HR advice and HIM race planning

If this is your first HIM, I would suggest staying in zone 2 or lower for the entire ride; as you gain experience at the distance you can experiment with some bouts of higher intensity on the ride but going too hard on the bike is very easy to do.

Ideally your HIM run should be within 5-10' of your open half mary which requires a very well paced and conservative ride in order to accomplish.

Shane

Here's a link to a Mike Ricci article which directly addresses your questions

http://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cms/article-detail.asp?articleid=1158

Thanks all.  This is my second HIM and I know I went out too hard for my first one.  Not all my fault though, the course is so hard, that it's impossible for me to stay in Z2 on all the long and steep climbs (with my current bike set-up).

I wish I could read the article, but I'm not a performance member - I was thinking of signing up anyway.

I'm thinking that I want to stay in high Z2/low Z3 and see what happens.

Thanks again...

Unless you are planning on being done the course under 3 hours, I would avoid z3 on the bike altogether.  If you do go to zone 3, I would say no more than the last 20-30' of the ride - otherwise you are setting up a long shuffle/walk.

Shane

Thanks Jorge,

I may try to get a couple mile run in after my next long bike.  I might have felt more refreshed than reality.  I felt fine after the ride, but I would be more certain if I ran 2 to 3 miles at race pace and guaged how I felt then.

Good idea, thanks....

some HIM race rehearsal ideas:

swim 20 min (HIM pace) + bike 2-3 hr with at least half 1 hr HIM pace + 40 min run half at HIM or

run 30 min easy + bike 2-3 hr with at least  1hr at HIM pace + 30 min run with 20 min HIM pace

Your question got me curious, so FWIW, I looked up a race from last year. My zone breakdowns were as follows -
Bike Z2/Z3/Z4: 24%/70%/6%
Run Z2/Z3/Z4: 23%/76%/1%*
*- it felt like much more than 1%.

My key race prep workouts are probably longer than normally prescribed. I like to work up to a 60 mile bike/10-12 mile run brick about 2 weeks out from race day. The bike I go by feel, and keep the run pegged at upper Z2. IMO, I get a sense of what I'm going to go through fatigue and nutrition-wise come race day. If I'm going to be out there for 5 hrs, I don't want my longest workout to be 4 hrs.