Some of the terminology used here is explained more fully in my previous post about polarized training. Be sure to read that first.

Our lives revolve around a seven day cycle, the infamous week. Between work, family, and friends, the best we can hope for is six workouts a week without resorting to two-a-days. If we schedule one hard day and the remaining days easy, we get close to 80/20. 

We now know that endurance athletes achieve the best results with polarized training. Sports scientist Dr. Stephen Seiler has led this movement. Master coaches Joe Friel and Matt Fitzgerald are two of many who agree. You can find lots more about polarized training on the FastTalk website.

Workouts generate stress, which we athletes feel as fatigue. Later, as we rest, our body shifts into repair mode. It is during this time that the rewards for all that hard work are received.

Training for triathlon means packing workouts for three different sport modalities into each week. Let me suggest a neat trick to help prevent your schedule from driving you batty - developing a routine.

For many of us, the word routine carries negative connotations. To have an exciting day sounds more desirable than a routine day. But, when it comes to athletic training, establishing a routine is a great way to create the opportunity to get things done. If your plan is to train when you can, you won’t.

A good relationship between athlete and coach is necessary for success. To that end, it helps the athlete to know something about the coach’s philosophy. In the coming series of posts I aim to lay out my coaching principles, my goal being to shorten the time required to get to know me.

I am a regular listener of the FastTalk podcast, a gold mine of information and advice on cycling, triathlon, and sport science. They set a high bar, but this week's show rises even above that. 

Race Stress, Threshold Work, and Dealing with Health Setbacks.

For me, this year’s Great Aloha Run was a lot like the Makaha Time Trial I did last week. It was mostly for fun, and a chance to see what needs to be done. In one way they were very different. That was my first time trial (not counting the ones I do in training). By contrast, this was my eighth GAR. I did my first in 2012, back when I had just started running, then every year for five more years. I skipped four years, from 2018 to 2021, because I was more focused on triathlon, especially swimming.

Saturday, February 11th, was the Makaha Time Trial. Once again my heart clouds my race results. By that I mean my actual heart, the one beating in my chest. Or is it the one in my head? 

Back in December I wrote here about the KISS principle. In that post I was focused on workout design. Lately, my podcast channels have been filled with dietary advice for endurance athletes. But there is a problem; an abundance of complexity and what seems like contradictions. Echos of my last post about training apps. Let's take a closer look.

InsideTracker is a service that analyzes your blood and makes detailed recommendations on ways to improve your health and fitness. It gets rave reviews from a number of high quality, athletic related sources, especially Selene Yeager’s Hit Play Not Pause. It sounded like something I might benefit from, given my heart condition, and since I had planned to make 2022 a big year culminating in Ironman Cozumel, I owed it to myself to give it a try.