dig deep into TSB when all it takes is an hours steady riding to raise CTL. Training fatigues me quickly because it’s stressing my relatively unfit body. As fitness builds the impact will lessen. I’d have survived a few more hours on the road, but was never looking at a successful training session. It was too much. In light of this I tweaked the plans.

The initial urge was to chase after lost TSS. Catch-up and raise that CTL faster. Numbers looked good in Excel, but considering my inability to do quality work and the fatigue I felt was it wise? Doing more later in the week means holding TSB down or lowering it further. I’d be continuing to push the line for a marginal benefit in fitness. Doing less would still raise CTL, allow some recovery and should hopefully mean better quality training. The upward trend is more important than the actual number.

Schedule done. A plan that raises my fitness over the next seven days, controls fatigue (I’ll still get tired) and allows time for work. I’ll be able to fit my training in and deliver all the schedules my athletes are expecting. Perfect.

The PMC is a useful sanity check when planning training. It doesn’t dictate sessions or targets, but it gives hints to the realism in a schedule. Obsessing over raising CTL I lost sight of the importance of TSB. A high CTL is desirable, but in the process of building it fatigue and recovery have to be managed.

How often do I preach this? Yet today I experienced the affect myself. The indicators were present in my PMC if I’d taken the time to look, but would I have changed anything? Probably not. I’ve performed well at lower TSB on the right day. The PMC is a guide. A low TSB has implications for performance and recovery, but I can’t say for certain what they’ll be. I use it to enhance the odds of training and racing well. Ultimately I still have to do the work.

• Tweet
• Comment