Getting Started Part II - The Training Plan

The goal is in place. The race is penciled in the calendar. Permission has been

granted from the significant other, or forgiveness will be sought at a later date.

Now it’s time to put a training plan into action. Jaime, my coach, likes to say, “It

isn’t real until it’s down on paper.”

As I mentioned earlier, most training plans for a sprint triathlon run the course of

ten to twelve weeks. Jaime has developed a twelve-week planning program that

concludes with a sprint race. There are shorter training programs but these are

usually for athletes who are moving into triathlons from another discipline.

Remember the mantra – start slow and work up.

By typing ‘training plans for a sprint triathlon’ into a search engine a myriad of

results and programs come up for you to choose from. All provide various plans

to get you to your first sprint but it should be noted that they lack knowledge of

you, your situation, your goal, and your daily commitments and responsibilities.

This is where a coach can help you meet your goals – have I introduced you to

my friend Jaime? A coach can work within your current responsibilities to tailor a

program that is realistic and attainable. More importantly, they can provide a

sense of accountability that keeps your eye on the prize.

Not everyone has the ability to afford a coach. One option is to look at

trainingpeaks.com. This site, which was developed by Joe Friel, provides plans

that you can configure to fit your schedule and needs. It also gives you the ability

to log and track your progress.

When coming up with a training plan it is vitally important to take into

consideration what is already going on in your life. If you have a commitment on

a certain evening make sure that is built into your schedule. The last thing you

need is to be stressed because you’re crunched for time and can’t get a training

session completed. Be realistic and again, the goal is to succeed, not to fail.

Don’t set yourself up for failure by not factoring in commitments and

responsibilities. Remember, it boils down to enjoying the process. A training

plan is a huge chunk of the process. A realistic training plan sets you up to

succeed, complete your race, and meet your goal.

Getting Started Part 1 - The Race

Setting a goal is easy. It’s the follow through that separates the ‘be’s’ from the

‘wanna-be’s’. For a person new to triathlons the point where the rubber meets

the road can sometimes feel like driving on black ice.

The process of getting started can seem overwhelming. This is where having the

goal in place is important. As I noted earlier, start slow and work your way up.

Begin with a simple sprint triathlon. Most of these sprint races consist of a swim

that is from 500 to 750 yards in distance, a bike ride that is 12 to 13 miles long,

and usually a 5K run. In some cases there are some races that are specifically

geared to first time racers.

Identifying a race in your area can be as simple as getting on a search engine

and typing in “triathlons in (your town)”. Other sites such as Trifind.com and

Beginnertriathlete.com provide links to races. I’m partial to Trifind simply

because it allows you the opportunity to find races by state.

Give yourself plenty of time to prepare for your first race. Yes, there are plenty of

stories of people who did a race after being talked into it the night before by a

buddy, usually after a couple of shots of tequila. If this is a serious goal then

treat it as such. My good friend and coach Jaime talks about enjoying the

process. Getting to the race is three-quarters of the fun and probably 95% of the

journey. Most training programs for beginner triathletes are geared to a ten to

twelve week training window. Identify the race you would like to complete and

then give yourself plenty of time to adequate get ready.

Because you are planning three to four months in advance it may be difficult to

find all the races available. Trifind allows the viewer the ability to go back and

view races from the previous year. If there is a timeframe you are partial to then

see what races are listed. If possible, visit the race website. Unfortunately from

year to year race directors leave or things happen and races get cancelled so

make sure that race you are looking at is still an option. Be sure and look at the

registration information. Usually most races have registration up until the day of

the race but there are also races that have caps on the number of participants

and can sell out. One race I did had the registration begin two months prior to

the race and completely sold out in less than four hours. Make sure you look

over the race information. Is the swim being done in a pool, a lake, or the

ocean? Is the bike or run course fairly hilly or relatively flat? Let this information

factor into your decision. You want your first experience to be a good one.

Another thing to keep in mind is location. Try to see if you can find a race that is

close by where you live. There is nothing better than to wake up on race day in

your own bed.

Once you have settled on a race make the commitment, pull the trigger, get

registered, block off the calendar, tell your spouse, partner, or family, and let the

process start. This is where the fun begins. As with everything, planning is the

key.

Goal Setting

“Wow, that’s going to be quite an undertaking don’t you think?” With the

comment came a slight dismissive smirk. Kind of a, yeah right, sure, you’re

setting up for a failure type smirk.

Looking back I can see the reasoning behind the tone and the attitude of the

response. Here I was, a 50 year old, out of shape guy, sitting at an indoor

Master’s swim meet on a cold December day. I was there timing other swimmers

rather than racing because I could barely swim 50 meters without having a

coronary. During a lull in the meet I got into a conversation with a triathlete. It

came up that I had not only set a goal of doing my first triathlon in a number of

years, but that I wished to undertake ten of them in the coming year. Mind you,

these would be sprint triathlons, but I still look back now and marvel either at my

naivete, my stupidity, or a little bit of both.

It’s good to set a goal, but it’s also important to set an attainable and reasonable

goal. There is nothing worse than to set a goal and then fail because the goal

was too difficult, too time consuming, or just too plain hard to meet. In retrospect

I went about this in the wrong manner. I should have set a goal to do one

triathlon. Once completed, I should have determined how it went and how I felt.

Then, and only then, should I have looked at doing a second triathlon. Instead, I

painted myself into a corner and then tried to get out of the room without getting

too much paint on my shoes and tracking it through the rest of the house.

In the end I could have gone back to that triathlete and gloated about how I

accomplished my goal. I ended up doing eleven triathlons, including an Olympic

and Long Distance course during the following nine months. However, that

person was simply trying to get me to see beyond my lack of patience and not

set myself up for failure. He was giving me good and sound advice that I

probably should have heeded. Much of the success in attaining my goal should

be attributed to a patient and understanding coach who probably rued the day he

took me on as a client.

Word to the wise – start slow and build. Don’t bite off more than you can

comfortably and easily chew. Patience is definitely a virtue, and it just may help

you avoid failure when setting a goal.

30 x 34 501's

The tags were off and the feet were through the legs. With a jump I hiked the

jeans up over my torso and buttoned up the crotch. They fit. I felt like I was in

high school all over again.

The signs had been there. The plummeting weight that registered on the

scales. The leaner physique I saw in the mirror. The positive comments I

received from friends and family. They all served to reinforce the positive

changes I had made in my life. It wasn’t though until I slipped on those 30x34

button up 501’s that I truly felt that I had arrived and met my weight loss goal.

It began on my 50th birthday. I tried to look at this milestone in a positive

manner. In my mind it was the mid-point of my life. I felt that I still had 50 years

left in me. And with that mid-point I also had a mid-life crisis. I looked in the

mirror and didn’t like what I saw. I was overweight, tipping the scales at 215,

and I was out of shape. It was then and there I set a goal. Lose 50 pounds in a

year. Something that was doable. It would translate into four pounds of weight

per month, or roughly a pound of weight per week.

Once I set the goal the question then became how I would go about losing the

weight. My wife had embraced cyclo-cross and mountain bike racing with wild

abandon. I like to mountain bike but I also wanted to strike out on my own.

Years ago I attempted a triathlon. I am not sure what wild hair caused me to

plow forward on doing another triathlon but I did decide that training for a

triathlon would become my goal.

I have a friend who undertook a triathlon for a girlfriend and another who did so

in order to continue and build upon past athletic pursuits. For myself, it became

the focus of my weight loss journey. As with any journey there were bumps,

some missed turns, an upside down map, some rest breaks, and some

wonderful experiences. The weight didn’t all come off in a year. It took a bit

longer. However, somewhere along the way I realized that it had no longer

become just a one-time thing to meet a goal. Instead, it had become a

continuing and on-going journey. It is a journey that I would like to share with

you.

I am an average Joe, an anonymous triathlete, if you will. I gave a triathlon a go

and I ended up getting hooked. I went from simply wanting to lose weight and

succeeding to developing a passion and embracing a lifestyle.