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Speed up your Ironman Racing with Neuromuscular Resets – Coach Woody
Increase your chances for a Kona slot – Coach Vinnie
Rest Days and Focus, learn how to read your body and think about what you’re doing. – Coach Shem
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SWIM CLINIC – shoulders blowing up early into swims
By: Alun Woodward
A common problem among swimmers and triathletes is the sensation of shoulders blowing up very early on in races or hard sessions, this just leaves us feeling weak and uncoordinated for the remainder of the swim and unable to perform to our potential. This feeling is a sure sign that something is going wrong in the swim, the shoulders should not be taking the brunt of the workload when we swim hard rather the latissimus muscles should be working harder.
When we look at top swimmers we typically see a V shaped body with very broad upper back, this is the latissimus muscle and should be well trained in experienced swimmers. We all have this muscle and even if not as developed as top swimmers it is a much more powerful muscle to use to propel us forward when swimming than the shoulders. While this muscle is much more powerful it is also much harder for us to switch on and use in the pool effectively due to hand and arm position. If your arms are not in the right place to start pulling the latissimus will not be able to do its job and the shoulders will take over the action. The shoulder muscles being much smaller will fatigue fast and fail long before the latissimus would.
Gliding and stretching forward
How many times do we hear this from swim coaches? If you do this and reach forward with hands near the surface of the water as seems the typical instruction it is almost impossible to switch on the lats and use them to pull, certainly the newer an athlete to swimming the less chance they will be able to use lats in this position and will have to rely on shoulders leading to weaker swim and increasing injury risk.
Angle the entry and push forward and DOWN
By changing the instruction to enter the water and push straight down so when arm is extended the hand is approx 15- 20cm below surface we put athletes in a perfect position to engage the latissimus muscle and use it to execute a powerful pull.
This one simple change to your stroke could be the key to unlocking real power, stopping your shoulders blowing up and some times to smile about on the clock!
http://youtu.be/RL0dmPTO4Z8
ironguides is the leading Lifestyle Facilitation company for athletes of all abilities. We provide coaching and training services, plans and programs, as well training education, health and fitness products to help you learn and live a healthy lifestyle. Come get fit with one of our monthly training subscriptions, event-specific training plans, coaching services, or a triathlon training camp in an exotic location! ironguides also provides Corporate Health services including Corporate Triathlons, Healthy Living retreats and speaking engagements. At ironguides, your best is our business!
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The men’s triathlon race at Rio Olympics has been run and won, we watched another dominant performance from the Brownlee brothers that defended their Gold and Silver medals on a day that was almost a repeat of the test event in 2015.
In the article below, we broke the race down in three lessons that any age grouper can learn from and apply to your own training and racing to perform better in your upcoming events:
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It was just another race
While most amateur triathletes don’t follow much of the draft-legal circuit, these 55 men racing in Rio have been racing each other for several seasons, multiple times per year. In order to qualify to the Olympics, you need to be a top ranked triathlete and race often in the world circuit, there wasn’t anyone in the start line that hasn’t been around at the ITU world series races in the past couple years.
Not only the athletes know each other well, but there’s also so many scenarios a race like Rio could have developed into, the non-wetsuit swim, technical bike calls for a small pack of strong swimmers being able to gain time on the main, larger pack of runners and that was exactly what happened.
At the test event in 2015, 8 triathletes entered transition two with 1’40” gap to the main gap, at the Olympics there were 9 triathletes 1’30 ahead, and several athletes were in both front packs. With that gap to the main pack it was clear the win would come from the front pack, with a small possibility the best run of the day would be able to sneak into the podium, at the test event in 2015 Richard Murray (South African) ran 30’30 for 10km and placed 3rd, and in Rio he ran 30’38” and placed 4th
Just another race start for these athletes
Just another race start for these athletes
The lesson here is that regardless of how important a race may be to you or anyone else, performance won’t vary drastically from other events and races especially if training has been consistent. It doesn’t matter how much you care about the race; the result is never anything that couldn’t have been expected. This should be looked especially if you get nervous before a race, even if you spent months thinking about this one day, any race is “Just Another Race” and as long as you stick to your pacing and race day strategy, the result will come.
Many of these athletes that did Rio, are already back to training the day after thinking about the next race on the world circuit.
See also: Gallery: Tri-Dash Bangkok – Long (14.Feb.2016))
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2) You don’t win a race in the swim, but it can make you lose it
In a draft legal race such as in Rio, the swim has a massive weight on the outcome of the race, since it sets the tone of how the race will unfold. We knew two of the best runners in Rio, Spain’s Mario Mola and South Africa’s Richard Murray would be a threat to the Gold medal if they could make it to the first pack, which didn’t happen, instead what we saw was a small group of swimmers working well together on the bike trying to stay away from these two guys and aiming to have as much time on the chase pack as possible to increase their chances of a medal or top 10 finish position.
The smaller pack works well in a tight and technical course like Rio, allows athletes to go faster on downhills and turns and also to communicate among themselves. Richard Murray had the best run split of the race, finishing 4th place, if he made the first pack a medal would have been guaranteed.
One of the best swimmers in triathlon Henri Schoeman used his swim to set himself to a great race
One of the best swimmers in triathlon Henri Schoeman (right) used his swim to set himself to a great race
And how can this lesson can be useful for the everyday age grouper that is doing a non-drafting racing and often an Ironman or Ironman 70.3? The faster your swim, more experienced and better athletes you will find yourself next to on the swim and bike, on the swim chances are you will have a smoother experience by going straight with better navigating, less body contact and less people around and on the bike you can still benefit from legal pacing by respecting the drafting rules, also less people around which will avoid an unfair drafting penalty or the need to accelerate and slow down for overtaking.
Despite the swim only account for a small percentage of a long distance triathlon total finish time, it has a big impact on the day’s strategy and may be the difference of a podium finish, a Kona slot, or a new personal best. Weigh that when you allocate time and effort for your swim training, look into it as a key component of your race instead of only a small and least important segment of the triathlon
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3) Stay within your fitness ability
France’s Vincent Luis had an incredible 2015 season, he was 2nd only to Javier Gomez at the Rio test event and was one of the strongest runners of the field, his 2016 has been quiet with no many races or major wins, however once the pack on the bike was established and the gap was increasing to the chasing pack, it was clear he would be the only one that could spoil the party of the Brownlees.
See also: 12 Weeks to Your First Triathlon
Early on the run, Vincent positioned himself in between the brothers, on a strategy similar to what Gomez did to win a silver in London. The trio quickly opened a gap on the rest of the field and it brought some excitement to the race, when would the Brownlees start attacking Vincent? Would they act like a team? Vincent is an excellent sprinter and the Brownlees certainly wouldn’t want to leave the race for the final few hundred meters.
However, with just over one kilometer into the run, Vincent got dropped, that was it. From that point onwards the Brownlees were cruising and we were now wondering if Alistair would be a good old brother and let his young sibling win a gold medal, and now we know the result.
France’s Vincent Luis keeping up with the Brownlees brothers early on the run
France’s Vincent Luis keeping up with the Brownlees brothers early on the run
Back to Vincent, after that aggressive and risky first kilometer he started to pay the price and got slower and slower as the race progressed, getting overtaken by not only the two fastest runner of the chase pack, but also from athletes from the same pack he dropped too quickly early on the race, such as Henri Schoeman and Marten Van Riel.
Vincent finished at the 7th place which is incredible, but did his early attack (and aggressive work on the bike) cost him a medal? Could he just have sat behind Schoeman for the entire run and outsprinted him for a bronze medal? Probably, but he opted to give it the Gold a go and that costed him the Bronze, a fair shot and he is likely aware of it.
But for the age grouper triathlete the lesson here is that this type of relatively small mistake in pacing or race strategy can cost several minutes if not hours in the case of a full ironman, the risk of trying something great that you can’t quite back it up with your fitness for Vincent costed him a medal, while for the age grouper may force you to walk the later stages of your run.
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Personalized Online Coaching: Starting at USD190/month
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Running Plans (10k, 21k and 42k – starting at USD40)
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By Vinnie Santana, online Coach, ironguides.net
I don’t believe in Magic formulas or secret training workouts, improving in triathlon is a result of years of consistent training and hard work.
However, training smart can have an impact on your development in the sport, it can be the difference of maxing out your full potential, achieving your goals becoming a great athlete (regardless of your level and goals) to failing to achieve your goals and quitting.
The below video explains a very simple yet important workout that will take your cycling to the next level and will also help your swim and run training since this will boost your recovery when positioned after your endurance sessions via hormonal balance (an anabolic stimulus after a catabolic endurance training).
The first person who introduced me to this workout was ironguides founder Marc Becker in 2013, who after years of working in the corporate world saw the opportunity to add this workout year long to most of the training plans we use at ironguides.
As a professional athlete from 2004 and 2007, I was also introduced to this workout and some variations of it by my former coach Brett Sutton, who coached multiple Ironman World Champions and Olympic Medalist and who is a big believer in low cadence riding.
Then working as a coach, I took part a workshop by former ITU World Champion Sheila Taormina, who also referred to this workout as the most important session she would do on the bike.
Most recently Chris McCormack a 4x World Champion also mentioned on his podcast this is a type of training every professional triathlete has on their training plans.
Enjoy your training
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Train with ironguides!
Personalized Online Coaching: Starting at USD190/month
Monthly Training plans (for all levels, or focused on one discipline): Only USD39/months
Event based training plans:
Sprint Distance (USD45 for 8-week plan)
Olympic Distance (USD65 for 12 week plan)
Half Ironman (R$95 for 16-week plan)
Ironman (USD145 for 20-week plan)
X-Terra (USD65 for 12-week plan)
Running Plans (10k, 21k and 42k – starting at USD40)
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