How Fit Can Trivelo Coaching Get You In 30 Days?

Today we have just a great example of an athlete who has come in, barely missed a session and had probably the most typical experience with us in the first month of coaching and some epic results and improvement already to show for it. So we're going to take you through what the first month of coaching with us looks like and the improvements that Erin saw straight away. So Erin is actually a 35 year old Aussie who actually lives in the US now. And she came to us, she's done 370.3s already, came from a very strong swimming background, which we always love. That's probably the best background to have if you're coming to triathlon. And she just really wanted a coaching program of someone that was really going to look at her and look at her properly and coach her individually because she was sick of following general programs online with no one really helping her or looking over her. So dad, what was your experience of Erin first coming into the program and her attitude? And then we'll start going through what, what the first month looked like with her.

Yeah, she was definitely someone who was used to training. And as you know, we talk about this a bit on the podcast. People who come from a swimming background. Why do we say that's good to have a swimming background? Well, a, in a, in a triathlon, if you can swim well, that's such a head start. We can always teach you to ride and run better. But it's, you know, everybody who comes to swimming who hasn't been a swimmer as a youngster understands the technicalities of swimming, how hard it is. And also you get it out of the water, in the front of the race. You know, you're, you're in a good position when you can swim well. So. But the main reason we love it is because they're used to dedicated training. Anybody who goes as a squad swimmer has to swim at 5am in the morning and then swim in the evening. As you know, if you're, if you're a national or state level swimmer, you would swim twice a day and you know, you are up at ridiculous time in the morning to get, to get it done. If you're a student, you have to get to school. If you're, you know, a young athlete, you have to get to uni and then you have to front up again. So you're swimming probably 4 to 5k in the morning, 4 to 5k in the afternoon. So, you know, do that seven times. That's, you know, 40k minimum a week of swimming. We have some people who can't run that far, so. And you've got your head in the water for most of the time, so you understand dedication, you understand commitment. So that's a great start.

Yeah. She was one reason that we, we also, you know, we like swimming, but we don't want it to be a limiter is we're not saying that if you can't swim, then there's no hope you can improve all three disciplines. We just definitely find that cycling and running is probably the easies to improve compared to swimming, but we really don't want to get that message mixed up. If you are a poor swimmer, you absolutely can improve. And our good friend Brenton Ford from Effortless Swimming, who we had on the podcast for a long time, he's a partner of Trivelo's, he really reiterates this message and just says people underestimate how much they can improve with just stroke technique. And he just implores people to just focus on the couple of key drills you need to work on for the next six weeks, next 12 weeks, do them over and over again, and you will get faster at swimming. And he says it's not about training harder, it's not about training with more intensity, it's not about training longer. He's, he just reminds everyone, just work on these couple of things at a time, do it for an extended period, and you will see improvements. So that's a really important reminder. But the thing I loved about Erin is she was already a big fan of the podcast, which we love because it means an athlete comes into the program knowing a lot of our problem, a lot of our principles. Um, and she came in with, you know, great expectations around training and execution and, and we want to go through her, each discipline and what we kind of worked on. So let's start with the bike. Um, her first test, the first challenge that most athletes have is executing an FTP test. If you've never done one before, it's quite challenging. But she came in and executed very well. She was super conservative, which we like, and came home really strong. Um, and from there we, she just had to get used to the, the type of training that we do, um, and also training to using equipment and new technology. And it was, it was kind of a whole lot of learning which most athletes find when they come to the program. There's some, some learning curves about how to actually go about the program to get the training right. So take us through the, the kind of bike training.

Yeah, and to be fair, she had been coached before. And so when you're being coached already and you're listening to a podcast where you're hearing information that's not going to be given to you in your. The program you're already doing. That's the turning point. That's the switch she had. Look, I'm already getting coached, but I'm hearing stuff that I'm not doing in my program. Why aren't I doing? So she was questioning the current program she was on. And, you know, rather than complaining about it, she did something about it. I'm going to change. So that was a great first step, which I really wanted to get across. And I know a lot of people are in this position, they already feel like they've got themselves a program, but is it the right one for you? And the thing that she was looking for was some sort of communication back. She wasn't getting that from her current program. And you need that feedback, you need that analysis. You need someone to be in your corner looking over your shoulder and helping you with some tips. And, you know, this is the thing that she's loved the most. And on the bike, that's the area where we can help her so much. Learning how to execute the FTP test is one thing, but then learning how to do that every day in training is really the key thing. You know, if you're doing five by five minute efforts, you know, your first effort has to be the most conservative. And then by the fifth effort, if you've got a hold of the program properly, the session will play out how it should. But if you start too high in that training session, you will end up fading. And that's what we're trying to prevent come race day. We're trying to replicate things that we want to do on race day in training. So she knew that, she knew those concepts. And for her it was like, oh, gee, where do I start? And, you know, they're. The conversation she was loving to have with, with us was, you know, well, if you're doing, you know, say your 150 watts is, is the range 150, 160 for her, you know, let's start the first set of five minutes, 150. And now looking back over those six or so weeks that she's been with us, now she's able to nail those sessions at, you know, top of the range, 160, all five efforts. And, you know, that's an example of someone who really is listening and understanding and just, you know, a sponge soaking up the information, getting the tips and the cues and going and Practicing it. That's the thing that she's doing so well. And when I looked at her first FTP, I think she started, you might have it up there, Jordan. I don't have access to it, I'm talking to you here. But I think she started it maybe 150.

166.

166 and ended up at 200 and something.

220.

Yeah, 220. So you know that that's the first go and so obviously she was you know, with a difference of what is that 60 watts? Yeah, you know that's, that's too much. But in your first go we're okay with that. You've actually started it conservative and finished strong. And so you know, next time she did a next test I think she started it. That was an average for 190 I think.

Yep.

And her next test she started around 190 and you know she's improved that much. She's gone up to 250. Was it for her last five minutes?

Yeah, yeah. So once again just as big a gap. So her first 20 minute test average 190, second 20 minute test three weeks later. So she did it on 18th of Jan, did a three week block of training and then we retest again and we do that a lot with athletes often where we just do one quick three week block and then um, go again. Especially if we feel like they're improving because if we take too long to test then they gotta be training at old numbers very quickly. And so she did three great three week block. She as we said barely missed a session. Her next test was 222 watts for the 20 minutes. So she went up 32 watts. And as you just said she started at 190 which is a great start because that's where she finished last time. Um, but still had so much in her with her last five minutes was 2:55. So still show shows she's got more improvement to come.

And, and imagine if we hadn't tested quickly, she would have been training at the 190 number instead of the 220 number. And that's going to slow your improvement. So you know people say oh, why do we test so much? I actually just had a text message which I was just before the call was saying oh, feels like I'm doing my 450th FTP test. And I actually had to reply saying well this is actually your fifth FTP test. But. And then I went into a great deal of description of you Know, don't think of it as an FTP test. Think of it as, I don't want to waste a training session. If I'm training at a number that's too easy, then I'm wasting training sessions. And I know that's a lot of attention to detail, but that is actually, you know, there's a whole lot of reasons, as we've mentioned so many times, but that is one of them if you are not testing. And you know, because we could see that Aaron was definitely at the top of the ranges and that's a big cue to us as coaches to say, well, this isn't stressing you enough. We need to have more stress and load. So let's see where you are. And instantly she now has to do these next training bits at a higher FTP number, which is going to challenge her more.

And a really big thing we want to talk about is that we don't give the most strenuous program to start with when an athlete comes in. We're not trying to burn athletes to the ground, trying to smash them with sessions to see as much improvement early as possible, but what we often find is that just the change in frequency, sticking to a really structured program and then training properly, training in the right zones for each of those sessions. And some people do the first week and say it didn't feel that hard and we just say just wait till week three, you know, and then they get to week three and they go, gee, I'm feeling it. Because they actually haven't trained seven times a week, three weeks in a row with real structure, you know, real difference between zone one and two sessions, your tempo sessions or your VO2 max sessions. And even though a lot of the program is easier in terms of the intensity, athletes get to the three week mark and go, whoa, this is actually the biggest load I've done for 21 weeks in a row. And a lot of athletes feel like they're training semi consistently and then this shows a stark difference. So it's not the most strenuous program, but just the frequency and yeah, training in the correct zones for you creates such drastic improvement. It's so good to see. Yeah.

And you know, I don't think everybody listening to us knows what I'm going to say next. It is all about consistency. Consistency is king. And at the end of the day, if you can manage to do that, as you said, 21 days of, of, you know, three, three times seven days of training, where you've done 21 days of training. And if you look back at what you've been doing prior to that. Did you get 21 days? Did you get 18? Did you get 15? Did you get 12? You know, that'll be the difference between your improvement and a slower improvement. And, you know, I don't know how many times I've said this. The hero sessions, they are exactly that. They're heroes, and they shouldn't be part of your program. It should be all about being. Turning up every day, just like a swimmer does, you know, has to get up at 4am to go to a pool at 5am, then has to turn up in the afternoon. It's relentless. And that's, that's the mindset she has. And she was just eating up this program. And of course, her fatigue levels were, you know, drastically improving. And that's why when we come to do the testing week, we use that as a little deload period. And, you know, we're giving a lot of our program away over the, over the podcast here. But, you know, it's important that people understand that, you know, you don't test tired. You have to test when you're, when you've actually got some sort of fatigue shedding. That's been happening. And, and the reason we do that is because we want to make sure that we're comparing apples with apples all the time. Yeah.

One major thing we loved about the bike segment, or the bike training specifically, is that she was having a lot of major technical issues to start with, with getting the bike set up, getting the, the indoor trainer set up. This happens a lot. The indoor trainer can be our best friend and our worst enemy. And especially in America over winter, when she started in January, you know, you have to do a lot of your training indoors. You just can't ride outdoors. And, boy, it can be frustrating when technology doesn't work. And all you want to do is get on and ride your bike and do the session for an hour. But sometimes it takes you an hour to figure out some technical issue, and then you get on and then it's not working, and then the whole process takes three hours, and you just want to throw the trainer in the bin. But to her credit, she figured it out. She sat there and figured out all the solutions. And this is a really, really important trait in all athletes. And we just say this a lot. You've got to be solution focused. You can't be problem focused. What does that mean? If you're just going to sit there and complain about the problems, then that's not going to help you. It's not going to help your coach, it's not going to help anyone. You know, you've got to be the one to really take initiative to be solution focused. Okay, this problem is happening. What can I do to fix this to get myself to be able to train? Otherwise this program and this sport will chew you up and spit you out because there's so many of these challenges that pop up and if you're not solution focused, you're just going to be frustrated more of the time than not.

I was so impressed and you know, I was trying my best to help her. And remember, technology is not my thing either. But all I can say is, Erin, everybody works it out. You've just got to, you know, there's some, it could be your wi fi, it could be Internet connection, it could be, it could be a hundred reasons why things aren't working. You could be on the wrong app, you know, so you've just got to keep trying. And she did it. And you know, that's an example of the athlete that we love is someone who's, you know, know, going to be a solution finder every time. And you know, come race day you get a puncture, you know, rather than woe is me, let's get the thing fixed. And you know, you had, should have practiced that in training. So yeah, you know, it's just not going to be the end of your day. And especially if you're an ironman, you know, over a 12 hour day, a five minute stop for a puncture is not the end of your day. And you have to remember, remind yourself of that. Sure. In a sprint event when it's, you know, an hour, five minutes is going to be quite disruptive to your overall performance. But at the end of the day you still have to find a solution and you know, it's not something that's never going to happen. It happens a lot. It's not something that, you know, is a freak thing. Getting a puncture is pretty common. So, you know, they're examples of what you're talking about with looking at a problem in two different ways. You know, one is, you know, a negative and one is a positive. I'm going to find a way around it. And, and for her, this is the thing that she's done so well is, you know, trying to fit her. She, she, this is another thing which I should bring up. Her job is one hour away from where she lives. So it, you know, it's a one hour commute there and back and she's got to fit work in and she's got to fit her training in and the two hours a day of commuting, you know, that's, that's a big task as well. But she's found a way to do that. And I know it means getting up early and, and as she said to me, you know, Jared, I spent my whole life getting up early, so I've got to, you know, I'm used to that. But, but that's someone finding a solution to, you know, a major sticking point.

Yep, yep, spot on. So it was the bike leg and that was the bike improvement, the, the run leg and run improvement. A little bit of injury history there where she was just had a lot of, of pain recently and last year not being able to run to her full extent. But she kind of showed us what she was capable of with two run tests. So in Jan, I think the instructions weren't to go all out but, and this is our instructions. A lot with people who run time trials is unless you're in the form and injury free to run properly, then you don't have to do an all out 5k or 10k. But she, regardless, she showed her running strength and she averaged 527 for 5k for her first test and then a month later she did a 10k and averaged 511. So having more confidence in running and being injury free really allows you to do that. And I just would just commend her execution on both of them. She found her limit on the 10K definitely, but it was a big positive split in the first 5k. Just running smart and, and not running beyond herself.

This really goes well for her upcoming races this year. And we know from her previous history prior to being with Trivalo that she was struggling definitely in her half marathon runs. And you know, I, you know, you and I both agree that she's probably based on that last 10K where she, you know, she's, she's run low 50s. She's now capable of running, you know, two to two hour 15. Whereas you know, she, I think she, she was two hours 28 or two hours 30. So it's a potential 15 to 20 minute improvement the way she's going and that's super exciting for anybody in a triathlon.

Yeah, a 51, 52, 51 minute 10K. You know, we equate that to about 156 to 2 hours fresh when you're well trained and hopefully 2 hours 10 in a 70.3 and yeah, that's 15, 18 minutes as you said. And, and Ideally, you know, athletes get as close as they can, you know, between their, their 70.3 run and their fresh run, you know, so a few minutes off is, is kind of what the gold standard would be. And I want to remind athletes that that's not a ability thing. You know, that's not a, only the pros can do that, get their, their half close to their full. You know, the ability part is the time. You know, only the pros can go under 70 minutes. That's what makes them pro in a 70.3. But any athlete has the ability to be well trained and get their half iron, half marathon time or their running time in any distance off the bike close to their fresh. Would you agree?

Yeah, that's one of our big aspirations as a coaching group is to, I say that in a lot of the training sessions, you know, is another practice session for you, you know what your 10. You know, if we used Erin as an example, we know her 10kpb is 51, 52. If she was doing an Olympic distance race, we would say to her, you know, if you can run 55 minutes off the bike in that Olympic distance race and then let's just keep working towards 54, 53 and get it close to that 52 minute marker, then you know, you're really at the peak of your performance and your form's good. The further away from your fresh time that you are in a run off the bike time in a race, then you've got lots of room to improve. And we know that all the guys in our coaching group who are at the elite level, we've got beginners and we've got elite, we've got everything in between. As everybody knows, the guys in the elite level can run almost just as good as they can fresh. And that's why, you know, that's why they're doing so well. And that's why a lot of the age groupers improve from mid pack or beginner level and they jump through the field because, you know, they're really getting that concept of their fresh and their race. Triathlon race times are very similar.

Moving on to a swim, I mean as we said, she was a gun swimmer. Her first 1k time trial was 1:24 pace. That is really good swimming. But it was really nice to see that just a month later she swam121pace. So yeah, she's come from a very strong swimming background. But yeah, once again it's good to see a three second improvement per 100. You know, that's an improvement of 30 seconds over a K to.

Yeah, when you're swimming 12 minutes 50 for a K, Jord, it's, it's, you wouldn't expect to have 30 second improvement in the space of three weeks. Four, three and a half weeks. You know, if someone's swimming a 20 minute 1K and they swam 30 seconds faster, you'd be saying, oh, that makes sense. But, but you know, for those out there who are listening and you heard that she can swim 1k in 12 minutes, you know, that's, that's right up there. So, yeah, really good stuff.

I mean, in conclusion, we just want to talk about the, and summarize the fact that, yeah, this was a very, very good, typical athlete. We see, we see athletes come in and have more challenges at the start and athletes that have even better results just from the nature of where they're at. But this is kind of just an overview of what we expect. And that's because she has come in and she soaked up the information. She loves getting the feedback, she listens and most importantly, she implements the feedback. And that's the perfect way to approach a training program.

I couldn't agree more. And that is the thing that, you know, when I'm interviewing athletes, I'm, I'm asking that question, are you, are you okay with getting constructive feedback? Are you okay with people analyzing, you know, are you okay with us digging deep into why your, your power ranges in your training session should need to be tighter, you know, not above and not below. And you know, she's going, oh, that's exactly what I want. This is what I, I want to hear this. And you know, this is what I'm signing up for. And, and then my next thing is, you know, you've now you hear the information, you hear the, the coaching tips, you've got to go and go and practice it. And that's the hard bit, you know. You know, there's so many athletes who come back and say, I don't know how to ride a bike. I thought that I knew how to ride a bike. And now when I'm trying to implement this pressure on the pedals in this narrow range that you're giving me, I'm just really struggling with it. And that's the thing that, that, you know, is going to make you a better rider if you can really get on top of that, that one cue. And there's many things like that that we talk about as an athlete and a coach. And that's the thing that she's, you know, she signed up for this. And. And we wanted to give this as an example of someone who's not been on the program very long. And, and, you know, already you can see that she's embracing the structure, soaking up the information and implementing the feedback and how quickly you can improve just by. Just by doing those processes.

Yeah, I love that example you've used of coaching her through the strength efforts early in the program, which we really focus on because they're a good, controlled way to teach people how to ride properly, ride at a set cadence and ride and their ranges. And yeah, her feedback, which is what you said, is a lot of people's feedback as well. This is really hard when you're saying to her, look, you're riding well, but you're too up and down outside of the ranges, and you'd really need to narrow that down. And people often say to us, wow, I can't believe how hard that is. And. But she listened and improved. And as you mentioned earlier in the podcast, she's above the ranges very quickly, and even she's about to retest again for her probably seventh week or so in the. In the program because she's already at the top of the ranges again from that last improvement from the new number that she tested to a couple of weeks ago. So, yeah, it's a really, really good example. And I just want to finish off with some nice gratitude and words from her that she mentioned after that first kind of block of training. And she just said, thanks so much, Jared. I've had the best time working with you over the last four weeks. I'm just loving the Travelo program, so thanks so much for taking me on. And we transitioned her onto her new coach, Abby, who is our coach in the US Based in the US which is a good fit for Erin being over there. And she said, Ebony and I connected on Saturday, already making a few pivots, and she's the best. Absolutely love working with her and her adorable pups. So thank you for the matchup. Looking forward to retesting again. And then, honestly, she went on to give us a whole bunch of gratitude. She said, I know gratitude is a big part of the program, so I thought I'd share some things. I'm grateful for this week, and I won't go into all of them, but she mentioned being grateful to be able to run outside again and train even if it's cold, grateful for the encouragement and getting set up, grateful for reconnecting with the sport, and most of all, grateful for the guidance and really psyched to be working with this group. So just some kind words from Erin there and we really appreciate that and just wanted to share that and and that's it for this case study. And if you want similar results, if you want a similar program, if you want similar help, then you can go to our website tribalocoaching.com au and apply to get coach there. A reminder, we coach anyone from all around the world and we assign a coach to you that we think would be best suited to you. It doesn't matter where you are in the world, just go to our website TravellerCoaching.com and we have a guarantee that if you don't improve and see an improvement in results in FTP in the first eight weeks then it's a money back guarantee. Then the coaching's on us because we expect to be able to help you improve. Last point on the website is that we, we know it's a bit broken. We are trying to fix it. It's just I have joked to a few people that our strength is in coaching and training and our strength is in fixing websites. So we apologize for the delay if you're going there and it looks a bit messy but the coaching application still works. So apply there if you want to get coached by us. That's it for this episode. Thank you very much for listening. See you next time.