Half Iron Man

Hey Ken,
Do you have a training plan that can get you race ready by May? And will you be able to make time to train for a Half IM? If so, then I say got for it. It should be fun.
My .02
Tom

I say go for it - get your hands on a training plan and start working in the long workouts.  good luck!

May is 6 months away...lots of time Get a plan though. I used the one on this website and was really happy.

Thanks everyone. I have a general plan of attack. Will check out this site for a specific regimen. Ken

Here's the page for half iron man plan. Not to be disloyal but there are other plans available on the web too. You have plenty of time to work yourself into the base required to start any of the plans.

Are you looking at the New Jersey Devilman Half IM?

You can do it with a focused effort on improving your endurance and aerobic fitness in each sport. Work on increasing the distance of your weekly long bike ride, long run, and long swim until you reach or exceed race distance. As the race approaches start doing some increasingly longer and longer brick workouts. An oly distance brick is a good pre-half IM workout (~40K bike, 10K run). I think you have plenty of time.

If you are only going to do one thing to prepare for this race - get on your bike and ride A LOT! If you don't have cold weather gear (I live in MD, too, and don't ride outdoors in the dead of winter) invest in a good indoor trainer and make use of it. Make sure you get in at least a few 50+ mile bike rides in March/April and then start in on some long bricks.

I do some open water swimming in the Severn River (near Crofton, MD) starting in March in preparation for the Chesapeake Bay swim and the early season triathlons. You'd be welcome to join us to get some open water workouts before the race. Just let me know.

As stated by econway above, It is all about building endurance base right now. Period! Don't worry about intervals, fartlek, etc. Simply get going and build the time on the bike, running, and in the pool.

When you can do each of these three individually NON-STOP (or with short breaks) for a reasonable amount of time (for me it is individual workout goals of 1+ hours [120 laps] in the pool, 3+ hours on the bike and 15+ mile runs) you can start the more detailed work. Remember, a 1/2 IM is a HUGE jump from oly (on average from 2 hour or so to do an oly vs. 5 to 6 hour or more for 1/2 IM) and that is why most folks don't do them. Not that they can't, but long distance triathlons require a lot of training time and many don't have that much free time. But for now, build slow, adapt the body, and build endurance. Traithlon is an endurance sport and that is the base you need.

With that said, GO FOR IT! You can do it in 6 months! As one quote says on this site, "Go big or go home." :-)

For workout plans I use Joel Friel's book "The Triathlete's Training Bible." I covers all the bases soup to nuts.

Good luck.

John

Edited by webguy 2004-12-08 12:18 AM