Hi everyone.  I was out of town for a couple of days, and am now getting back into things.

Music.  Dance stuff is good.  Aerobics stuff is good.  Stuff from your 15 year old is good.  .  Whatever works!

Swimming:  ANother vote for getting lessons.  Might be a swim class, as mentioned. Might be private.  Might be through Masters Swimming.  Longer term, Masters swimming is a fabulous deal.  Coached workouts.  A group to swim with.  A really, really good value.

Recovery nutrition:  Scott, drink some chocolate milk.  It has almost the perfect ratio of carbs to proteins.  Its fairly cheap and gives you everything you need.  I'll see if I can dig up some articles on the subject.

Another thought about swimming.

Get a copy of Terry Laughlin's Total Immersion Swimming.  I'd recommend both the book and the DVD.  It really shows you how to develop a very nice tri swim stroke.

Scott, here is a link to an book/article about nutrition and endurance sports.  Its produced by Hammer Nutrition, so it includes a lot of sales/marketing info for their products.  But the science behind it is good.

http://www.e-caps.com/downloads/fuelinghandbook.pdf

Chapter 11, starting on page 42, deals with post-workout recovery.

I've been thinking about this statement since I read it last night.  I think this might segue into a very important topic.   Something critical for long term success in this sport.

Scott, what are you doing thats causing you to be sore?  Can you please elaborate on what workouts and what intensities are causing you to be sore?

Scott,

On the hike, were your legs sore from the hike itself or from previous workouts?

The run afterwards.  How fast did you run?  How close is this to your 10K race pace?  What was your perceived exersion level?  High? medium?  easy? 

Generally when you run or bike, how intensely are you doing it?

I was guessing this was the case.   I know exactly how this feels.  I was the exact same way a couple of years ago.

If you haven't already, I strongly recommend that you get a copy of Jack Daniel's Running Formulas.  Its maybe $15.  Daniels is one of the top running coaches in the country and has worked with runners from high school athletes to Olympic medalists.  In his book, he talks about putting together ideal running plans based upon pacing and desired race lengths.   In his programs, about 80% of all running is done at "Easy Pace" aka Epace, a pace thats approximately 2 minutes/mile slower than 10K race pace. 

At that pace, you stress the majority of the systems needed for effective running.  But you don't overstress the body such that it requires recovery periods.  This allows running day after day after day.  Consistency.  Repeatability.  Low risk of injury.

Now, running at more intense paces will stress some additional body systems above and beyond running at Epace.  And thats why Daniels suggests about 20% of running at higher paces.  But there's a significant cost to running harder.  And thats in recovery time and injury risk.

Earlier in this thread on Page 4, I posted an article titled Interactions Between Training Sessions - Part II.  In it, Paulo Sousa, the author, identifies the length of time that the body needs to recover from different types of workouts.  Copying from that article, we have: 

- Extensive Endurance: 8 to 12 hours.
- Intensive Endurance: 24 to 30 hours.
- Sprints/Short sets: 30 to 40 hours.
- Extensive Anaerobic Training: 36 to 48 hours.
- Extensive Strength Training: 40 to 60 hours.
- Intensive Anaerobic Training: 36 to 48 hours.
- Intensive/Strength Training/Competition: 48-72 hours.

Medium to hard runs likely fall in the Intensive Endurance to Extinsive/Intensive Anaerobic Training.  The recover periods for those workouts are 30 to 48 hours.  This means that the body hasnt fully recovered and adapted to/incorporated the workout stress of an intense run by the next day.  The repeatability on a daily basis can't reasonably be had.  In contrast, the Epace runs require only an 8 to 12 hour recovery. 

The point I'm trying to make is that the science supports running and training at easy paces the majority of the time.  But not just the science, but also the real world results.  Its optimal to do most tri training at relaxed paces.  The biggest gains over time come about that way.

Please, do yourself a favor.  Go get the Daniels book.  It really is a great read for understanding how to best improve.

Interesting timing of this email from my former coach's group......

The answer to that question depends on who you ask.  Its a topic of very intense discussion on the boards here and in the greater tri community. 

Some of the pros:

1) Strong muscles are healthy muscles.  2) It can correct strength imbalances, something that can cause injury in repetitive stress sports like tris. 3) core strength plays a part in all 3 disciplines  4) muscle mass improve metabolism

Some of the cons:

1) strength work improves fast twitch muscle fibers.  Most tri stuff requires slow twitch muscles.  2) the increased mass and bulk slows you down.  3) studies have not shown that strength work in already fit athletes improves tri performance. 

Here's a link to just 1 of many, many articles on the subject

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?itool=abstractplus&db=pubmed&cmd=Retrieve&dopt=abstractplus&list_uids=9830826

PARTICIPANTS: Ten male triathletes who had been endurance cycle training for a minimum of 12 months prior to the commencement of the study. MEASURES: Subjects completed a maximal incremental cycle test as well as a series of muscular function tests including a 6-s cycle test, a concentric isoinertial squat jump as well as an isokinetic leg extension test performed at velocities of 60 degrees (s-1, 120 degrees (s-1 and 180 degrees.s-1. In addition, each subject also participated in a triathlon race of distance 1.5 km swim, 40 km cycle and 10 km run.


Results:

1. A significant correlation existed between cycling time (of a short course tri) and absolute VO2 peak and peak power output.
2. No significant correlations were found between the results of the muscular function tests and the incremental cycle test as well, as bike time during the triathlon race.

Conclusions:

1. Peak Power Output and VO2 peak are useful variables in assessing cycle performance in triathletes. However, the importance of muscular strength of the lower limbs may be minimal in overall cycle performance during a short course triathlon race.

Here's a link to one of the discussions here on BT.  http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/di...sts=31&start=1

Bottom line on strength training:  If you want to, go ahead.  It doesnt hurt.  It might reduce your injury risk.  But don't expect it to materially improve your tri performance.  You're working different body systems than tris require.

Scott and Dave, I don't want to mislead you.  Learning pacing was one of the hardest things for me to do.  I know how tempting it is to go hard and go fast.  It feels good!  Its fun!  You feel like you're really working hard and getting great benefit.  "No Pain, No Gain", right???

Those are the lessons we learned growing up.  And its damn hard to undo those mental lessons.

But going hard or medium hard all the time WILL lead to injury and burnout.  Sooner or later.  Its been probably the toughest lesson for me to learn.   I've paid a rather high price for making that mistake.

Coming in to being a mentor, this is one of the critical things that I wanted to convey to my team.  That, and just learning to take this as part of a lifestyle.   Without proper pacing, and by that I mean most work done at easy paces, we will not last in this sport.  Our bodies can't handle it otherwise over the long term.

This is a critical, critical lesson to long term success.

I'd suggest listening to your body.  If you're particularly sore, go especially easy.  If you're feeling not bad, then head into your new pace and go from there.

As for an estimated new pace, take your 5K or 10K race pace and add 2 minute/mile.  Thats a decent guess at an Epace for you.  Probably 85% of your running should be at that level.  The remaining can be faster intensities.  Again, Daniels will have far, far more details.

Scott, I know I've come down rather hard on you today.  But I figured you could handle it.  You and others can obviously do what you want.  This information is something that I've come to really appreciate over the last 3 years in this sport.  The only real difference between me and you is that I'm a couple of years or so further down the road.  My hope is that I can speed up all of your learning.  Give you guys some of the benefit of my reading and experience over the last 3 years.

This nutrition article this month has some really, really good stuff in it.  Here s link.

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=1424&vote=5

It does require a paid BT subscription to read it.