John C. writes -- Curious: Why no swimming yet?
John C. Thanks for the question. I'm sure many may disagree with my philosophy. If I were competing for the win or a professional triathlete, I would focus more energy on the swim. However, time is my biggest limiter. And unfortunately, I just don't have the time (though I do have the desire) to do it all. Thus, I have to make choices. I believe that, in my situation, the opportunity cost to focus more on the swim is too high. First, even I were to focus heavily on the swim, I think I could only improve my swim time at best by 10-15 min over the course of the year (and even that I think is generous), and that of course would be at the expense of improving the bike and run. I believe there is much more upside to improving bike fitness, run fitness, and overall endurance. Second and on a related note, I've calculated that in order to get to and from the pool and swim 45min takes me about 1 and half hours total time. That's at least 45 minutes wasted. On the other hand, I have my bike set up on the trainer (where I do 99% of my riding) so that I can start a relatively long ride or I can go for a run on the treadmill or out the door, literally within 5 minutes of waking up. I also don't have to worry about scheduling my workouts according to when the pool is open but rather can get in as much training as my schedule allows. That is a huge bonus when I have to wake up early or only get home late, which is often the case. Finally, while swimming more may balance my program, I believe that to reach my sub 10 goal, I need to reach 300-350 miles biking and 50-60 miles of running, irrespective of my swim time. So while I concede I will not have a good swim, I think I can maximize my race given my time constraints by focusing more heavily on the bike and run. That is not to say I will neglect the swim entirely. But I don't really schedule my swim into my program and rather just swim when I have a chance. As you can see, I haven't done a very good job of it so far, but ideally, I would like to get a couple of swims in a week but don't sweat it if I can't. As the race approaches, I will be more diligent about getting to the pool.
4 comments:
I've always done what you are doing..
In 2000 at Ironman Hawaii I swam 1:01, biked 4:50, and ran 2:55 as an age-grouper and was the top amateur/ 16th over-all with an 8:50.. I swam ~6000 per week that year.
Then in 2002 I swam 20k a week over the winter, busted my ass, and did swim 56:00 at Kona.. but still only went 8:50 over-all. Good for 13th though.
I would rather not swim ;)
Cool. Now if only I could run as fast as you.
Why can't you? Really.
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