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Training and Race Schedule Questions
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 2013-06-27 3:06 PM |
Member  19 League City, TX |  Subject: Training and Race Schedule QuestionsHey everyone, I've decided to pull the trigger and register for a full Ironman, 2014 Ironman Texas, and have other events planned during training to build fitness and keep me interested throughout my year of training. I wanted to get a little feedback on my training and race schedule to see what everyone thought and to make sure I haven't bitten off more than I can chew. I don't plan on winning anything so I planned on using a lot of them as training events leading up the the Austin Half and Texas Ironman. 7/7 - Begin 16-week HIM Training Plan 9/21 - Kemah 10K 10/6 - Tough Mudder 10/19 - Gaveston 10K 10/27 - Austin HIM 11/17 - La Porte Half Marathon 1/19 - Houston Marathon 1/26 - Begin 15-week Ironman Training Plan 5/17 - Ironman Texas Thanks for the feedback. |
| 2013-06-27 3:43 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Pro 6520   Bellingham, WA | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions I don't think that is an overly aggressive schedule if you have enough base to not risk injury. If you are going to race a lot you have to factor in the impact on your overall training plan. Since the IM is your primary goal, it is the weeks during your IM plan that are probably most impacted by additional races. The problem with racing during this time frame is that the races (assuming some amount of taper/recovery) can get in the way of key workouts aimed at IM prep. It can be done but you have to integrate it into your plan and work with it. Between now and then I'd go for it and enjoy the journey. |
| 2013-06-27 4:07 PM in reply to: popsracer |
Member 19 League City, TX | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Thanks for the feedback. I was worried about overdoing it when I started doing my Ironman-specific training so I didn't schedule any races after the marathon which leaves a full week to recover and then start a 15-week plan where the first few weeks should be fairly easy with all the other training for HIM and marathon, allowing even more "active" recovery from the marathon. |
| 2013-06-27 4:20 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Pro 6520 Bellingham, WA | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Don't underestimate the amount of mental recovery you might need after a very busy runup to your IM training. It can be a grind and a lot of people get a little burnt out at some point along the way. |
| 2013-06-27 5:47 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Member 55 | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Why the marathon? Have you run a marathon before? If you google "marathon for ironman training," you will find dozens of links explaining why it is NOT recommended. It seems counter-intuitive but the IM marathon and the open marathon are quite different. In any case, enjoy your journey. |
| 2013-06-28 8:19 AM in reply to: caltrijedi |
Member 19 League City, TX | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions I registered for the marathon before I registered for the TX Ironman and I have done one other marathon 2012 Houston plus many half marathons. I have heard and read that its not recommended to do a marathon during training but I guess that was part of my question since I'm planning on doing a 15-week program for Ironman-specific training and the marathon is 16 weeks before the Ironman. I was thinking my fitness level would be pretty high with the marathon training as long as I remained consistent with the bike and swim as well so I will have a "head start" on the running portion of the training. |
| 2013-06-28 9:32 AM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Veteran 930 Morgan Hill, California | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions It depends on how you feel coming out of the marathon. You want to be as fresh and healthy as possible going into start of IM training (and coming out too hopefully), so if you can recover from the marathon and be ready to go on the IM training, then go for it. But, if you are going to be skirting the line of injury for the marathon prep, then that might be hard going into IM prep. |
| 2013-06-28 10:55 AM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
| Member 55 | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions A friend of mine who just completed his first IM (IMCDA) was contemplating a second marathon as part of his IM training (4 months out). After reading the many articles saying not to run the marathon, he still did the event but was able to switch his registration to the half marathon option. A lot depends on your recovery. I wish you well! |
| 2013-06-28 3:34 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Pro 4723 CyFair | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Originally posted by tsapp1981 I registered for the marathon before I registered for the TX Ironman and I have done one other marathon 2012 Houston plus many half marathons. I have heard and read that its not recommended to do a marathon during training but I guess that was part of my question since I'm planning on doing a 15-week program for Ironman-specific training and the marathon is 16 weeks before the Ironman. I was thinking my fitness level would be pretty high with the marathon training as long as I remained consistent with the bike and swim as well so I will have a "head start" on the running portion of the training.
Can you switch to the half marathon? What is your goal for the marathon? If you "race" the marathon and try to lay down your best time possible you will set yourself back a bit recovery wise. If you go out and run it at Z2 (Friel's) the whole way you may be ok. I prefer my athletes to go with the half mary if racing Texas.
Also have you already registered for Austin? You may want to think about Oilman this fall instead since the majority of the Oilman bike course is on the IMTX course. Just a thought. |
| 2013-06-28 3:56 PM in reply to: uhcoog |
Member 19 League City, TX | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions I do not plan on "racing" the marathon at all. It will be more of a confidence booster since my first marathon didn't go well which was completely my fault because I didn't train for anything past the half marathon distance for the first one so I hit a pretty hard wall around mile 15-16. The recovery from my first one was pretty quick, within a week I started doing some light running (under 10k) because I had a Tough Mudder two weeks afterwards. That was actually a mistake because I ended up getting injured jumping over one of the barricades too fast. I'll definitely be taking it slower at this Tough Mudder and I'm doing it with friends who haven't run much so I plan on staying with them and working as a team to finish. I have already registered for Austin. I did Oilman in 2011 and live up in the area so I plan on riding the course quite a bit during training so I can get used to the rollers in the Woodlands/Cypress area that aren't down in south Houston. |
| 2013-06-28 6:21 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
Veteran 740 The Woodlands, TX | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Free advice is always worth what you pay for it. The general rule about not running a marathon too close to IM makes a lot of sense, if you're training is anywhere close to your capacity. If you think you'll be pushing yourself to your limits during your 15-week program, then you might want to reconsider. However, I don't think too many middle or back of the pack participants fall into that category. What kind of running mileage will your plan ask for the first week or two after t he marathon? Do you think you'll be able to handle it? Nobody can say what's too much for you......only you have the insight to make that call. Take an honest look at your season this fall after Austin and see how things went. Were you fighting injury or constantly fatigued? Did you skip a lot of workouts? How did you handle the training volume? If you struggled, then skipping the marathon may make sense. If it was tough, but you handled it okay, then there's probably no issue with doing the marathon. I can tell you that there are a lot of IM-TX participants doing TX winter-time marathons and even ultras with no issues. We're not all Kona qualifiers, but, for most of us, that's not our goal. My preference is to race a lot. I'm not "podium" material, but I'm typically in the top half of my age group. There are also a lot of people following 20 or 30-week programs who skip the winter marathon season or do fall marathons. Limiting your race schedule before IM is a more conservative approach, but that may or may not be the best approach for you. |
| 2013-06-29 7:48 PM in reply to: 0 |
| 643 | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions I think it's fine. I'm on a 30 week IM program and it called for an Olympic at week 18 and a HIM at week 22. I did a marathon instead at 18 since it was way too cold for local triathlons (marathon was 37 degrees!). I PR'ed that by 4 minutes (probably due to cooler weather). Normally it takes a good week for me to recover but all that biking and swimming building really seem to help recovery. I did 45 minutes of Z1 100+ bike spinning that right. That made my legs and knees feel way way better (I plan all my spin session at night now on my long day runs after figuring this out). Tuesday my plan called for 2,500m swim + run for an hour. I did a nice easy 1,200m swim or so and mainly just worked on stoke and not sets. I skipped the run workout. Wednesday plan called for a 45 min bike + 30 min run transition and I was able to do that. I was able to jump right back onto training pretty much Wednesday, except I cut short my first long run (details below). Now I didn't go 100% at the HR I should have...maybe 90% and I was very careful to listen to my body and knees if they were telling me something wrong, but 12 weeks, in your case 16 weeks, seems like plenty of time to recover. I did a mix of my 30 week training program (Be Iron Fit) + Hal Higdon's 18 week marathon program (used my triathlon workouts plans for weekday and took his long run). On week 19 my plan only called for 1:30 running, which was way less than I was used to. I did cut this to about 1:10 or so since that's 2 laps at my training location. After that, I just followed the IM plan. The IM plan increased running way slower than marathon plan, so it worked out.for me. Edited by Blastman 2013-06-29 7:49 PM |
| 2013-07-01 8:58 AM in reply to: Blastman |
Member 19 League City, TX | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Thank you all for your responses. I'm going to continue my research and training, making sure to listen to my body every step of the way and making a decision on the marathon after the Austin HIM in October. I'll keep you guys posted as I continue on this journey to finishing my first Ironman and I'm sure I'll be on here asking many other questions. |
| 2013-07-01 4:03 PM in reply to: tsapp1981 |
| Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions Originally posted by tsapp1981 Hey everyone, I've decided to pull the trigger and register for a full Ironman, 2014 Ironman Texas, and have other events planned during training to build fitness and keep me interested throughout my year of training. I wanted to get a little feedback on my training and race schedule to see what everyone thought and to make sure I haven't bitten off more than I can chew. I don't plan on winning anything so I planned on using a lot of them as training events leading up the the Austin Half and Texas Ironman. 7/7 - Begin 16-week HIM Training Plan 9/21 - Kemah 10K 10/6 - Tough Mudder 10/19 - Gaveston 10K 10/27 - Austin HIM 11/17 - La Porte Half Marathon 1/19 - Houston Marathon 1/26 - Begin 15-week Ironman Training Plan 5/17 - Ironman Texas Thanks for the feedback. This is just my opinion, but I'd ditch the marathon completely. You've only got 8 weeks between your HIM and the marathon, and 1 week from the marathon and the start of your IM training. To me that just doesn't make any sense if *I* were doing that. I'd need AT LEAST 1 week to recover from the HIM before resuming a high running volume program. I can usually transition from a HIM to a high volume biking plan, but running needs a more gradual transition IME. Then I would need to taper for 1-2 weeks before the marathon...so that really only would leave me 5-6 weeks of actual marathon training. That's not my idea of running a good marathon...even after coming off of HIM training. Then after the marathon, I would need to go right into IM training...usually I need about 2-3 weeks before I feel normal after a marathon. Again, the biking normally comes back pretty quick, but I usually can't run more than 20 mpw for a few weeks. Then combine the fact that this entire training schedule lastst 10 months with little to no break... So if I had to rework this schedule, I'd do the HIM...recover for a week or two mentally and physically, then base build for another 6 weeks (maybe with a run focus) and head into IM training feeling good and ready. Of course...everyone is different, and this is just what *I* would do. Best of luck to you in whatever you decide though. |
| 2013-07-01 4:13 PM in reply to: Jason N |
Master 2855 Kailua, Hawaii | Subject: RE: Training and Race Schedule Questions totally agree with Jason. 15 week IM training is aggressive IMO, to possibly weaken it with the marathon recovery, wouldn't be my plan. |
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