My 5 Tips for A Maniac Training Cycle

My personal philosophy is that since I am only given one life, I better squeeze the most into it. I apply that to everything that's important to me in every domain. Go big or go home, right? In terms of training this has played out by making things harder for myself in the interest of seeing what my body is capable of accomplishing. I want to find the limit for how fast, how far and how intense I can race for no reason other than to just know and enjoy the process. I like to find my edge. This fall I will be trying something new: a triathlon. Coincidentally, one month after my sprint triathlon, I will be running the Detroit Marathon, and the training plans start at the same time: this Monday! In comparison to a marathon, I think a sprint triathlon is easy in terms of training, time and commitment, but I would really like to rock both of these as much as possible and do so without pulling, tearing, fracturing or having any diagnosis ending in "itis." I also want to have fun and not feel I am creating my personal Guantanamo Bay of a training plan. So, in preparation for the super intense training that begins next week, I've been thinking about how to organize two training plans at once and stay healthy at the same time. I've come up with a list of ideas to get it done.

My plan is to replace the running part of sprint triathlon training with marathon training and follow the bike and swim as close as possible in the triathlon plan. These are some other things I need to do to pull it together.

1. Use my technology. This may not make sense to anyone who doesn't use a smart watch for their every move, but bear with me or skip to 2 if this doesn't interest you. I think what has kept me healthy is making warm-ups and strength training a regular part of my training. However, it's easy to think this is less important than miles and speed work. To be a better runner, one must run and only run. More is better. Just kidding! Running isn't helpful when it leads to burnout and injury. To put in maximum miles, I need to be strong. I wear the Garmin Fenix 3 and created a "brick app" to use when I bike and then run. I can create apps to do just about any exercise or combination of exercises. Today it occurred to me I can make an app that starts with my warmup, goes into running, biking or whatever and includes strength, measuring all of these things in one press of a button. Why does it matter if my sequence of workouts is in one app rather than I spend two seconds pushing a button for strength, then run and then strength? Because it sets the expectation that warm up, run or bike and strength is one day's work as it should be. These are not three things of varying importance, but one complete workout.

Added a multi-sport for the expectations of each day

2. Swim options? I think I am not alone in finding the swim training the most complicated part of triathlon training. I cannot swim out my backdoor or in my bathtub. There are bodies of water within a mile of my home, but none that allow swimming. Getting a swim in is a several hour affair. I do not have a gym membership or the desire to pay for a pricey gym with a pool in order to swim .5 miles one time in September. My plan calls for swims 3 times each week, including weekdays. I'm not swimming on weekdays, let's leave it at that. I can swim once, maybe twice per week, when weather allows, on Saturday and/or Sunday. However, as mentioned, I do have water close by and it is often used for kayaking. I have a kayak. I will throw a midweek kayak in. Granted it's not a swim, but it's getting used to being on water and working my upper body. It may or may not help me be a stronger swimmer, but I like it and that in itself must count for something.

How I look when swimming

For me, the workouts are the easy part. I like being outside and I like exercise. No problem. It's the other things that keep me healthy like rolling and eating well that are toughest. And therefore...

3. Sunday needs to be serious food prep day, whether I feel like cooking or not. I need to stop eating shit. It's true, marathon training burns a lot of calories, but the body needs nutrients to keep it healthy and my muscles repairing and growing, rather than cupcakes and Doritos just to replace calories. Know a great source of calories and fat? It's not ice cream and french fries. It's avocados. So, more avocados and less ice cream and fries. It's been my experience that eating well involves eating planfully rather than on the go. So Sunday gets some food time thrown in and hopefully, I can organize myself enough that I won't have to even think about it much the rest of the week.

How I feel about meal prep. 

4. Giving rolling a designated time. Why is rolling so hard? It usually feels pretty good and by that I mean hurts so good. I have benefits when I do it. It takes 10 minutes at the very most and it's impossibly difficult and never a priority. So, knowing that my most challenging training days are Wednesday and Sunday, those will also be my post workout roll days. I mean, 5-10 minutes of self-massage injury-prevention isn't the worst thing.

Injury-prevention is just so horrible sometimes.

5. As mentioned, I like to be outside and I enjoy all sorts of activities other than running, biking, swimming and kayaking, so in that vein, I shall have "Friday Funday," in which I allow myself to do whatever the heck I like: hiking, climbing, skating, surfing or ping pong. Whatever. I will be active in anyway I wish and enjoy it, because exercise should be fun even when everything hurts and I'm dying.

Hopefully not me by October.

And just like that, a new journey of a training plan begins.