ok, It’s now official. Savageman 70 is now paid for. TT bike not mandatory for this course profile. At least according to BBS., I’d need to have FOP position and a fairly high end bike to get a faster split.
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Have fun 
Yea, take it with a grain of salt, my numbers have not been making much sense. It’s not a fluke either, 4 weeks later I rode 5:21 in Roth and another 4 weeks later a 4:55 in Hamburg, testing 267 / 3.86 W/kg. In all three races I outbiked my buddy who’s been sitting above 300w for a while. My position is very good and I am religious about not breaking aero unless I have to.
But still I feel like I tend to under-test on the ramp protocol. I just did Taylor-2 after retesting yesterday, 3*15 30/30’s at 120% and it was nowhere near the terror and awfulness I once experienced in post-retest VO2max workouts. I actually punched way above prescribed intervals. I don’t know. I just hope I don’t miss out on training benefit because my FTP is set too low for whatever reason.
Understand what you are saying mate, just the unknown really. I am as fit as I ever have been but I don’t have the knowledge to be able to predict how well I will do. I would really like to go sub 5.25 on the same course 2 years ago I did 5.44 so I need to drop 10 minutes on the run and 15 on the bike, Might get a couple of minutes on the swim but not enough to make a difference.
Hoping that after my first ever duathalon in 2 weeks time I have a better judgement of fitness but then again with no comparison it might end up being meaningless. I’m also at the point now that everytime I think about diverting from the plan to do either a ride outside or a race I am going to lose some progress.
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You’re right, without any frame of reference it’d really hard to know what times are likely to be. Best bike split as mentioned above can be good and I do use it but I tend to out perform their models as well so they aren’t perfect either.
You might get a better idea after the duathlon like you say as whatever numbers you manage you’ll get a handle on the sort of speeds they get you. One of the best things I think triathletes can do (and not many do that I know anyway) is to do some Time Trials. They can be good training, give you realistic feedback on your bike position in a race scenario and also give you some invaluable knowledge on just how hard you can ride and still run off the bike. A 50 mile TT with a run off is about as good HIM training you can get and well placed in your schedule is really good indicator of potential.
Over the last couple of years I’ve managed to time a 100 mile TT with a 5 mile run off the bike around 6-8 weeks before an IM race which I’ve used a key training session and an indicator of where I’m at before the triathlon.
It’s Holkham you’re racing wasn’t it? I still haven’t got round to entering yet and I missed the final price increase I think 
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Nottingham
My memory isn’t what is used to be 
No danger, still debating what else I am doing for the rest of the season.
I’m off to Zante all inclusive the week after Outlaw then I’ve got a couple of weeks and I’m off to Austria with school, 1 session of mountain biking while I am there, some white water rafting, a fair bit of swimming but no real training. I was then going to start training towards Vitruvian which is start of September but now we are off on another all inclusive in mid august (I know woe is me, 3 holidays derailing my training, although 2 lots of 24 hours on a coach with 40 11 year olds might derail that holiday).
Rather you than me 
That’s the real endurance event
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I think “pseudo science” is a bit strong for me, but I agree that there are too many variables to accurately compare FTP and w/kg between riders. En masse though, i.e. thousands of data points, those variables become less influential.
@Simo429
Another factor in comparing bike splits, often over looked, is the run split! Plenty o people give their all on the bike…but what you really want to compare is properly paced efforts, and the only indication of that is how well they ran afterwards. Incidentally, this makes the whole affair even harder to achieve.
I think what you want is more like w/kg than FTP, and race position rather than bike split. Check out the CoachCox website for some race stats.
I’m around 2.8-3.2W/kg and usually have a bike split around middle of the pack in my 70.3s with a solid run afterwards. For me this is about ten minutes slower than my hilly half marathon best.
(excepting the mechanicals, dehydration and extreme weather that plague my performance) 
Nutrition…fuelling your workouts.
How does everyone go about this? I’m close enough to racing to want to simulate race feeling too.
For example, I have a 3h bike (2000 kcal) ride today with a 1h brick run (1000kcal)…so 3000 kcal to burn.
Had a few boiled eggs, toast and coffee for breakfast, banana snack, so about 500 kcal consumed so far.
I’d consume about 2x 180kcal in powerbar isoactive, and 3l water normally…doesn’t sound like enough really. I think I need to buy some gels.
How would you tackle it?
I am no certified coach, but from my experience I’d agree, that FTP is for LD racing kind of limited. My FTP will not be able to tell me, how fast I can bike to run a strong Ironman afterwards.
FTP is surely one factor for a strong 4-6h performance on the bike. But you can have great endurance capabilities over hours with a comparably low FTP or on the other hand a high FTP but not the ability to fight through long hours on the bike.
So I totally agree with you that run split and bike split need to be looked at together.
But FTP or w/kg is not as meaningful in the ironman as in an 40k TT for example.
The gold standard for LD Pacing is in my opinion experience educated RPE. Experience from other events and/or long and hard brick workouts.
This is probably why the LD Triathlons Plans are the only plans, where Coach Chad included these slow long distance workouts.
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In this situation I try, how much Carbs/h my body can handle. I go from the 1g Carbs/kg body weight per hour and try if my body tolerates more (on the bike it does).
For me it’s mostly water, Gel and Bars.
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I like this topic becuase it is something I have been doing some research in lately. The strategy I have adopted for fueling is to start low and work-up. I started with 60g of carbs per hour. my body was able to handle it and so far I am up to 80g/hr. I am trying to see if I can handle 90g/hr but I want to figure out a 2:1 glucose to fructose solution. I’m lucky that my gut has been able to handle what I’ve thrown at it. I’m not limited to the type or brand of nutrition I use.
On the bike I do mostly liquid nutrition with one gel every 45 minutes. I just find it easier and faster to get liquid down than fumbling with a gel or chew. But I also like the variety of a gel or chew so I keep them in the mix. I have done a little cost/gram of carbs analysis and liquid nutrition is in almost every case cheaper than a gel. Although the cheapest thing is real food which is what I use early in the season.
My running nutrition is not as scietific yet but there I mostly do water and gels. I drop down to about 60g/hr of carbs becuase it is harder for me to eat and run. I am also focusing on HIM so as long as I fuel well on the bike the 60g/hr gets me through the run.
One thing I want to do but haven’t done yet is measure my sweat rate so I can determine my fluid replacement better. One day I might look into sweat content testing. But cramping has yet to be an issue so I’m holding off on that for now.
My current crossroad: Which direction to establish X base as my season progresses from:
- X base
- Sustained build,
- 40k Specialty,
- FD Build,
- FD Specialty.
Will be following FD Swim&Run throughout;
- FD Base (12 weeks),
- FD Base (12 weeks),
- FD Build (8),
- FD Specialty (8).
- SweetSpot Base
- Full Distance Base
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voters
Starting the HD MV Build phase today! Should probably make the FTP test my first workout of the day, swam in the morning and did FTP test followed by Homers Nose +5%. Up to 3.62W/Kg @ 240W.
Question for everyone about schedule changes for this week and next. This week is “Match Week” which is when all of us neurotic medical students find out where we are going for residency. Takes place friday morning followed by festivities later that day. Since I cannot be certain I will get a workout in that day, I was considering taking it fully off and using it as my rest day. I would also switch Warlow and Run around with the Pioneer +1/Tempo BRICK to decrease the fatigue accumulated on the weekend heading into next week since I wouldn’t have a day off between my LSD run/Swim day and bike VO2max workout. Anyone see any problems with this plan? If possible, I will try and get the Pioneer BRICK workout done prior to our match ceremony, but want a contingency plan
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There’s your answer, I’d suggest to skip Pettit and if you are worried about the missed TSS you can add it after the scheduled Sunday workouts as active recovery or as a tack on to saturday’s Warlow… followed by Monday Recovery for bike Vo2s on Tuesday 
Can move Friday Swim session to Wednesday or Saturday or just skip it… remember we aren’t pros or getting paid
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good luck, I’m also in medicine and I hope you get a good one!
and yeah just skip the friday work and enjoy the extra rest. I also wouldn’t overload an already stressful plan by moving workouts to other days unless you know you can handle it.
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