Workout types question

I normally swim 1-3 a week and they are all pretty hard. Sometimes I'll do longer 400-500 yd sets in there but at a 80+% effort pace. Last year I swam 4x a week and made the biggest gains in speed but again...they were all pretty hard. My biking routine is pretty bad...but it works for me. I only bike 2x a week but am pretty good at it now. This is one really stupidly hard workout during the week (e.g., 30-45mins of total FTP effort or a few Z5+ intervals) and then 2-4 hour workout on the weekend but it's not a steady state ride unless I'm about 3-4 weeks out before a race. This also has FTP+ efforts thrown in it. It's not as hard as the weekday workout with respect to the number and duration of intervals but it's hard since it's long and there's still some hard efforts in there. It helps break it up. I train with power and my last FTP test was about 294 but I'm sure it's less now as I did bike 3x a week when I did that since I was nursing a running injury.

I think in general you will find that people do more intensity in swimming and biking, due in part to the lower risk of injury from pushing it hard in those sports. It probably varies somewhat, though, with the distance you are training for and how much your focus in on doing a competitive time vs. just completing the race. For the past two years, I've been focused mainly on HIM with the occasional sprint or Oly. For swimming, during a hard training week, every session (usually 3 a week) will have some pretty intense sets in it, as well as some less intense warmup, cooldown, and drill sets. During a recovery week, one of those swims (or a fourth swim during a harder week) might be just an easy recovery effort.

For biking, unless I'm pleasure-riding during the off-season, or the purpose of the ride is active recovery after a race or long run, there's always some intensity in the workout. Obviously it's going to be lower on a long ride, but it's still there one way or another. I'd say in most cases it's more like a tempo effort. There isn't really "long, slow distance" the way there is with running in many programs. Might be different with training for full IM. I don't know about others, but the speed/power I can maintain for HIM does not feel like an easy effort, even for 15 minutes. It's definitely a tempo effort.

A typical week of early-season HIM training might look something like this:

Monday: Swim workout with some hard sets, 3000-3500m
Tuesday: Morning-trainer workout with some hard intervals; PM easy run
Wednesday: Morning--run with some speed work; PM strength
Thursday: Morning--easy run. PM Swim workout with some hard sets 3000-3500m
Friday--Trainer ride with some hard intervals; PM strength
Saturday--Long run with some tempo sections (at or a little under HIM race pace); longer swim workout (about 3500m)
Sunday: Long brick with 2-4 hour ride with some tempo efforts and 20-40 minute run

Monday: Swim in the morning before work. 1 hour. Around 2300-2500 m. Easy workout. More of an active recovery day.

Tuesday: Bike to work 14 miles. Bike home from work 14 miles. Easy pace, just get to work and back. Tempo run up of 5 to 8 miles (6:45-7:00/mile).

Wednesday: Swim in the morning before work. 1 hour. 2500-2800 m. Moderate workout. Bike after work 30-50 miles at +20% IM pace.

Thursday: Bike to work 14 miles. Bike home from work 14 miles. 10 to 14 mile run at IM pace (8:00/mile).

Friday: Swim in the morning before work. 1 hour. 2800-3000m. Hard workout.

Saturday: Long bike. Up to 100 miles at IM pace with 15-20 minutes 10-20% above pace every hour. Brick run 5 miles at IM pace.

Sunday: Short bike. High Z1 low Z2 for 30 miles. Long run at IM pace, up to 18 miles.

Repeat over a 4 week cycle. Building distance and time for 3 weeks then cutting back for the 4th week.

In the summer all my runs and bikes are outdoors. I open water swim once per week in the summer (Monday) after work then indoors the other 2 days. In the winter all the biking is indoors on the trainer, but all the runs are still outdoors, except for the Tuesday tempo run which is at the local indoor University track with my tri club. That is fun, but really tough. I play hockey Sunday mornings and bowl Thursday evenings. I have a PowerTap rear wheel and all the bike workouts are based on zones based on FTP. In the winter I do a lot more higher intensity work. Zone 4 and 5 than I do in the summer.

This year was a bit more run focused because I trained for and ran in the Boston Marathon. After IM Louisville next weekend I am doing another run focused block to prepare for the Dopey Challenge in Disney World. After I run that it will be a bike focused block with a lot of short time, but high intensity work to build up and increase my FTP. I also do a circuit of weights and stretching/bands/ball work in the winter 3 days a week, but that gets cut back and disappears in the summer.

I train all year round. I just do less distance and time in the "off season".