Hi,

bit of a question for those amoung us who know what they are doing!

I currently work full time and am completing my masters full time as well. I am really struggling to fit tri training in every day. I spend 3 hours per day travelling when i am in the office.

I am wondering, how bad is it for me to put all of my training into 4 days which would be the weekend and mond/tues. I currently try and do 3 sessions of each sport a week, but would possibly be looking at cutting the swim session down to 2 and then riding everyday and running 1 long run and 2 short?

4 days should be fine, unless it's an Ironman you're doing. If you can commute by bike (at least partway, to a train station or something) and then try to run off the bike a few times per week, it'll help a lot. Then you only need one longer or harder run session, and it's just a matter of fitting in some swimming.

Four days training will be heaps enough. Even if you are training for Ironman. B) It just depends on what you are trying to achieve. If you are planning on making a last ditch run at selection for the Commonwealth games team.... you probably need to do more. If you are trying to finish second last (that was always my goal, try to not be last) then you will be fine. The important thing is to run off the bike. Thats really the only secret to triathlons. I have seen 4 min/k runners do 6:30 min/k in races because they didn't train to run off the bike. The swim doesn't matter... in the scheme of things as long as you dont drown, you can make it up later.
My triathlon career involved being followed out of the water by support craft and then cycling past all the good swimmers. :) ... then there is the run.

Cheers,
Peter.

Hi there,

I'm with Iron Pete: the swim is a matter of getting by without drowning. I'm always towards the back of the pack in the swim but after that it's all go and passing people for the rest of the race feels good! And more training in the pool will only take a few minutes off your overall time....whereas more time spent riding or running will take much more off.

Four days sounds fine, I did a half ironman last year on about that much training. But there's a number of factors you havent covered: what event are you aiming to do? what's your base fitness? have you done triathlon's before?!

Cheers,
Darryn

Hi tjnewie

The only thing I would add is to try and not do the training 4 days in a row with a three day break. Maybe a two and two; or a three and a one; or two , rest, one, rest, one. You do need to allow for rest.

Cheers Plu

Post number and year
2049: I am 89 years old now and about to jump into the next age groupings ahead of Tim, Brendan, Tesso, O' Runner, WobblyMan and a few others who are still around.

Thanks guys!

At this stage, I am training for sprints mostly, but i am hoping that by the end of next season i will be racing at least olympic distance.

I am generally a pretty slack swim trainer (cause the boredom!) but i am usually ok in the swim leg over the shorter distances. My run was improving considerably, although, i have just had a week out with illness which has done bad things to the training program. I feel better knowing that i am ok to do the 4 days, i was running out of hours in my week :)