Monday Minders
CpC family, this is an email I sent to my crew. Some thought it would be of interest to some on the forum so I pasted it here to take a look at, if you are interested. Train with joy. sj
Fellow athletes,
Each week, I will try to put out a few of my thoughts on training so that we
have something to mentally chew on while we are training. If these help,
great! If not, just put them in the "Scott's hair-brained thoughts" file and
move on. I plan on calling these thoughts/tips "Monday Minders". If you do
not want to be on this email list, don't hesitate to let me know! I'm very
sensitive to email kharma, I won't take offense at all if you ask to be
removed from the list. Enjoy.
After helping Mitch coach another high-volume camp in the last couple of
weeks and having the opportunity to train with some really remarkable
athletes I have some thoughts from the experience and while sitting here in
my Tokyo hotel room jetlagged to the bone, I thought I'd share with you some
of my takeaways. The CpC camps are usually in the 35-40 hour range over the
8 days so there is plenty of opportunity to get tired training hard with
others and with that comes some interesting exchanges with other coaches and
athletes The other opportunity I had was to train and live in close
proximity to pro triathletes Clas Bjorling and Kristi Gough. During long
bikes and transits in the van we had some interesting chats and I want to
take the opportunity to share a couple of those pearls with you as well.
Scott- "So Clas, what is the biggest difference you see in the way
age-groupers train and the way you and your other pros train?"
Clas- "Scott, age groupers rarely really train with their training partners,
they race them during their workouts. They should work more to just train
with their friends, not race them"
Scott- "Is there a difference in focus?"
Clas- "You guys are turned on with fast workouts. You all just want to go
fast all the time but you don't have the base to support it. You should just
go steady everyday. That will make you strong, training fast just makes you
tired and sore and prevents you from training as well the next day. Its all
about being able to train the next day just like today-that makes you strong
and strong makes you fast."
Scott- "What else do we do differently?"
Clas- " Age-groupers don't value sleep as much as pros. Mostly because you
don't have the time, but it is important to remember to rest. You need to
sleep more if you really want to improve. Training tired all the time really
limits how good you can be. Stress than rest"
Just wanted to share that with you guys. Clas, a Swede, doesn't say much so
when he does-I listen. For those who don't know, Clas is a sub 8:20 IM
finisher.
The other thing I wanted to pass to you friends and neighbors has to do with
goal setting and season planning. This has come up recently with some of my
athletes and I want to talk about it with all of you. When planning out your
season it is really important to think about a couple of things. First one
is "What do I really want to accomplish this season?" Second question, which
is really important "Am I prepared to do everything it is going to take to
reach that goal?" Third question, "Is my goal attainable by me with
absolutely no bearing on what others are doing?" Last question, "Am I doing
anything in my training that might be shipwrecking that goal?"
Here are some examples of what I'm talking about.
1. "I want to race a quality ironman but I'm going to be recovering from a
marathon 5 weeks before my A race ironman." hmmm...
2. "I want to be a world class triathlete and am willing to train to
whatever level I need to in order to get there but I'm going to throw in a
50k ultra 5 weeks prior to my A race half ironman." hmmm...
3. "I want to race as fast as Michael Blue (awesome seattle age group
triathlete)." Thought-Michael Blue trains 20-25 hours per week and has 20
years of base in his legs. Ask yourself, Is this really a goal I should
strive for or should I set one based on my capabilities based on my training
protocol and my years in the sport?
4. "I want to podium in such and such a race." What does this have to do
with you? Can you control the other athletes protocol or are you only in
control of your own training?
Just some real live case scenarios to help with your own goal setting and
season planning. It is not my intent to get you guys to not run that
marathon or ultra before your A race. I'm just trying to help you really
calibrate your expectations and have a realistic expectation on what the
cost of doing something like that is so that you aren't destroyed if you
don't meet the A race target that you set for yourself.
If you want to be world class, train like it! Don't be distracted by going
off in a bunch of different directions that don't lend well to your racing
fast. Ask yourself everyday; Am I doing all I can to attain my goal in this
sport with the time I have available or am I wandering off target? Do my
goals and targets realistic pass muster based on my training, not others? Am
I doing the little things? Sleep? Nutrition? Massage? Supplementation?
Stretching?
Just some thoughts to ponder this week. Hope there is something in this long
drawn out diatribe that helps you. Remember, in Triathlon its all about you
and only you!
If any of these sound like this is might be you, it probably was, but only
you and I know about it so please don't get your feelings hurt. I'm just
trying to get all of us moving in the direction that we want to go and make
sure our goals and targets are appropriate to the training protocol to which
we are trying to adhere.
I wrestle with the same stuff believe me!
Train with joy my good friends.
Peace Scott
