Team Q&A: Ultimate Race Course

We're back again with another team question. This time, we asked everyone to build their ultimate race course/venue. The answers are split into two groups. The first set of responses are below and the next set will be posted in a couple of days.

Stu: The swim would most definitely be from Escape from Alcatraz. A point to point swim is hard to find, and what better one than Alcatraz to San Francisco. The bike would be Rev3 Quassy. The scenery, rolling hills, and outrageously amazing pro field to blaze the way makes this a great bike route. The run would be Wildflower. There is a bit of everything on this route. You name it, you will find it (for those that have done it, you know what I mean).

Michelle: My favorite race venue would be comprised of places that I have raced before. I absolutely love the IM World Championship swim at Kona. It is an out and back course in a bay. The water is temperate, wetsuits are not allowed, and the bay offers some natural protection from overly nasty swells/waves. The salt water provides some natural buoyancy. The ocean bottom can be seen throughout the whole race. What better way to pass the time than watching colorful fish and coral! For the bike ride, I would choose the IM Lake Placid course. The scenery is absolutely spectacular. If you are a lover of the outdoors, camping, fishing, mountains, great forests, and rivers, you will not be disappointed. The ride offers a double loop course with several long gradual climbs, descents, and flats. It’s got it all! The run course I would choose is at a race I've done many times in Wisconsin at High Cliff State Park. It has it all. A massive climb right out of transition, followed by terrains which are varied and fun. The run goes through the state park and goes over asphalt, gravel, limestone, and natural forest bottom. Truly great!

Chris: When I ran cross country in college I became really disillusioned with one after another of flat, fast, races held on groomed golf courses- it was too far from the roots of the sport. With a few notable outliers triathlon courses also tend towards fast and non-technical over slow and difficult. My swim would be a point to point river swim like the now-defunct New York City Ironman where the top swimmers went sub 40 minutes, but my course would be against the current. Since I have complete geographic freedom the ride would be the 115km bike leg of the Alpe d’Huez triathlon. For the run, I have to go with the Wildflower half marathon. This is a challenging run with a mix of trails and roads and really, really good support at the aid stations!

Charlie: I think my favorite swim for triathlon is an ocean swim, like Ironman Florida and Kona. I haven't done Kona, but I've swam the course. There's something very humbling about being in that volume of water. My favorite bike course was at Whirlpool's Steelhead 1/2 ironman in St Joe, Michigan. The scenery is beautiful and the gentle rolling hills fun to power through. The best run course was at The River Cities triathlon in Bossier City, LA because the course is almost fully shaded through a park around a reservoir. It also had an off-road cross-country section which kept it interesting.

Sarah: My favorite distance is the half-ironman. I think I've done nearly as many halfs as all of my other triathlons combined! My dream swim would be in a relatively small, clear, protected lake. I love a swim with little chop and great visibility. I know some people prefer not to be able to see the bottom of the lake they are swimming in, but I really enjoy it. Chisago half iron, Liberty when it was in Lake Independence (both in MN), and the Ironman Wisconsin swim all have decent visibility, but my ideal swim would have closer to 20 feet as opposed to 10. The bike would be on rolling hills in the countryside - think the Liberty half iron course in Minnesota or Steelhead. The run would definitely be around a lake with a breeze. I think I would prefer a two-loop course like the Minneapolis Tri (formerly Lifetime). I love a run that encourages a lot of spectators and has some shade to offer. In my ideal world, I’d be racing alongside as many of my family members as possible. Oh, and the aid stations would resemble that of an ultramarathon. If you can think it up, it’s there.

Inch Leads the Way

Matt entered a local 5K and got more out of the race than he put in. Read his race report to learn how:

So I decided to sign up for a 5k when I got back from Chattanooga with the Evotri gang, and chose the Viking Fun Run because I figured it there was going to be awards for the overall winners, they had to be sweet viking trophies or goblets or something! Usually I am lured into these types of races for prize money or cool awards, its the little things :)

So Chattanooga was a huge training week for me, and the following week again was also another massive week. I was shutting it down at work because it was my last week with Terex, and was going to be transitioning into teaching. So having completed most of my finishing tasks with Terex, I had a lot of time to train...and that I did. Piling 2 huge weeks with solid intensity I figured I would be in for a rough week the following, but surprisingly my body was responding well and wanted more punishment. I had gone nearly 18 days without a full day off, and surprised I was still firing on nearly all cylinders. I wanted to try to get in one last big week, and then roll into a recovery week before my half ironman coming up on April 27th. Well, midway through the week the wheels fell off. Its amazing how well you can feel one workout, and then wake up the next day and be flatter than a pancake! I talked to Andy and strategized the plan leading up to the half, which clearly included a couple days off!

So I took the day off leading into the 5k, and went in with the mentality that I would run with the leaders for the first 2 miles, then pull away in the last mile, finishing 15-20 seconds clear of the field. Sounds easy on paper.

I woke up feeling good race morning after the day off, and thought if im going to run pretty comfortable in the race I might as well rack up some miles before the race...so i went for a nice easy 5 mile warm up, ran the course and checked out some of the local area before getting back to the start line, stretching and toeing the line. There was a 1 mile kids fun run, and a 5k that were starting at the same time, and sure enough, every 7 year old kid wanted to be starting right on the front line haha, which was fine with me because I was going in just to have fun with it and hopefully win a cool trophy! They shot the gun and the kids and I were off.

after about 200 meters of little kids screaming and sprinting, I weeded my way through them and noticed another kid, bigger than the elementary kids, but still a "child" way out in front and looking very fluent. I figured he had to be about 13-14 years old, and definitely in the 5k, so I opened it up a bit and closed the gap. Took me about 3/4 mile, but I comfortably closed the gap and greeted the kid. We ran together shoulder to shoulder up until the mile then he started to drop back...we hit the mile in 5:39. At this point I'm thinking OK, this kid got out hard and is clearly talented for his age, lets do a little coaching and see how tough he is...so I started to give him some words of encouragement, telling him to stay right on my tail and ill block the wind etc.

When we hit the turn around I could tell the kid was hurting, but a true fighter. He was not letting go of me without giving it everything he had, and I respected that big time! The fact that he didn't quit and say that guy is way older and coming second to him is good, ill just run comfort zone the rest of the way really stood out to me. He was gritting his teeth, breathing heavily...he was All In!

There was a short steep incline for about a minute after the turn around, and I let the kid know that if we are going to really push the pace up the slope here, then its all flat/downhill the rest of the way. I started to turn it over and with each stride he was hanging tough not letting me get out of reach.

Once we crested the hill I settled back into our early pace and kept yelling at the kid to hang tough, 1 mile left, anything to encourage him for a great race up to this point, but to make sure he finished it and wasn't satisfied with 2/3 of a great race.

His pace started to slip after cresting the hill and I was gaping him. At this point I thought to myself, what would I rather do, really lay the hammer down and go get my sweet trophy? Or do I continue to pace this kid to probably the greatest run he has ever had? I have always enjoyed coaching that age group of kids, and it was a no brainer at that point. I pulled back on the reins a little bit and let the kid close the gap and get within reach again...at this point in the race we were probably averaging just over 5:40s through 2 miles and change, and the last bit of the race was gradual downhill. I again gave the kid some encouraging words, and he was back into the stellar pace he started out at, he came around quick and was really moving now.

As we turned on the very last road and headed home we were just over a half mile to go in the race...and I thought to myself "What do i do? Do I kick it in and drop him here? Is this race really worth anything? If I do kick it in and finish with a 17:25, do I or anyone else really benefit from this? What about my trophy?

Meanwhile I am filling this kid with everything verbally I could to keep him on pace and to finish strong. I was so stoked at how he was fighting out there, and when I looked back to see his face, the pure grit and determination to hang on, to not let the race go, to take a huge risk and stand by it...at that point I knew what I was going to do...the kid had earned the race and he absolutely deserved the glory!

As we approached the final 300 meters, his family was in the distance and they were going ballistic! They were so happy for him, and that's when I told the kid you have less than one minute left in the race...Finish It! And that he did...he took off, I countered him stride for stride, and I looked down at my Garmin ..we were ticking off 4:40s over that last 300 meters...unbelievable!

Over the last 40 meters I took my foot off the gas and let him enjoy the moment. I could still hear his family going berserk behind me. I came in a few strides behind him, and its a good thing I shut it down when I did because the overall results showed him with a 17:41.2, and me at 17:41.7! And if that time isn't impressive enough, the Garmin clocked it at 3.19 miles for an avg pace of 5:32 min/mi!

Matt and Friend at the finish line.

The kid came up to me after the race and thanked me for pacing him, which showed a lot about his character. An appreciative kid who laid it all out on the line...I hope my kids are like him because that is picture perfect!

Team Q&A - Favorite Workouts: Chris

Finishing us out is Chris with lots of great info, answering"What's your favorite workouts for each discipline?" In cased you've missed it, Inch, Sara, Rob, Michelle, Sarah, JP, Stu, and Charlie have all provided answers.

My favorite sets (as opposed to more general workouts) are always done in groups. I have always thrived athletically when part of a strong team. For years my primary training strategy has been to seek out the strongest athletes in each discipline and train with them as often as possible. Although I am not actively coaching triathletes now, I dug into my workout sets for a few of my favorites.

Swim
For a main set I really like this classic sprinters set from my high school days. Attribution goes to Jim Runkle who coached the Peoria Woodruff High School team and the C.I.A. club team I swam on.

The basic block for this main set is:
75yd rest 10 sec
50yd rest 5 sec
25yd rest 45 sec

This doesn’t look too bad on paper, but it is meant to be done all-out. Each block totals 150 yards. If you can string 10 of these together without yakking, you’ll come out the other side a better triathlete!

Bike
OK, switching gears to long course training for this one. Over time this workout has become a key benchmark during my Ironman training. This is not a base-phase workout. In fact, the only time you are likely to successfully complete it is during your build or peak phases. Again, I think this looks quite manageable on paper. It is the last hour (and specifically the last 30 minutes of that hour) at 80-85% of Functional Threshold Power (FTP) that always gets me. I’ve probably done this workout 10 times and successfully completed the whole thing twice. A word to the wise is to stay within the ranges early on! Credit for the basic structure of this workout goes to coach Mike Ricci from D3 Multisport.

20 minute easy warm up
1 hour at 65%
1 hour at 70-75%
10 min easy at 50%
1 hour at 75-80%
5 min easy at 50%
1 hour at 80-85%
15 min at 90%

Cool down.

Run
With run workouts I am a big believer in teaching your body to run fast when you are tired. Much of what I do is designed to be faster at the end than the beginning. I try to negative split all of my long runs and tempo runs. I also incorporate some harder efforts into all of my long runs. The track workout below uses decreasing distances to help teach your legs to turnover when fatigued.

15 minute easy warm-up
1600m @5K pace
400 very easy jog
1200m @3K pace
400 very easy jog
2X800 @2 mile pace
200m jog between the 800s
4X400m @ mile pace

1 minute recovery between quarters10 minute cool-down

Team Q&A - Favorite Workouts: Charlie

Charlie's up! Read below to know how he answers,"What's your favorite workouts for each discipline?" In cased you've missed it, Inch, Sara, Rob, Michelle, Sarah, JP, and Stu have all provided answers. 

My favorite workouts lately have been the progressively longer runs that my wife and I did with our third daughter Signe in preparation for the Louisiana Marathon. We have 4 daughters and have encouraged each of them to run a marathon with us while they are in high school. With 4 children we've really enjoyed some one-on-one time with each of them preparing for their marathons. We intentionally do not set any time goal - it's all just about running together and soaking up the day. They have each finished the marathons with such a sense of accomplishment - the experience of setting a big goal, preparing for it, and successfully completing it has really taught them a lot about life in general. So many people have things they want to accomplish in life but never figure out how to do it. Hopefully this marathon experience will teach our daughters to dream big, go after those special things in life wholeheartedly and not give up.

Team Q&A - Favorite Workouts - Stu

Now it's Stu's turn to answer, "What's your favorite workouts for each discipline?" In cased you've missed it, Inch, Sara, Rob, Michelle, Sarah, and JP have all provided answers. 

My favorite workout is always the long run, it is a great way to end the week.  In the past, my long runs where at a (relatively) very slow place, often as slow as 9+ min pace.  This last session, my long runs were just :45 seconds slower than my race pace.  With my race pace at 7:30, my long runs were 8:15 pace.  I felt so much stronger and on race day, I had a lot more confidence since my long runs were closer to race pace.  I'm always near my home on long run days, so often this is a workout where I get to see many of my friends along the way.