Wednesday, October 31, 2007

We Have Lift-Off

This week marks the start of my “official” Ironman training program. It may sound a little early, but the California 70.3 is in 5 months and the training plan incorporates that. Also, with the holidays and potential vacations I may lose a few weeks along the way. And most importantly, I just need to get into the routine of doing regular training.

I’m using Joe Friel’s “The Triathlete’s Training Bible” to form the basic framework of the program. I won’t be following it exactly however, for a couple of reasons. First, many people on my Tri Team will be doing a program for Ironman Brazil and I’d like to join them as much as possible. Second, and more importantly, I’ll be deviating from the written program because Joe Friel is Insane.

Oh don’t get me wrong, there is a lot of useful information in the Triathlete’s Bible. But when reading through it I quickly released this book was not written with me in mind. For example, Friel talks about setting goals. Good idea. Here’s a sample of some of the goals he gives: “Run 10km in less than 40 minutes in the Boulder Peak Triathlon”. “Qualify for Ironman
Hawaii with a sub-five-hour at Half Vineman”. You know what my goal was when I did my half-iron race? “Live to tell the tale”.

Joe Friel gives plenty of training details, including what he calls “Suggested Daily Routines”. They include a 30-minute noon-time nap, every day. I’m not sure where Mr. Friel thinks I work, but I don’t see how crawling under my desk for a snooze is going to help me. And if I DID have a place where I could sleep at work, you think I’d nap for only 30 minutes? Hell no, I’d be out like a light 2 hours every day.

Regardless of the details of the program, the important thing at this point is just to make sure I’m “getting out there”. Only 33 more weeks to go.

6 Comments:

Blogger Herself, the GeekGirl said...

I kinda know what you mean. Thats why I hired a coach. but even he slips every once in a while and puts sometime in my training plan like, "Run 6 miles with 30 minutes sub 9 minute pace". I've never run a sub minute pace, except, maybe for about 200 yards.

4:49 PM  
Blogger Bigun said...

hey, me too...first week in the 'official' IMCDA training season! Hit it hard, big dog!

6:11 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I have Joel's book too and I don't follow it as strictly. The problem with making too structured of a plan is that it takes away your flexibility and when you miss even small portions of the scheduled training plan, it starts poisoning your psyche because you feel you're falling behind. That is more destructive IMO than the occasional "going off course". I budget certain miles and workouts that I need to do but keep the "B" priority workouts open to change and make things up if I have to skip.

That's how I beat David Duchovny this year.

10:02 AM  
Blogger ShesAlwaysWrite said...

“Live to tell the tale”.

LOL! I had the exact same reaction to the Training Bible - it was SO not written for the likes of me!

4:26 PM  
Blogger Cliff said...

The bible needs to be modified for personal use, that's for sure. The most i got from the bible is undersatnd how to structure a training schedule. How to build the base, recovery and peak.

I would love to take that 30 min nap every day.

10:36 AM  
Blogger Brent Buckner said...

Yes, TTB structure too much for many lifestyles. Still fascinating and useful.

Rock the training!

12:11 PM  

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