bschulte mentor Group - Closed (Page 5)

Hi folks,

I quick post to keep the topic moving this week before I hit the rode for a weekend of racing / riding / suffering

There are several methods out there to determine your HR zones.  Rather than type them each out I will provide links.  I use the Karvonen method.
http://www.answers.com/topic/karvonen-method

http://www.ajdesigner.com/phpheart/target_heart_rate_equation_karvonen.php

Standard % of Maximum Calculation

http://www.thewalkingsite.com/thr.html

You will note there are some differences in the terminology being used for the different zones.  Don't be concerned with this.  I will cover the different types of training and which zone they should be done in, as well as what the physical adaptations each type of workout provides next.

Brent,
     I have updated my workout log and notice that I get a bunch more running in than I do swimming and biking.  As I stated earlier I have a decent swim time in the 500 and for my first race I'm doing a sprint.  So the distances aren’t going to be a problem but I am competitive.  I don’t like doing something if I can’t do it well and compete with the others.  My question I guess is what times should I be shooting for in each event?  .5 mile swim is approx 800m I think and I think I can do that in less than 10 min, but what should I be trying to get it down to?  The bike.....  How long should the 15 mile bike take me on a flat and fast course?  I know the run is approx 3 miles and I can do that in about 20-25min.  
    So far I haven’t been able to find out what the winning time for last year’s triple threat triathlon is so I guess I am wondering where I stand as far as competing goes.

I'm back! I'm working on my race report for Wildflower. But here is a quick summery.

I ran the whole way (kind of walk running in parts and walked two feet at the top of the highest hill near the beginning, but mostly running most of the time). I was worried about that. I did my swim at about my expected time in spite of thinking I'd done a crappy job (had trouble staying on course and also got kicked and swallowed water and had to stop and get it out). My run was slightly faster than expected (even though it's still my worst event) and my bike a lot longer. But my finish time was right within my window I had assigned myself so I was happy.

They had water and Gatorade Endurance at the aide stations. I did take some bottles of the Gatorade Endurance at the bike aide stations. They hold them out as you bike by and trying to grab a bottle and not crash amused me.  I figured it would make my special mix last longer but I really didn't need to do it and I think that stuff gave me gas on the run.

I did end up walking up one hill on the bike course, but then I was sorry. Pushing a bike uphill is almost as much work as just riding it when the hill is steep! So I remembered that when I got to the next hill with my rubber legs that wanted to give up and just powered through it. On the last hill I passed a 73 year old man who called me a young chick.  

I'm so excited and I'm going to do another Olympic course in July and maybe a 70.3 in Oct. There is a relatively flat one around here I could do to get my feet wet. 

Great job on your first olympic!! From what I hear, Wildflower is a challenging course and sounds like you battled through it. 

Buoyancy will not have any effect on your race swim time besides making you more comfortable in the water.  It is kind of a safety net for those not as comfortable in the water, I know it helped my confidence when I first started, but now I probably would not use it for a swim under 1000m as the time in transition would offset the time made up in the water.  The wetsuit, from a time perspective, helps faster swimmers with great technique more so than slower ones.  I would anticipate maybe a couple seconds per 100.  Brent probably has a little more experience with this topic but thought I would throw you some thoughts.

Ryan

Good luck and practice removing the top while running this weekend at your OWS.

Thanks for the tips on the T1 stuff.  I bought one of the Pro-motion wetsuits that are advertised on the BT website using the discount.  I went with one of the nicer ones they sell and fortunately it has the 1/4 zip up the back of the calves, so that should help with some of the lower body peel off.  Hopefully we'll see what the result is this weekend.

Hi folks,

So let's finish up the HR training topic today.  I'm sure it is pretty dry and technical, but some may find it useful, if not right now, perhaps one day.

So last week I provided a couple links on how to determine your HR zones.  You may be thinking "so what".  Today I'll talk about what each of the zones does for you physiologically.  Recall the 3 basic ranges I spoke about last week:

1.  Aerobic training (means with oxygen) - plenty of excess oxygen for your muscles to use here.  This is the "EASY" pace
2.  Anaerobic training (without oxygen) - muscles are using all of the available oxygen, starting to burn higher % of sugar
3.  Threshold training - muscles using all oxygen and burning very high % sugar, also your body can not remove all of the lactic acid, a by product of burning sugar, at the rate it is producing it.  Muscle fatigue / burning becomes prevalent.  "HARD" workouts.

As I've stated before I use the Karvonen method to get my 5 zones, so I will speak to these zones.  I'll apologize ahead of time as some of these physical adaptations can get pretty technical, but I'll try to provide some layman's terms to help. 

Zone 1 - completely aerobic - these are the EASY workouts and the pace may seem too slow, but because the duration is longer (think long run day) you are tired when you finish.  You should be doing a lot of training at this level (probably > 50%).  You wouldn't train at this level for a short training session as it wouldn't do much good.  Adaptations are:  Increased aerobic energy sources, increased aerobic energy pathways, increased capillary density, increased mitochondria proliferation, increased free fatty acid mobilization.  What all this means is you are teaching your body how to burn fat as an energy source, and teaching your body how to get oxygen and energy deep down in the muscles.  Here's a car analogy for you.  Let's say your body is a car engine.  There are 3 blends of gasoline you can buy for your car, premium, mid-grade, and regular.  The premium, let's call it "glycogen", the mid-grade, let's call that "blend", and regular, let's call that "fat".  Your body / engine is a finely tuned race engine which runs on the premium stuff, "glycogen".  let's say there is a gas shortage (Atlanta last Fall) and you can only find a little bit of Premium, a little more of the mid-grade, and all the regular you need.  Your engine can run on the mid-grade and the regular, but it must be tuned up (trained) to do so.  When you first try to run it on the regular it spits and sputters.  The problem is that it doesn't go as fast when it runs on the regular, and goes a little faster on the mid-grade, and fastest on the premium.  Over time the "tune up" (training) starts to set in and your car runs more and more efficiently on the regular and you find it can even run longer on the mid-grade.  Zone 1 training is your "tune up" to get your engine to run more efficiently on it's endless energy supply, fat.  Without this zone 1 adaptation, you engine will "run out of gas" in a short period of time.

Zone 2 - This is the level most people who are unfamiliar with training zones will probably train in.  It is slightly harder than the zone 1 stuff and you start feeling fatigued after moderate training time.  About 20 - 25% of your training is in this zone.  Adaptations are further improvement in aerobic energy sources, and further improvement in aerobic energy pathways.  In this zone you are increasing your ability to use fat as a fuel source at a higher heart rate.  While racing if you can go at a HR where you are burning a higher % of Fat vs. your competitors at the same HR, you will be able to go longer and will have more glycogen (premium) at the end for that last mile push where you will be passing people left and right.

Zone 3 -  This is a pretty hard level to train at and a moderate training time workout at this level will be very tiresome.  Very little training should be done as straight zone 3 training (<10%).  Interval training is a better option, which I'll explain next.  Adaptations in this zone are:  increased aerobic energy pathways, increased recruitment of FOG fibers, increased glycolysis, increased oxygen transport system.  Basically, in this zone you start to use different muscle fiber types which have a quicker contraction rate (type II or fast twitch muscles).  These muscles use the "premium" grade fuel called glycogen.  You are developing the systems to fuel these muscle fibers.  Gross oversimplification, but basically what is happening.

Zone 4 - This is sometime referred to as anaerobic threshold training.  Interval and hill interval workouts are done in this zone.  About 10% of your training will be in this zone depending on which phase you are in.  These are HARD workouts.  An interval workout is a track type workout, or hard repeats in the pool, where you are doing repeats of specific distances.  Adaptations in this zone are:  further increase of aerobic energy pathways, increase in anaerobic energy pathways, further increase of FOG muscle fibers, increase of your anaerobic threshold, increased oxygen transport systems, increased ability to clear lactic acid.  Intervals should be preformed at or just below your AT.  Typically you would only have one of these session in each discipline (on different days) a week.  After several week your AT will start to raise and workouts at lower HR's, say zone 2, will start to seam easier and you will notice your pace at these workout will increase.....HEY folks you are now going faster at the same HR!!!!!!!!

Zone 5  - This zone is completely above your AT (anaerobic threshold) and above your LT (lactic acid threshold) and are usually in the form of "speed bursts" which last less than 60 seconds.  These are sort little speed ups which are "all out".  These type additions to your workouts don't come in until usually in the taper and racing phases of your training plan and account for only 1-2% of your training.  Adaptations are: increased anaerobic energy sources, increased fast-twitch FG muscle fiber recruitment, increased speed and neuromuscular coordination.  This will help you adapt to that "rubbery leg" feeling you may sometime get after a hard effort.  You are training you body how to get rid of the waste these hard short effort produce.  This will help you power up a hill, pass someone on the bike, get to the front of the pack at the start of the swim to stay out of the chaos, and yes, sprint past that person you have been trying to stay with for the last mile on the run......your "kick".  

Whew!!  that's a lot of stuff and probably more than you need right now.  Like I said before this will give you a peak at some of the "methodology" which goes into training and getting the most out of your training. 

In a nutshell your most important training is the stuff on both ends of the scale.  The zone 1 and the zone 4-5 stuff.  Unfortunately most folks spend too much time in the zone 2-3 area where they are not getting the biggest bang for the buck.  Now if you haven't been following these principles, I wouldn't recommend you change on a dime and go out and do a tough interval session.  You have to ease into it.  The last thing you want to do is pull a muscle and not be able to train at all.

QUESTIONS???

great stuff Brent - explained very well!  I should print that and put it in my workout bag for future reference.

Alright more questions so I hope this helps others. My resting HR is 58 I did 34 on the bike with avg 148 today so just out of zone 1 I guess. I am able to keep it down during rides and swims but not so much during the run. Do I just need to plan to run slower. I do my oly this weekend so I am not changing up right now but when I start training for the HIM I want to be doing things right. I feel that I have a good base. Ultimate goal is a full ironman next year. I will be doing a couple other shorter distances this year a sprint and another oly but want to make sure I am doing things right. The other question is where can I find a good HIM distance trng schedule? I saw on here but not to sure about it.