How To Pace Your Next Triathlon Race Properly

This podcast is brought to you by Trivelo Coaching, where we help triathletes and cyclists like you train smarter to race faster. I'm your host, Jordan Donnelly, and on my left is former Australian Ironman champion and head coach of Trivalo Coaching, Jared Donnelly. Today's podcast topic is how to pace your next triathlon race properly. And whether you're doing a sprint distance, Olympic distance 70.3 or full Ironman distance triathlon, the the pacing strategies differ significantly. Whichever distance you are entered in, you need to adjust your pace accordingly so that you can execute to your maximum capability as an athlete. Because if you decide to race them similar pacing strategies, you are going to either blow yourself up depending on the distance or go too easy depending on the distance. So it's really important to understand the requirements of the distance that you are racing and then how to adjust your pace properly compared to the distance of the event. So that's today's episode topic. But before we get into that, dad, welcome in. Let's start with our normal segments. What are you grateful for?

My gratitude is really easy. I'm so grateful that we can actually be in a climate that's away from our normal climate, which is the Melbourne winter for training camp at Sunshine Coast. So I'm extremely grateful that I look outside and it's 23 degrees and blue sky and I know I would normally be sitting in 8 degrees in drizzle. So I'm grateful for the opportunity to run some training in a much better weather environment.

Absolutely. My gratitude is. It's funny how often a gratitude comes when something's taken away from you, but I have had come down with the flu a little bit this week and I'm just so grateful today to have a somewhat clearer nose compared to having a blocked nose all week. Albeit, you know, I'd rather not have any flu in this kind of weather. But coming. Okay, so excuse my nasal ness or if you hear any full of symptoms on this episode, I do apologize in advance. Moving on to the next segment, what has caught your attention?

This is a bit left field, but I actually was out riding with a lovely lady yesterday. Shout out to Jess, who's an NRS rider, and I'll get to the point of this eventually. But I want to actually say how impressed I was with her. She's a mum of three kids. She's 35. I think she said 35, 36. She's at the highest level as a road bike rider in Australia and the NRS women's competition for those who don't know what that is. That's the National Road Series competition and the best female riders who are maybe aspiring to go to Europe or just wanting to ride at the top level in Australia. I ended up just bumping into her. I don't know, I've never met her before and I, I come up alongside her and she was really strong and I thought, oh, this person's quite a good rider. And turns out that that's why she's an NRS rider. And I was ask about a schedule and, and we're talking a lot about, you know, things in, in cycling in general. And she's got three children, two five and an eight year old or four year old and eight year old. She's a, she works as a paramedic, she does three 12 hour shifts, which is 36 hours. She's got three children and she trains full time pretty much. And I'm super impressed with, with someone who can manage that, that schedule. It's, it's really impressive and she's a good rider. She just did Grafton to Invaril, which is one of the big races on the calendar. It's a long 200 something K ride of 3000 meters. Race situation. She came top 10, she came 9th and she said she was a sprinter. So that race is an endurance with a big climb in it. So super impressive. But as we were talking, which is what caught my attention, we were talking about sprinting and I was just asking her how her sprinting was going. She said, oh, I'm such a novice, I'm new to the sport and I haven't had that race experience of different scenarios of how to win a sprint. And we were talking about the things you need to be a good sprinter. And I started saying, oh, you know, Sagan hasn't, I said, don't beat yourself up. Sagan hasn't won, you know, 500 races that he's been in, but I guarantee he's been on the podium first, second or third in the majority of them, even the top five. But I think you told me he'd won his 120th race as a professional, which is impressive, but I saw a stat where he'd come second equal that amount of times. So it's, it's not a given that you're going to win. Even if you are the, one of the best cyclists, sprinters in the world, you aren't always going to win. And she said, oh, you know, Sagan's not that a good example because he's kind of bit past and I Said, oh, I don't know about that. And jokingly, we were having a joke and I said, oh, never give up on a guy at that level. You know, sure, he's getting towards the end of his career, but he can still win. Because it's not all about the person who's got the best power. It's about your positioning, where you are when the sprint starts, it's about the timing of your sprint and it's about how much power you've got. So if you've got one of those three things, that doesn't mean you're going to win. You could have the most power and start off in 12th position and end up sixth if, you know, I'm an example of somebody who's got very poor sprinting power, yet I position myself well on our little muck around bunch rides on a Saturday.

Not just the bunch rides in races.

As well, but positioning and then timing it. And my power's not that good, but I'm putting myself in the right spot. So. So they're the three keys to it. And, and I was sort of saying, don't give up on Sagan. He may still because he's got such experience in when, where to position himself, when to start his kick and then hold the power. And lo and behold, at the Tour of Swiss that night, you text me and said, oh, Sagan won today. I could not stop laughing. How ironic it was that Sargon hasn't.

Won a race for not sure exactly how long.

It's quite a while.

Yeah, yeah, but he's, he's, he's being extremely inconsistent and unlucky in his race wins over the last couple of years.

Y.

But that was, that was his 120th win.

So that caught my attention. And the point is, you know, never give up on someone. There's a whole lot of points there, how to sprint properly. But, but you know, when you've got an ability and you've got experience, you know, don't write them off. And we talked about this at, at the World Ironman Championships with the fe. And you know, so, so many people had said, oh, she's no, no chance. And she came out and, and won comfortably.

What, what do you think about when you see someone? I'm glad you brought up the Sagan thing because I also found out that he, he's first race was in. His first race win was in 2010. So since then, over 12 years, he's averaged, averaged 10 wins a year and he's obviously won more in some years and a lot Less the last couple of years, but to average 10 race wins a year at pro level, to me over 12 years is just phenomenal. And you definitely can't write a guy like that off. But to your first point, you were impressed with Jess's ability to handle so much in, in that work life and training balance. What do you think about that and how do you approach that with athletes? Because you are very generous to athletes in saying that you don't expect them to be able to do that. You know what, what she's doing is on the extreme end of what they can handle. Is that something to aim for or, you know, should you be expecting a bit more from yourself? Because we all know that it's hard to sometimes train and back up with work and it really affects you. So. Yeah. What are your thoughts on that as a coach when you hear that, is that, is that something to aspire to?

Absolutely. I've told you many times, the example is the, the year 12, last year of your schooling. And the kids who are so into everything, they're into their sport, they're studying really hard, they're involved in this. The best things that school can do, like extracurricular stuff. They could be the school captain or school vice captain, they could be the, you know, in the, in the debating, they could be in the musical, they could be, you know, a really top cricketer or netballer or yet they still get 90 something as an enter score. How is that? And it's not just about talent and intelligence, it's about organization, it's about planning. The busier you are, the more successful, in my opinion, people are because they have to plan, because time is so precious. And if they got all this idle time, you, you know yourself, if you've got, oh, I've got two weeks till that assignment's due. All of a sudden, the night before you're doing the assignment, yet you do it in, in no time the night before because you have a time limit. So planning like that is crucial. And she epitomized that. The way she's trying to run a family and a job and be at the top of her sport. It's not a sustainable thing that you would, that you would think you could carry on year in, year out. There's other things that are more important. This is what's important. I'm just using her as an example for this particular period of her life. You can do it and aspire to that as long as you're well organized. And our motto is plan, prepare, perform. So it's not all about performing, it's about planning and then getting the work in and then performing. So I'm a big believer in if, you know, I use the example is if you've got a doctor's appointment at three o' clock on Thursday, you'll make it. No matter what's happening in your life, you rearrange your schedule to make that doctor's appointment. Well, why don't you make a training appointment at 5 o' clock on Thursday and make it a non negotiable but you plan it because that's what you're able to do. If you work till 6:30, then you have to plan your training appointment at 8:00 or 7:30 and that's what you need to do with everything you're doing. If you just haphazardly do it, it will the day and the hours will go by and all of a sudden you get to the end of the day and you've run out of time.

You're not afraid as a coach that it becomes almost demotivating or too much pressure. When someone's trying to do everything and they put too much pressure on themselves and they kind of crumble, it comes.

Back to what you're selecting. And the guys I coach know that I'm saying to them sometimes, do you think that goal's correct for you? You know, is this a goal that's going to cause you to have, you know, I don't, I like balance. I don't like extreme nothing and I don't like extreme too much. I like it to be balanced so that you're functioning through life where there's, you're not feeling under pressure every minute. So don't, don't aspire to things that are going to cause that in the first place. So it's your goal setting that's going to actually determine how much pressure you put on yourself. I just had a good conversation with one of the guys who've been coaching for a long time and triathlete, might mention his name, but really successful triathlete and wanted to concentrate on marathon running. Got a young baby, busy job and I had to make the call today to say this is too much. You need to stop doing the program. You need to concentrate on your family and your work because obviously the inconsistency in your training, you need to not do this marathon that you're aiming for in the end of the year because you're going to get to that race start in a form that you're not happy with. So don't create that anxiety, change your plan, change your mind. It's okay, you know, just because you have a goal, you don't have to be so strict that nothing's going to stop you from getting to that goal. If things don't work out, you have to be up for flexibility and change it.

That's a really good summary. I'm glad you brought up the fact that we are up here train on a training camp in sunny Queensland, because if you're watching the video, we are in a different setting. So that explains why we're not in the podcast studio. We are on a couch in a different sort of couch. What's caught my attention is we talk a lot about Jakob Ingebritzen, another Norwegian athlete who is just at the top of his game as a athletics runner. And they just had the Prefontaine Classic, which was a mile race in Oregon in America a couple of weeks ago. And it was a really stacked field. It was, it was unbelievable, the field. And once again he showed the same race tactic he does every single time. And he is undoubtedly the best runner in the world at the moment in terms of over 1500. But even you'd argue 5000 meters. He kind of wins almost every race he goes into. And once again he had the same race tactic of at the start, he just runs his own pace. And almost every time he's at the back of the race or in the back three or four or five. We've spoken about this many times and I just can't believe it keeps happening. He wins the race. He wins in 3:48, which is a blistering time. He wins by 8, 8 to 10 meters. And I just think, why is anybody in front of him at the start of the race? He's the winner, he's the fastest runner, he's the best runner. Everyone sprints out like we talk about to get position. But if I'm in that race, there's no way I'm ahead of him. He's going to beat me today. So at no state should I be in front of him. And we know he does it because they are such believers in lactate and he just refuses to let his lactate get above a certain level. And a lot of athletes put themselves under so much pressure in the first 30 seconds and it's so hard for them to come back from that. Whereas he enters the last two laps still with his lactate under control. And I guess the point is, you know, he's doing in a 1500 meter, you know, three minute race but we as athletes do the same thing in the first K of our 5K or 10K or half marathon. We put ourselves under pressure in that first K and then there's no coming back from it.

What you've said I cannot argue with in. But human behavior is intriguing for some reason. When we get on a start line, we are like sheep. We. It's our competitiveness, it's our ego. It's so many things that cause us to make this. And it's a mistake. It's a huge mistake. And if some guy takes off and the average pace you're going to run for that 1500 meters might be 60 second laps. If he does the first 200 in 24, everybody else will feel like they need to chase him. That's just human nature, unfortunately. Except Inger Britzen's proving that you don't have to do that. I'll run my first one at 30 and he could be 15 meters, because this field could be stretched right out. 15 meters could be, you know, three seconds. When he's going through that in 29 and the front guy's going through in 24. How different is their lactate? How different is their feel of, oh, Jesus, I'm already feeling like, you know, I'm tying up here. So it's hard to not be a sheep and follow and be competitive and chase. And if they all ran like Inger Britzen, it would be pretty amazing race because you would have everybody being able to get to that last lap or last 200, last 400 or 200 with less lactate. And so they can run better and they would do better times, there's no doubt about it. And we talked about this weeks ago, where almost all the world records are run negative split on the track. It's amazing tracking the road, you know, 5k, 10k, 15, 20, 21k half marathon, marathon. They're all second half faster than the first half. And that's just not a coincidence. That's because it is easier to run when you've got less lactate build in your body over that period. So if you're running and putting yourself into that position, if you've trained like that, then you've got some chance. But I don't reckon people are training like that. I reckon people are training normally where they're running each of their intervals, intervals in their training session at the zones that they're meant to. And if you want to run like that, you need to train where the first 200 is 24 seconds and then you're going to run and I don't reckon they train like that and I clearly don't because they can't beat him and the confidence to do that takes balls. That is really tough to do to sit back. And you as an experiment we did that with your 800 meter running. We tried to let you go with the punch and just sit in but that was too hard for you. The minute you broke your 2 minute 800 meter was the day you ran 30, 30, 30, 28 seconds and you ran a 158. Whereas every other race you did for two years was a 26, 200 meter, a 28, a 30 and a 35 or 34 fading. So it happens at amateur, it happens at the world's elite and we use the example of Christian Bloomfeld in the Ironman at St. George just letting the pack go and still winning the race. Lionel did the same with his pack, he came second. So I don't know why people aren't understanding that message.

Yeah, yeah, I didn't mean to grind your ears on that one but I.

Know it's a favorite topic of mine.

But well after hearing you have eight, eight race calls pre race calls last week just hammering the same message of I am going to be so angry with you and you don't get angry at your athletes but I'm going to be so angry if I see that your first K is your fast. You're just making sure the athletes knew not to do that.

Yeah, it was great watching the Ironman at Cairns and also the duathlon in Canberra. There was plenty of examples of you and Tom and Stevie, Mack and Georgina and even Dean all ran to the plan and felt strong in terms of something different happening but definitely letting the people go that are running too fast and, and they found out straight away. So I've been on many start fun run races where there's been some really good runners. Mona Getty was on the line once and I reckon out of the thousand people who are in the race 800 of them ran the first K at his pace.

Yeah.

Oh was it just because they wanted to run beside him or they think they could hold that pace? I don't know but, but you know they finished half an hour behind him so he's the only one who can run at that pace. So why is everybody else with him?

Yeah, if they could run at that pace they'd all be at the Olympics with him. That's right in the top five. Continuing on with the topic of race plans and race execution, let's get into racing strategies for different distances and we'll start with sprint distance triathlon. And how do you working out what your pacing strategy is for your swim bike and run for each of these distances? You really have to start with your threshold. Right?

That is the most general question you could ever ask someone. George. I don't know where you want me to start with that, but okay. The difference between a sprint and an Ironman, I mean it seems obvious to any, anybody we're going to spend a fair bit of time at a sprint event where it's potentially between 500 and 750 meter swimming. Potentially because every rate sprint differences, sprint distance seems to be random to the state or the venue. It could be 15 or 20 or 24k somewhere around there and the run can be 5 or 4 or 6k. So we're talking about potentially a 10 minute swim, a 30 minute bike and depending on your ability anywhere between 20 and 30 minutes running. So it's an hour to an hour and a half. So when we say sprint people just think, oh, it's just a fast flat out race. Well it's still going for an hour and a half for an hour. For the elite, you know, they're 55 to an hour, 52 to an hour some of them. And the age group is between an hour and an hour 30 or an hour 40, depends on where you are in the field. So. So anything over literally over three minutes is, is not a sprint. Anything under that is, you know. Well, you don't even call a 400 meter a sprint.

Exactly.

So you know I was talking sprint is between 10 and 20 seconds. So it's the wrong term. Yeah, so. So it's an endurance event that's faster than an ironman. That's the way I'd like to look at it. And at the end of the day you still have to execute. So in the swim are you trying to swim higher and faster than you do in an Ironman? Probably, but not at a massive percentage where your heart rate's through the roof and you're lactating so badly that you can barely ride. You still have to execute across all three disciplines. You have to take each of the individual sports, swim, bike and run separate and even the transition is really key. The difference between transition in sprint and Ironman is chalk and cheese. You are still trying to move efficiently in both scenarios, but it's because time in the transition at sprint is more cutthroat. As you found out in a duathlon race if you spend more than 30 seconds more than your opposition. In a sprint event it could be the difference between first and fourth, whereas 30 seconds difference in transition over an Ironman, it's probably not going to be that much, although there are Ironmans decided by less than 30 seconds. But it's not as much as a sprint distance where 20 people could be coming in in 30 seconds.

Whereas we do see still a lot of in 70.3s people getting missing out on the age group podium by 10.

Seconds, 20 seconds because of transitions.

And yeah, they could have made that up in transition.

Yep. So the longer the event, the less significant it is, but still significant. So your goal, your goal is to swim at your best, at your best threshold. That's your goal in the swim. You know, if we use percentages, you're trying to swim 95 to 100, you're not trying to swim faster because it's still a 10 or 15 minute swim. It's not a 50 meter, you're still trying to swim 500 or 750 meters. Just using the sprint as the example.

Would it be easy to go through the one discipline for all distances or stick to.

Let's do that, yeah.

So swimming and sprint, that's where you're best at.

So for an Olympic, you're still very close to, you know, 95%. You're still mindful that it's 900 meters potentially higher, so it's not nearly a K further. So you're gonna have to hold that pace for a K, that threshold. And you know from your training you've done, you should have done 1k time trials or 1500 meter time trials where you know what your threshold is. So you want to be there or just under for those first two swim and Olympic and then the half, it's only 400 meters more. So you're going to be very close between, you know, that sweet spot which is probably 90% to 100 and a half. Whereas in the Ironman you are definitely, you're swimming nearly four kilometers. So you are now going to an endurance swim. 1500 meters is still an endurance swim, but this is really, this is, this is big endurance. So those of you can hold between 80 or 90% of your pace are doing well, you know, 75 is probably close to it. But with swimming because, because people have got so many differences in their technique that, that the pace doesn't vary for a lot of people between their 500 meter swim and their 4K swim, if.

They'Re fit enough, they find they can hold their.

That's right, it's just the same pace, but that's, that's what you should be doing. So. So yes, the idea is with the endurance swim like the 4K, you're definitely trying to keep your heart rate as low as you can and swim as efficiently as you can with no spikes and no sprinting to get onto people's legs, feet, you know, you don't be doing that if someone comes past you, you move in straight away. But in a sprint race, you may be looking up going, I need to be on that bunch who are five meters ahead of me. So it's okay to a degree to sprint, to get on it because you're only going to be in that race for 10 minutes. Whereas if you're out there for potentially between 50 minutes and an hour and a half in an Ironman, it's not okay to do four of those sprints to get onto a bunch. That's what you're after. That's the difference between the two. So really, as an ironman competitive swimmer, I'm pretty much going to swim my own pace from start to finish. And if there happens to be someone who comes past me at a pace that's quite, they're moving past me slowly or they're swimming side by side with me, I may even slow up because if I swam with them for two or three minutes side by side, I'm going to slow up and sit in behind them and that's going to be a saving. So you're thinking like that the whole time. You're not thinking about searching and sprinting to a pack because that pack could be holding a pace that's way too hard for you just because your coach tells you you should be swimming on people's feet. Well, I've got to go and do that in an ironman. No, that's not what you should be doing. But in a sprint it's okay to burn a match because you can get away with it. It's not going to be for long.

This is only actually relevant for people that are willing to wear the form goggles, you know, or are able to check their watch as they're swimming, which is quite a hard skill to get right. But otherwise most people are just quite blind anyway.

Yeah. Yep.

So.

So the swim's a bit tricky because you don't have a lot of, as you say, data coming back to you. But the advantage you have with, with the goggles that have been got your speed and your pace and your heart rate on the screen, it's, it's unbelievable.

Advantage I still maintain, this is a bit off topic, that the ratios of swimming across the distances are completely out. As someone who sweet swimming is the weakest link. The Olympic swim needs to be 1000 meters. You know, it doesn't work that it's 1500 and you only got 400 meters to a 900 meter swim for 70.3 yet the bike goes from 40 to 90k. It doubles, you know, so by that ratio and same with the run, 10k to 21k, it doubles or over doubles as well. The swim needs to be 1000. I think that would be.

Whoever made it up doubled the swim 750, 1500.

But then. Well, they technically doubled the bike as well. 20 to 40. Well, they double it again, but they don't double the 70.3 swim, so.

That's right.

Instead of making the 70.3 swim longer, I think they might just make the Olympic shorter. I'd prefer that.

I agree, definitely. I think the swims out of whack in the Olympic distance. Definitely. That would be one area if you could, you know, if like, you know, soccer doesn't change its rules but you know, occasionally they, they do one, you know, the goalkeepers know how to hold the ball for more than three seconds or now that you don't have to, you know, you don't have to keep the ball outside the 18 yard area now, whereas you used to have to clear it. So they're little subtle changes. I reckon the triathlon should look at the swim and the swimmers will be just absolutely fuming to hear this because that's their strength.

Exactly.

So yeah, but you know, it seems disproportionate in the whole event that you can trim a, you can be in a half ironman, swim 1900 meters, just be an Olympic distance and swim 1500.

Moving on to the bike. Bike discipline. And how do you, how do you pace it knowing it's the second leg? You still got a leg to go after. Based on the distances.

I heard Dave Scott recently talk about, it's a triathlon, not a bike race. And no truer words could be said. You can have a magnificent bike day and then have a shocking run because you rode that hard that you couldn't run. He was talking about the elite triathletes of the world, Jan Frodeno in particular. He actually mentioned his name, which I was, I thought would have been. Oh, this is a little bit, this is a little bit touchy, isn't it?

Was he calling him out?

Well, no, he was in a nice way. He was saying that Jan has got. He's one of the. Jan is probably the best athlete ever in triathlon and that's a big statement coming from Dave Scott who won six konas, who arguably is the greatest of all time. No one else has done. Oh, Mark Allen's done six I think as well. So there's only two athletes.

I don't know if it's five or six.

Yeah, two athletes have only won five or six. No one else has come near it. So we keep talking up these, the newer athletes, but they haven't been tested over time yet. You know, Christian is unbelievable at the moment, Gustav, and there's some great athletes out there, but have they done it for six years? And don't forget Dave Scott came second and third a few times as well. So over a 10 year period he was. So that's, that's how you judge people on their performances over time. But, but certainly he was. His point was that Jan is an incredible runner at a 70.3 run distance. He could run, I think it was 69 minutes or under 70 for a half marathon, yet he can't run 230 for a marathon in an Ironman. Whereas he's running 240 to 238, 239, 240. Correct me if I'm wrong, I don't know what his PB is. It's. Is it, is it 236 or 237?

Yeah, I don't know off the top of my head anyway.

Dave's belief was he should be running low 230s or in the 220s, 229s and he's, he's not quite there yet. And so he was, he was praising him for being an incredible athlete, but he thinks that he's not reaching his potential yet. So it wasn't really calling him out. It was, it was more just an observation rather than being a criticism. I think it was really, it was really well delivered. It wasn't taken as, you know, I don't think you're that good a runner. So with that we're really trying to concentrate here on what percentage of execution you should be doing across the bike.

So that you can also run.

Yep. So that's my point is when I'm giving this advice, sure, I'm sure you can ride harder, but it's not worth it when you can't run. So my advice is based on enabling you to run properly. So everybody needs to hear that.

I think it's also giving people confidence to go well, that's what's possible for a lot of age group athletes. That's what I should be striving to get to because maybe you don't know what's possible for you. And if you hear these percentages you're about to say, you say, oh, that's kind of my aim. That's what I should be aiming for, to practice in training so I can do it on race day.

We, we had some great examples on the weekend, actually. We had a really short race, the duathlon, which is only 40k, and we had a Ironman in Cairns, which is. We had athletes in both the 70.3 and the Ironman. So. So one of our athletes gain incredible confidence from their previous half, Ironman, where they rode a little bit better than they had before and were able to run the fastest they've ever run. So instantly in her mind she's thinking, to the next race, well, I know I can ride like that now, so can I ride a little bit harder and then see how I go with the run? It turns out she rode way better and she ran a pb and there's a whole lot of other reasons for that to happen, but it just gives you confidence that at some point in time, the more times you experiment with where your pace is, when you can run properly and you can't do that, if you blow up in the run, you're getting the ride wrong somewhere. But if you get the ride right and then you're still running faster, then you can still push your ride more for the next time.

All right, so let's start with sprint distance. And what can you handle percentage wise?

Well, this is just my opinion, but as a sprint distance triathlete, I myself would be really pushing the athlete to be anywhere between 95 to 100% and I would not be recommending over 20K anything over 20 minutes. You shouldn't be riding faster than your best 20 minutes. So you know, no one can ride 20K better than 24 minutes or 23 or 25. So we're really looking at a time that's 30 minutes plus. So it could be 40, it could be 50 for some athletes. So if you try to ride at 100%, how far do you think you're going to get? You're going to fade and you're not going to run at all. Well, so that's where we're basing our knowledge on. We're trying to get the time so we know what our best 20 minutes is. If we've done an FTP test. So therefore, this distance is 20K, not 20 minutes. You know, if you, if your distance you travel in your best 20 minute FTP outdoor is 14K, you've got to add another 6K onto that. So if you're an elite level triathlete, then sure, you should be around that 98, 99%. You know, just a couple of percentage watts under what you can do for 20 minutes. Most people can hold 20 minutes, they can hold for 30 minutes. But once you get past 35, that's a different ball game. Even the elite athletes are going to have to drop the power once they've added another 15 minutes on top of their 20. So it's just logic we're trying to think about here. Logically, how can we get the most out of ourselves on the bike and still run? So the age grouper as compared to the elite, it can range from 90 to 100. The elite is really for 95 to 100.

And then as it goes up and you know, each leg kind of doubles in distance. And this is, this is different to a just a bike time trial. If it was a 20k time trial, a 40k time trial, a 90k time trial on its own, because you can go gun ho and you'd have to run afterwards.

So, yeah, absolutely, you were going to be at the upper limits. That's the, that's the difference. When you're doing an individual time trial as a cyclist where there's no run, you are not only going to finish strong, whereas as a triathlete you're going to keep the same pace. You're not going to try and finish fast. That's going to be actually worse to get off the bike with a higher heart rate at the end of a time trial. As a cyclist, you don't care what your heart rate is by the end. You don't care if it's maxed out in the last two minutes. That's your goal. Pick a pace and then try and negative split through the ride to push more power than you did. So we're really aiming to be as consistent as we can in the range that we can sustain for that period. So the difference between a sprint and Olympic, you know, even though it's double the distance from 20 to 40k, it's not a great deal of difference in the percentages. It's still 90 to 100%. And the elite people are still trying to work at 97, 96, 98. So the new competitor, the sport could actually be under 90% for that Olympic distance. But the difference between sprint and Olympic is there, but it's really marginal.

And the, even the elite people have to be careful of that 100% number because technically that 100% number is, is what you can hold at your maximal for an hour. And so if it's a 40K and the elite people are probably riding somewhere between 50 and 56 minutes, let's say they don't want to be at their 100% because there's no, it's pretty hard to run after riding at you 100% for an hour.

It is almost impossible. But funnily enough, that's the goal. We, we are actually trying to ride as hard as we can as long as we can run to our potential. And, and I'm always saying, which we'll probably talk about in the run is, you know, the sign of a really good triathlete is a person who can run close to their PB off the bike. So if your PB's 40 minutes as a 10k runner and you can run 40 minutes, 30 off the bike, there's not many people are going to, you know, be in front of you in that, in that event.

And then as the distance goes up, then the percentages really start to get quite a bigger range between 70.3 and Iron Man.

Yep. So as the, as the distances, as you say, go from 40k to 90, it's a huge jump. It's, you know, double plus some, you know, even the elite guys can't ride much more than 81, 82, 83% and still run properly. And as Dave Scott says, why are they riding that high when they should ride at 80 or 78% and run a 230 or 228 and they probably run, you know, eight, 10 minutes quicker and they'd only ride, you know, two or three minutes slower. So there's a five or six minute gain. So we want to give the age grouper, as we've talked about, there's a difference between someone who's really experienced and done a lot of races, is someone who's a really competent bike rider and there's someone who's absolutely, absolutely a novice. So, so when I'm giving percentages, I'm trying to cover everything in general here. So as a 70.3 relatively new person who's never done a race before, hardly been on a bike, they would be looking at 65% of their FTP of their 100%. So 65% would be the bottom marker for a 70.3 because we know that even the top age groupers can ride at 90 and we've got plenty of athletes who can do that who are age groupers. They're not professionals. So as a 70.3 athlete, the pros should be trying to ride at that. 91, 92, 93, 94% depends on how damn good they are. And we've seen some guys riding a 156 for 90k, that's 43ks an hour or something, which is pretty incredible. But the majority of guys are between two hours and 210at the professional level, which is around that, you know, around that. 90 to 92%.

Yeah.

And, and you know, a lot of the female athletes are not looking at the same percentages. They're going to be a little bit less because they're not able to ride with the same power and strength. There are some really top elite age group women who are getting really competitive and, you know, beating a lot of the, the age group men. So. So the difference between the two genders is, is, is quite stark as compared to swimming. You know, there's majority of the female swimmers are equally as good as the male swimmers and that's across the board. But on the bike there are a lot more faster riders than there are female riders, so the percentages have to be a little bit lower. But, you know, that's up to you to work out where you sit in, in your training. And, you know, we're coaching plenty of cairns. We had, you know, the fastest bike on the day by Joe Ritson, you know, and, and she's getting close to 90% of her FTP, so, so there's examples where possible. It is possible and getting off and running a pb, so, so it's not like she just did that and, you know, hung her hat on. I got the fastest time on a bike. It's, it's. I got the fastest time on the run is more important, I think.

Yeah.

Which is what she did. Yeah.

So, but same thing. You can't just keep yourself fresh until the run and then.

No, that's right. Yeah. If you're competitive in all three, then you're obviously going to be at the pointy end of the, of the event. But we're trying to give advice to everybody here and that's really difficult when there's such variety in ability. So I hope you can bear with us that we're not trying to complicate it. We're just trying to give general advice from, from everybody from beginner to elite. And you've got to find out where you sit in, in that pecking order and what percentages have you trained at that are going to enable you to race well. And if you don't know that come race day, then you're guessing at best.

So let's go through it then. Let's start with beginner. Approximate percentage for 70.39 man.

Okay, so as I said, 65 to 90%. That's where the range is for 70.3.

Yep.

Okay. And for Ironman it's 65 or 60 to 80. So. So I wouldn't be going into an event if I couldn't write at 60 and I wouldn't be starting the event if I was riding at 85.

That's quite generous. You, I don't think you'd ever advise a beginner athlete to go close to 80 in an Ironman.

No, no. And that's what I'm saying. You know, 80 is, is for the pros. That's the, the only people who could do that are the pros and the winning age group riders who can win the event. I'm not talking about winning the bike. Right. The bike section. They will be between, you know, 75 and 78 of their FTP. And the people who are, who are very competitive, you know, from maybe 5th to, to 50th, they were somewhere between 70 and 75% in the Ironman. And the people who are towards the back end of the field, they would definitely be between 60 and 70 and they should be because that's where they are.

Yeah. So to make it really clear. Sorry. So you've given 70.3 range is 65 to 90 towards the lower end. If you're the more beginning you are towards the upper end. The more experienced you are, the more mid pack you are, the more you're in the middle of that percentage. And then Ironman it's even lower at 60 to 80%. And like you're saying no one's really above 78% ish unless they're an elite pro.

Yeah. And there's only, you know, 15 people in the race out of a thousand who should be doing that number.

And that's a really, really important point to think about because 70% of your FTP, if let's say FTP is, we're going to say 200 watts. And let's see how good our quick maths is here. But 70% of that is going to be approximately 140. Yeah, 140 watts. And for a lot of athletes they'd start their ride in the ironman thinking that 140 watts is too low, you know, because they would have done a lot of hard training sessions well above 200 watts. So they might aim for 150, 160, something like that. And that's just way too high for the Iron Man. So it can. You can really get caught out thinking that, you know your number is going to be too low because it. It feels so low intensity. But that's what it has to be, right?

Well, that's what you were asking me about before with let's take Cairns. You come out of the swim and Palm Cove and you head to Port Douglas, which is a bit of a tailwind. And if you ride above your number there and you're doing the Ironman, you're going to have the worst day possible by the time you get to run and possibly halfway through the ride. Because as soon as you turn around from Port Douglas. I'm just using this as an example. It's a headwind back to. And it's pretty much the same every year. Tao went down to Port Park Douglas for your first section. We call that sector one. Sector two back to Palm Cove is a headwind. Then you turn at Palm Cove and go back to Port Douglas. Tailwind back to Palm Cove, headwind. So they're the times when you need to be riding. If you're trying to ride it, you know, tailwind at 150 because it feels so easy. It's the start of the actual event. That's the time when you should be disciplined and saying, no, 140 is my average. I should be at 130 in the tailwind and the whole field will be passing you. Just like the Inger Britzen example we talked about. The whole field will be just flying past you, and you'll think that your race plan is crazy. It is so dumb. I don't even feel tired yet. I'm riding like. Like, you know, like my mum rides, you know, very slowly, and she's 90. So. So when you turn into the headwind, that's when your ride starts. Then you ride at your 140 or 145. You just be over it into the headwind, and you'd be under it in the tailwind. And then all of a sudden, the people who are flying past you aren't passing you anymore. You're probably maintaining distance. Then you turn back into the tailwind, and no one's passing you anymore because everybody's settling down to, you know, they're getting tired because they've already ridden 60K. And this is the, the 90th 60 to 90K. And then when you turn from 90 to 140, you will be passing people in that headwind, I guarantee it. And that's the conversations I've had from post Cairns. Exactly. That scenario happened. And then when you get to Palm Cove, it's more headwind to Cairns, which is the really weirdest course. And that's where people were actually flying past people. Drive Ello people flying past people because most people had done their dash in the first tailwind. And now the longest part you take is in the slowest periods of a race. So you want to be making that slowest period the shortest time possible. And that's where the gains are made. And that's an example of actually executing according to the number.

So let's finish off with the run then. And more importantly, you're running off the bike, so what can you expect your run off the bike to be in comparison to how fresh, how you can run fresh any of these distances?

It's the percentage you take off, isn't it? That's, that's the, that's the golden number we're trying to aspire to. And you know, we've got a race calculator that, that works that out because we've spent a lot of time looking at race data and trying to find out how close people can run to.

Their PB depending on their experience level as well, which again is really key.

Yep. And, and it doesn't matter if you're not experienced. We, we just need to know that. We just need to know how close can you run to your PB in practice, in a sprint, in an Olympic, in a 70.3 and in an Ironman. And you can't do that in an Iron man because you're going to run a marathon in training. So. So you're really relying on really good planning. And we just had Port Mac and we've just had Cairns as an Ironman example. And the plan we set out for our guys in the run, they were able to sustain from start to finish. And that's not easy to do. And that takes a really good understanding of what percentage you need to drop from what you can run fresh to what you can run as a triathlete. And that's the golden question. What are the percentages? And the run is different to the ride. The ride is really easy to extract the data from what we've. But with the run we've got people who are. Now we're getting data from people who have swam and ridden and they could have a good day, a bad day. So the data is so varied, whereas on the bike it's very conclusive. So we've got people who nutritionally go bad and that's the only reason why they didn't run well, not because their plan on the bike was, was poor. It's just that they forgot about nutrition. As we've said many times, it doesn't matter how fit you are, if you don't actually feel yourself, you will come to a grinding halt.

Nutrition and hydration.

Yeah, both we putting them under one umbrella there. But, but. So the run is quite a difficult one to, to really measure and to get it right. You're really pretty happy with yourself.

What are you aiming for?

So in the sprint, if you know, if you're trying to run 5K and your best is, let's use you, your best is 16 minutes, you know, we're trying to get you to run as close to 17 minutes as possible. So as a percentage, it's 50 seconds. What is that? That's just an example. And if you can, you know, the closer you can run to 16 minutes, the better athlete you are. But if you're experienced at road racing, so if I said that to someone else, you know, in a 5K, your best is 25 minutes and I want you to run 25:50, it's probably not possible. So the less experienced you are, the more percentage you have to add on. Doesn't matter. The distance, the distance, that makes it worse. But I'm talking about the sprint at the moment. So I still have some good fit runners who might be A, a 25 minute 5K runner. They can still run 2550, which is outstanding.

Yep. Yeah. The running is going to be a lot worse. Whereas if running is your strength, then hopefully you will be closer. But that said, there are a lot of strong runners that aren't strong runners off the bike.

Yep. So we've got to be careful about giving percentages for the run and that's why I'm quite reluctant to, to give exact examples because I could have someone who can run 25 minutes for 5k and 25:50 off the bike and then no matter what they do, they can't run 30 minutes off the bike.

Yeah.

So the range is too big in. And it's always, how did you perform swimming and riding, whereas on the bike you've only had a swim.

Yeah.

So just to make it clear, it's very hard to generalize, but I'm going to have A crack at it. So when I'm talking to just an athlete who's a runner and I'm saying to them, oh, so you've selected the half marathon to run. Tell me what your best 10k is and I can pretty much tell them what time they're going to run on their marathon without having to go to my calculator. And they'll say, oh, I want to run, I want to run an hour 30. I'll say, I want your best 10K. And if they say it's over 45 minutes, it's not possible. They won't run an hour 30 because you can't just double it. So your 10K and plus it's 11 second half is 11.1.

Yeah.

So you're actually adding. If you're a 4 minute K runner, you're actually adding 4 minutes and 30 seconds. So there's a mistake in itself. You just can't double it. So I would say you need to be a 40 minute 10k runner to run 90 minutes. That's because I think that my formula has worked so many times where you double what your best 10k is and then add 10 minutes to 22 minutes, depending on the caliber of athlete you are. If you're someone who's just new to running and maybe an elite rower, then you're still going to be in that 10 to 14 edition.

Yeah.

If you're new to running and have no sporting experience at all, you're going to be more like double it and add 22 minutes. So there's a very big broad range for half ironman.

Yeah.

And so that's just fresh. So now you've got to throw in the fact that you've swam and ridden on top of that. So not only do you double it and add 10 to 22, but you then add a little bit more on top. So you've got to allow for, for the fatigue from the other two events. And the same formula is exactly the same way for the Iron Man. So whatever you could do for a half. If someone said to me, I want to break three hours for the Iron man, if they can't run under 125, then they can't run three hours. And we've had talked about Daniel from years ago where he tried for three years to break three hours and, and finally ran his half marathon, 124 said, you're ready, Daniel.

Yeah.

You know, 125, 126, 127. You're so close. It's three hours and two, three hours and one. But if you can break 125 because double it is 250 and add 10, but add 10 to 26 now, depending on your ability. So. And then add in the bike so you, you're adding a percentage more.

So I know that's general, but that is a really good help. And that's what we said at the start is we're just trying to give some guidance, something to aim for. So if you've got no idea what to aim for. Okay, well, here's a starting point. Here's what the best people are kind of doing as age groupers, and here's what the lower end people are doing and finding where you sit in that.

Yeah. And, and once you, once you understand that, then. Okay, I've got a good idea of what I think my pace should be according to what is, you know, an hour 30 for half marathon pace? Well, it's something like, you know, four minutes, whatever. So therefore you can run that from start to finish, unlike, you know, running with moneghetti in the first kilometer at 3:20 pace and then running 5 minute K pace for the next 18. So they're examples of how you can go about working out the pacing for your running.

With the marathon part. It has to be said that, you know, it's. You're saying at the bottom end, it's double it plus add 30 or so minutes, maybe plus or even more, sometimes 40. Yeah.

And look, I had another theory which I've put. To put to its test. We talk about another theory that we had that Once Essen kicked 101 points in a football match. They have never been beaten. And that's, that's held true since you were a little boy.

It's actually become a mainstream theory now and because Channel 7 talk about it all the time. So.

I didn't know that.

Yeah, they've been mentioning it a fair bit over the last.

Listening to us. Are they? And so what was the theory? I was going to say, the problem.

Is Essen don't ever get over 101 points anymore, so you can't win any games anyway. You had a new theory.

So the theory was I was trying to look at helping the people I was coaching. I was looking at my own performances as a marathoner. And I was thinking, what's the formula that best fits marathon running? So I thought, right, because I know what my ironman marathon time is. You know, out of the 10 I did, they're all around 258 to 3 10, depending on how well I went. And what was my PB as a marathon runner? 232. So for me at that pointy end it was 30 minutes. 30 minutes difference, which is now doesn't hold very good very well.

It's totally different because if you had a better bike back then and you were riding for half an hour less, which.

Don't defend me, Jordan. It's okay. I'm okay with it.

Well, it just means your hypothesis for the timing is out.

That's right. It does a little bit. But. But 30 minutes is probably a good middle now, a good middle range because of the technology advances on the bike where I rode a steel bike with no clip on bars in a road position. So you know, to, to get that, that, you know, got a guy, he's doing the UK Iron man and he can run 252. He ran 252 at Boston and he's desperate to run 320. And I'm saying, boy, that's only 30 minutes difference between what you ran fresh and what you're trying to do. And I as a professional could barely do that. Yeah. So just be careful what number you're aspiring to. And I'm continuing to tell him that I think 320 to 330 is more your range. But he's determined to prove me wrong, which is fantastic if he can. But that's another little theory that I've tried with a lot of the other people who've done marathons and done Ironman marathons. And it seems to me that the elite people are adding 20 minutes. So I reckon if Jan Fadino could run, if he can run a 236, he's possibly capable of running under 220 for.

Yeah.

As a freshman for a fresh marathon, low 220s.

I'd love to see what Christian could do.

Yes. And that's the elite pointy end. And at the other end, you know, you would have to be adding between 30 and an hour.

I wonder if they can run that fast. I wonder if they're just so good at being close to their point that maybe. You know, Christian, who ran a 220 or 230 last week, his PB is actually only 226 or something and he's just got this ability to run as close to that as possible.

Yeah, I'd love to see.

Yeah.

But what's his PB as a half marathon runner?

I don't know. I don't know. But he can run a 1330 or 45K.

That's probably sub you can run it. We know he can run sub 30 in a race as a 10k runner.

He's fresh. 10k is 27, I think.

So that's going to be. It's going to be, you know, he can run a 68 half which is.

Well, he does that in half. In half. Ironman. Yeah.

Yeah. So it's a 110, it's a 220. So yeah. Yeah, it should be about right.

Yeah.

Sorry for us just talking off topic here but, but I just trying to. Trying to get across that there's no real formula for. For what you can do, but the goal is to run as close to your fresh marathon pace as you can.

I guess that final point we wanted to make was the conservative thing in an Ironman. You know, we have our race calculators and. And we get people to add on a certain amount of time depending on their ability and what they've done in the past. And yeah, that conservative end is double and adding 30, 40, 50 minutes. And we are always pushing majority of people by a long way, 89% of people to be at that conservative end. It's very rarely in an Ironman are you ever giving someone a race plan that's a little bit higher than conservative because it's such a brutal.

No. The exception to the rule is bar none and majority of age groupers that we coach, they're going to be at the conservative end.

Yep. Yep. Well, that's a good way to finish. I mean it's. There's a lot of detail in it and our aim at the start was to provide you with different race tactics for different distances and that's what you can take for each distance. And it's about working, about working out your own abilities and athlete and then applying these principles to your ability and what your plan should be for a race. We want you to go try it and execute it in a race and we guarantee that if you get your ability right and as you say, your ability and your ambition accurate, then you'll have a much better race than just flying blindly and not even knowing what your race plan should be.

Yep. And as we say many times, the race plan is only as good as the execution.

That's a great way to finish. Thank you very much for listening as always and we'll see you next time. Sam.