Designing the season for a triathlete who competes in the Age Group category * has its difficulties. Do accounts. Three sessions in the pool, three on the bike, and three on the run in one week, as well as a rest day, make it necessary to schedule double sessions on some days with Lifeguard Training.
That limitation may make you ask the following question: How do I train three different disciplines, and in what order? There are three things to keep in mind when coming up with a winning plan: be specific, ensure the quality of both training sessions and recovery, and fit into your schedule.
A specific plan is one that reproduces what you have to do during the race. That doesn’t mean always going at a race pace, but rather training in a way that resembles race conditions. In other words, when possible you should train swimming first, then cycling, and finally running. It’s best to train in the same order as you compete so your body gets used to pedaling after swimming and running after getting off the bike.
brick sessions
A suggestion. You can have fun by including what we call brick sessions (for example, swim-bike-swim-bike or bike-run-bike-run), in one session. It goes without saying that it is not easy to design brick workouts, so better consult an expert who can advise you.
The second key factor is the quality of training and recovery. What time of day or what day of the week do you feel freshest to train? The answer to that question determines how to schedule the quality sessions in the weekly plan. In fact, you should always do quality training sessions at times (or days) when you have the most energy to devote to them.
If you have two sessions planned on the same day, a quality running session and a technical/aerobic swimming session, my advice is to do the hard running session during your lunch break. So you can use the energy stored in breakfast and mid-morning snacks, and leave the pool training for the end of the day, as a kind of active recovery.
quality training
Since the goal here is quality training and recovery, it’s okay if you don’t meet the criteria for specificity. Remember that you have several goals throughout the week and that you must meet all of them to perform at your best.
Finally, study the schedule carefully with lifeguard training. Non-professional athletes have a thousand commitments, apart from training, that force them to schedule sessions early in the morning or late in the afternoon. When you make the weekly plan, keep in mind what hours of the day you are dedicating to training, and remember that a session at the wrong time is a missed session.
Bottom line:
- Schedule quality training sessions on days, or times, when you feel most energized.
- Get plenty of rest between one quality session and the next.
- Make your sessions more triathlon-specific by keeping the order of the events: swim, bike, and run.
And last but not least, remember that training should be fun and rewarding. Don’t turn fun into a nightmare!
- Age Groups, a category in which non-professional athletes participate divided by age.