How To Prepare For An Ironman 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. Every event has its own specific requirements that you need to make sure you're adequately prepared for. And this is especially true for any endurance or ultra event, but especially the Ironman. We had the epic Port Macquarie Ironman here in Australia last week, and over the weekend we have the Ironman world champs in St. George. Actually, when this podcast comes out, it will have already happened. So we're recording this before the weekend, but by the time you hear this, the results will already be out. And so this episode we are talking about how to make sure you're properly prepared for your endurance event, specifically looking at the Ironman. And as always, these principles will generally apply and translate to whatever event you're aiming for. Because of the Ironman specialty happening these two weekends, that's what we want to talk about. And just know that we will make our predictions for the race in this episode and then you'll quickly find out next week whether we were right or wrong because the results will have already happened and the race will have been run and won. But dad, welcome to the episode. Let's start with our gratitude. Before we get into the Ironman stuff, what are you grateful for?

Thanks, Jord. Looking forward to this episode. And it's always really good when it's back into Ironman season. And just so happens that, you know, there are Ironman races all over the world that are that are actually continuing to happen. But the summer season for the Northern European triathletes are all around, but my gratitude is based on that. As a coach, you can't get to every event. So some races you can be there in person to see your athletes get around and give encouragement, but it's not always the case that you can be at every event. And this was the situation on the weekend. I couldn't be at Port Mac, which is disappointing. But my gratitude is when I do not get to event, I can sit on the computer and I can actually watch the race more accurately than I can when I'm there. So it's always high up and down day of emotions sitting there and you can't do anything about what you're seeing unfold in front of you. And this is the first time ever, I think that all eight athletes executed exceptionally well and that's my gratitude.

We will get into that in the episode because we want to talk about exactly how they prepared so well and how they executed so well. My gratitude is quite simply for my car. It's funny when things are taken away from you, how much you appreciate them. And my car battery went flat and I really needed to go somewhere and it was bit of a frustrating process having to figure that all out. And so I'm grateful to be able to use my car again. It's funny just how convenient they are. You just forget about how convenient it is just to have a car to go anywhere. So that is my gratitude.

Yeah. It was good that you had that gratitude because you were about to do your training session and you couldn't. And then you came three hours later to do the training session and as soon as you ran out the door, it bucketed rain on you. And I couldn't stop laughing.

I was so angry because it was pure. It was pure blue sky when I was supposed to do the session.

That's true. That's good. You got gratitude around something that wasn't that good.

Yeah. Let's get into it. Preparing for an Ironman. Firstly, I have given the Iron Man a bit of a. Not a bad rap, but a bit of a go a few times on this episode about how ridiculous an event it is. But I do want to talk about the flip side of that and talk about how much of a special event the Ironman is. The atmosphere surrounding the entire day, the amount of preparation, training, hard work, nerves, excitement, family, commitment, having the. Having people's families there with them. It all happens around the day. In the lead up, you see all the Instagram stories, the preparation, putting the bikes in the night before, which only happens at certain big races. It doesn't happen at most triathlons. You rack your bike in the morning, you know what has to go in for every single person to turn up, from the top pro to the last place finisher. It is such an epic day for people to turn up and take on this insane challenge and put a number on and attempt an Ironman. So I want to know, starting off, what are your thoughts watching the event? That means a lot to you?

It does. And I suppose that was the event that I actually won. So it has a special. Even though it's a different venue from Foster to Port Macquarie, but it is the same event. Same event. It has a special place in my heart and I get emotional on this day every year. And watching guys that you've helped achieve their goals, I. I've told these guys when I talk to them after the race. I had a tear every time one of them crossed the line. And that's how, that's how much it meant to me to watch these guys go around and, and be successful and equally successful as I was. I might have won the race, but they won their races. And that's what it meant to me, to help people achieve their goals and to see them execute the way they'd planned and the way we planned together and to be able to run strong. And one of the guys said he passed, I think he said 100 people on the bike and then he passed 200 on the run. And you know, that's the way to do an ironman. You know, the journey is everything but the last three steps across the finish line. That's what it's about is whatever happened six months out to those last three steps and all of a sudden it means everything. Those last three steps are going under the finish line with. You are an iron man screaming over the microphone. It's pretty special. And it means, it means a lot to everybody in that little team that's. That's going to contribute to that one person sacrifices that. The family and friends and, you know, work almost your social life, you know, you have to, you have to put it in a lot to, to get, to get something out of it. And I know there's guys going there just to tick boxes and that's absolutely fine as well. But. But for the guys who have really been on the journey and succeeded, and I don't mean winning, I mean succeeded as in reaching their personal best. And that doesn't have to be beating your PB from previous, but just achieving the whole build and, you know, culmination of those last three steps, that's the finish. But you're so, so proud of yourself and grateful that you've been given the opportunity first and that you made it. And boy, there's some struggles. That's the funny part about watching it on the computer is, you know, in one of the. One of the guys, Ben, won't mind me mentioning his name, but at the 110k mark, his average speed on the next, because there's segments that come up on the computer, he was averaging, you know, around that 30 to 35ks, depending on whether it was the hilly section or the flat section or the headwind or the tailwind. So the average speed fluctuates. So it's not that kind of accurate. Doesn't give you a running average, it just gives you an average of that sector and then all of a sudden his average speed was 24. And I've thought, oh no, there's something mechanically gone wrong. And then the next sector he was back to 34. And I'm thinking, what happened? And you know, we get the story after the race and you know, his bottle bounced out and smashed on the road and he was on the downhill. He had to walk back up the hill and grab his bottle which is now empty and couldn't be used. And his nutrition's gone and it's just there's stories like that everywhere and you know, not only that day but you know, four weeks out he, you weeks out, 12 weeks out, he crashed and you know, something happened and it's just some getting to the line, you know, and then, and getting to the start line and then getting to the finish line on the day, you know, you start at 7 and some people are finishing at midnight, some people are finishing at 7pm It's a 12 hour day, some people are doing 14 hour day, some people do an 8 hour day. It's just an epic day. No matter which way you look at it. It's, it's just epic all around and, and it is ridiculous. But we, we now, it becomes quite a common event now. There's hundreds of thousands of people who've done an Ironman now compared to the first five guys who did it on day one.

And the fact that it's so common just still shocks me because it hasn't gotten any easier just because more people are doing it.

It's such a flippant thing. Oh yeah. I'm doing the next Iron Man. Oh wow. Do you really know what's involved in that? And, and you know, we had a couple of debutantes for this one and you know, unbelievably outstanding results which I'm so proud of and I'm so proud of them and I've told them that and, and you know, I don't think it'll sink in. I was talking to one of them about if you've ever been involved in a team grand final and you have, you've done two of them, it doesn't matter what the sport is, but if you've, if you've shared a victory with a team and it could be a netball grand final, it could be, you know, Australian Rules grand final or a rugby grand final or a cricket premiership, it doesn't matter that you've got this bond with that group of people forever. And I've still got mates from the under 16 grand final that we won as a junior that I, you know, we know we shared something special. And, and that ironman feeling in 2022, in May of, you know, of this year will be forever ingrained in those people. Whether they do one more or whether they do, for some people, 20 more, that will be something that they'll remember. And the people who witnessed those or who are part of that journey will always remember. Oh, yeah, I remember, you know, the struggles you had for that event. And it's pretty special. And, and the reason it's special because is because it's so enduring. It is an epic event and you couldn't even make it up to be so hard. It's, it's, it's one of the hardest days you'll ever experience and I don't think you'd ever be prepared for it. And even though you've done, you know, one or ten, they don't get any easier. It's just, it's just how well are you prepared and how well do you execute? They're the two key things that, that, you know, it's easy to sit at the bar and say, let's do basso, let's do Port Mac, you know, oh, yeah, yeah, and everybody's on board and, and oh yeah, let's, let's do the training.

I take, I take my hat off to anyone that, that puts a hand up and actually follows through because it takes stones. And I personally don't, don't, don't know if I could do it. I don't know if I can put myself through that, through the training and the actual day. And triathlons is a very niche sport. And so quite often when people ask, what do I do? And I say, you know, run triathlon coaching business. And we have a podcast and they sell triathlon and they kind of try and clarify what it is sometimes. And then people have heard the word iron man. They don't exactly understand what's involved. They say, isn't it. It's a massive, massive days. And it's, it's like, it's like 100ks or something. And you explain, well, firstly, and I always, I would do it the same way because I like seeing reactions. And I say, well, how far have you swam before? You know, and people. Maybe a few hundred meters or something. You say, well, it's a 3.8 kilometer swim. And you know, that's, that's over an hour of swimming. And when, if you swim in the ocean for, you're at the beach or something, you go for a Bit of a swim for five minutes, you're exhausted when you come out. And I say, imagine swimming for over an hour. And people go, yeah. And then I say, well, I haven't done it. But dad reckons that you'll then do the hardest bike ride of your life, 180k solo, you know, and you look at some Gran Fondos where it's around the bay in a day and it's 180km in one day. And people do that recreationally and it's one of the hardest day of their life. You know, they spend all day riding with very little training a lot of the time, and most people can't walk the next few weeks. And I say, imagine doing that and then doing a marathon. And by that point people are shocked and they can't believe that's actually the event. And when you break it down individually like that, it just, it just seems crazy.

I think the marathon at the end gives people a realization and perspective because a marathon on its own is epic and always has been. You know, you try and run 42.2 ks, it is. And you try and do it after swimming 3.8 and riding 180, you know, it's. It's a whole new world out there. But you're right, it is so easy to talk about, is. It's, it's a funny thing. I find it ironic. You can just rattle off, yes, I'm doing that. But then do you really understand what you just signed up for? And you can get, you can get through with minimum preparation and poor execution? Absolutely. You can, you can do it. There's been hundreds of thousands of people do it. I reckon the majority of the field are getting through it with poor preparation and bad execution. They still come back because it's got some mystique about it. And, and as I say, those last three or four steps to the finish, it. It is something about, God, that was hard, but I can do better or I want to do it again.

If you've ever experienced any type of endurance event, you get that feeling somewhere in the middle where you're, you're getting a bit, a little bit lost and you enter the fog a little bit, or you're just so exhausted you can't believe that you're still going. And that would just be multiplied to the extreme scale, which is why it has that special spirit or mystique about it where you're going further than you probably ever thought possible.

Going deep is a big thing, isn't it? You're going through so Many highs and lows, you know, at the 140k mark or even the 3k in the swim, I don't know if I can get to the finish here. I've still got 800 meters to go. I'm absolutely exhausted. And then, you know, I've got 40k to go on the bike. I don't know if I can pedal much more. I'm actually hungry now and I've run out of fuel and I've got. You get off and you start your first car and you've got. I've got to run a marathon. You've got to be kidding. It's a shuffle. So it's not an event you can race except for, you know, 10 people. Everybody else is enduring.

It was really special. Seeing. Getting to see the live stream of the finish line, that's just such a great thing that they have now, and you can watch a live stream. And we were waiting for the Trello athletes to come on, and we knew when they were about to finish and they'd come across the line. And that was just inspirational. And it definitely gets you because personally, I have no motivation to do an Ironman, except when I'm watching these people finish and you go, oh, crap. Why do I suddenly want to do one? Why do I suddenly want to take on this challenge? And that's because it is so inspiring. And I know you were feeling emotional, ecstatic. Watching the tribal athletes on the tracker all day and then seeing them get to that line, it was.

It was incredible. And, you know, I've done that. I've sat there for, I don't know, eight, nine years. And. And in the early days, maybe I wasn't getting my message across in. In the preparation and in the execution, because no one has executed and prepared like this one and had the outcome. I've had a few people out of, you know, maybe 50% or even some. Some races, 25% be achieving their success, but this time it was 100% of people actually achieve what they set out to. And. And for me, that was. Oh, I was sitting back there going, geez, I love my job. This is. This is absolutely why I do this, for this day, for this moment, to see every one of those guys come across the line. You know, Obi did one of those jumps in the air, like Greg Welsh used to do when he finished. For those who remember, every race Greg Welsh did in an Iron man, he kicked his legs up in the air sideways. I don't know how he did it, but I. And I. I filmed it and then I froze it and took a photo of it and I sent it to him. It was a great photo. And you know, just the joy and expression on his face. And the fun part is the next day when I go over the race with them and you know, it's such a fun phone call when guys just can't wait to tell you. You know, Ben's telling me his story about his bottle and you know, and he's swearing his head off and you know, what should I do? And then trying to remain calm and you know, I can work my way through this and you know, I've lost some of my nutrition. Is it gon affect me on the run? It's my first iron Man. You know, so many stories that you can just talk about the next day. But the fun part is that, you know, overwhelmingly they're saying, far out. I'm so glad you made me run around those mountain goats hills so that I was strong. Far out. I'm so glad you made me do those race specific sessions where I understood where my power was against my average speed. And, and you know, hearing that come back at you is the most gratifying thing you can hear because it just makes sense. And I often wonder in the early athletes, you know, some got it, some didn't, but it was overwhelming this time. And yeah, it's an interesting one and something we can learn from as a coaching, from a coaching point of view that we're finally getting the message across. And maybe it's because we never had podcasts in those days. They're not hearing the message regurgitated week in, week out. There's a whole, as you asked me a lot of questions, I always say there's a lot of answers, there's a lot of reasons. So it might be a combination of a lot of things of just they've heard the story and now they're actually wanting to implement it themselves and they know that they'll get a good outcome if they actually follow this advice. And that was gratifying. And I think, you know, I'm really shy about putting people into an imam. When someone says to me, I want to do this Ironman, I'm trying to talk them out of it. That's my first thing, you know, can you convince me that your family are on board with this? Can you convince me that your work will allow you to have possibly 16 hours a week of training? You know, you probably could be better off with 20, but you can do it with 16. And, and are you ready to commit yourself to that, that solo possible six hour bike ride and that three hour run as, as a six month thing, are you, are you on board with all that? And if, if you can convince me that that's what you want to do and they're passionate, I'm all in. But you got to convince me of that because this is something that I don't want to see people go through. It's just, it could take weeks and months to recover from and some people don't recover from it. The people who don't prepare and don't execute and tick the box, they could be seriously damaged for a long time after and never go back to riding their bike again. And that's not a good thing, I don't think as.

Yeah, it just shows the enormity of the event. But let's break it down. I mean what you're talking about right now is, is let's, let's break down. And that's the topic of today is what makes you prepared properly for an iron man? And, and what are the really specific requirements? I mean, one, one little story that Ben told me as well was he kind of had the opposite feeling to that elation on the finish line. He was so relieved. Oh no. He was so exhausted and out of it that he doesn't really remember the finish line. He was, he just got there and he said it was completely dizzy crossing it. I don't really remember that whole period. And obviously later he was ecstatic. Once he had an IV drip in him and he's feeling pretty good. But that to me just, just shows that, you know, a lot of people have that, that relief and that elation. But for a lot of people, they are just making it to the line and that's as far as I can go. That's that last step that they can get to.

There's not too many people, George, who can say to me at the end, oh, I didn't go hard enough. Yeah, I don't think, you know, I don't think there's anybody who said to me, oh, I could have done, I could have done harder than that. And if, if you're in that position, you're very lucky because you must have stuck to a very conservative plan which would be brilliant. A big, a big tick.

Yeah.

So possibly Obi, Paul o', Brien, who, who did the big high five at the end. He, maybe he didn't go hard enough. I know he did differently, but yeah, so, so we don't normally mention people's names, but, but it's kind of a different experience on this one because it, I just want people to understand that what we're telling them is real. It happened this way. And, and you and I have spoken a lot over the podcast that we've done specifically about Ironman Triathlon, about wanting to run the leg of the run leg and not walk it. And, and I think, I think that's why I think I got so much out of it was because we had people selecting a run strategy and executing it within. You know, if you fade 10 seconds per km, you've had a pretty effing good day. If you can pick 4:45 pace and finish at 455, still running, I think that's outstanding. If you pick 4:45 and finish at 6:20 or 6:30, you know you haven't done something right in your preparation or your execution in the swim and bike or the start of your run. So already there's things I'm, I'm questioning. Why did you lose 30, 40, 50 seconds per km in the last 10k or 6k? That's okay. With 2k to go, it's fine. If you're on, on your limit, it means you've, you've measured your effort pretty damn well. But, but if you're fading that badly, there's something not going right in your, either your preparation or your plan or your execution. And, and they're the things that are so hard to get to get right. So that's what the topic is here today. How, how did we get to have that outcome for those athletes? And overwhelmingly, they were so well prepared by understanding that they need to be strong to hold the pace in the second half of a marathon, you don't expect to go faster ever. You expect to go slower. And that's, as we've said many times, the majority of the field are doing that. And if you can hold your pace from start to finish, you'll pass hundreds of people. Because everybody starts above their expected average pace and finishes 30, 40 seconds worse. That's the standard that's set and that's what everybody does. And it's only now that we're seeing guys in age groups not do that. And as a pro, there's still guys making that mistake. But the majority of them aren't. The majority of them are holding the pace they can do on the day and fading slightly. You know, As I said, 5 seconds per K or 10 seconds per K, that's within reason. I think if you're racing, you know, you're having a crack and you're good enough to hang on but guys were losing 30 seconds or 40 seconds or up to a minute per, per kilometer. You know your time blows out by half an hour. You know your predicted time can, in the run in the last 10k, you can add on 30 minutes to your outcome. Instead of you doing a 955, you end up doing a 1030. Instead of doing a 1040 you end up doing an 11 something instead of doing a PB. That might be 1150. You're now 13 something because you're blowing out that much, you know. So as you get slower it gets worse and it doesn't become 6:30 pace becomes walking pace which is 9 or 10 minute K pace. So in 5K you could add on another 25, 25 minutes to your time which you know, someone's trying to break 12 hours or someone's trying to break 11. You know, that blows that out of the water which is disappointing because you know, everybody's got their goals and it doesn't, you don't have to be you know, an eight hour Ironman person to have a successful day. You know, there's people doing 14 and a half hours breaking 14, doing 1350, that's a win. That's, that's Christmas, you know. And, and you might say it doesn't matter If I run 7 minute k or 8 minute k. Yes it does. It's the difference between 1350 and 1430. That's what the difference is by, by blowing out 1 or 2 minutes per k for, for 5 or 6k.

It's really simple keyword difference there, isn't it? And you really, it is simple but you have to understand it. It's, you're going for stronger, not faster.

That's right. Being able to, being able to endure, endure the pace that you plan. You know, I suppose the intensity that you're selected on the day and when I say the word intensity, people think we're talking about hard. No, your intensity can be 50%. That's your intensity for the day. You select the intensity you choose and the person who can sustain that intensity from start to finish is going to get the better outcome. The person who selects an intensity and fades is going to get the same result as everybody else which is slower than the result they want. The reason, and I did say this a few times in the pre race conversation to our trivalo people, I was a little bit reluctant to use me as an example. I was saying I wasn't necessarily the fastest person on the day but I Endured my pace within two or three seconds per kilometer in the marathon from start to finish, guys were better runners than I was, but they couldn't endure the last 10k to match their first 20k. That's what I was good at. My actual bike time for the first quarter, first half, third quarter, fourth quarter, were all within a minute of each other. I held my pace. I was consistent. The marathon the same. I was within five seconds from start to finish and I endured better than everybody. Everybody else slowed down. I just stayed the same. I wasn't beating people, they were beating themselves.

Looks like you are, but it looks.

Like I am and it feels like I'm running away from them. But I wasn't. I was just holding my pace. They were slowing down.

That's the experience that every tribal athlete had.

Exactly. And you feel like you're. You are flying, but you're actually holding the same pace. It feels like you're running faster, but you're not. It's because everybody around you slowed down that you feel like you're flying. And you're getting these calls from people around you who are, they're in the walk of death, you know, yet they'll look up and go, unreal. You know, they're still going to yell out, fantastic, whoa, you're flying, mate. It's a big buzz when someone who's just distraught he's still got the energy to congratulate you.

It's part of the sport I love. It happens in every event, no matter what distance. But even in Ironman, people like, yeah, congratulating you on flying past them because they know what hurt they're in and they go, how are you doing?

How you're doing that? Yes. And I think that's the most satisfying conversation I'm having with post race is they're just so excited to tell me that, oh, I was in Hurt Locker, I was in dark places. But I knew that the training I'd done, the strength I had to be able to hold that second half. And now I understand why you made me do those sessions is because I could maintain, endure my predicted pace that I planned, my intensity that I unplanned. I was able to hold it within reason. And that's fun.

So let's really list specifically the requirements that you think are key to be able to do that on race day. And you said one before and that was, are you willing to go and do six hours on the bike by yourself in preparation? So take me through what are the key run run sessions, ride sessions that you need to have done in order to get to the start line on the beach and go, I'm well prepared for today. And, and how many of them do you need to do?

Without giving too many secrets away, I am sure the majority of the field are all doing four, five, six hour rides. I'm positive that's happening. And if it's not, that would be the exceptions. You know, there'd be a small percentage who didn't do any of that. But the majority of the people of 1500 people who entered this event in the 3000 who go to that event and the, the majority of them would have experienced endurance riding and they've ticked that box. But let's just, let's just explore that, that ride. How are they doing that ride? And this is the bit that I, that I hone in on. You're with a pack of 20 great mates all riding six hours. What fun it was all riding together, getting your endurance ride ticked off. The guy who spent the time in the front, he's the only guy who got the value out of the ride. Everybody else who sat in the bunch is doing a six hour ride, but it's not anywhere near what's going to happen. Their experience is going to be on race day because you can't ride in a bunch on race day even though there are some massive packs. But, but you're technically not allowed to be in those packs. So why would you train that way? That is the biggest mistake that the group's making. They think they're prepared because they've done 10 six hour rides, none of them by themselves. So. Well, that's pretty antisocial, isn't it? That would be the answer I would get. But I do this sport because I want to be with my friends. Well, sure, that's all meat at the coffee shop at 6am and let's all go do our six hour ride and go a minute apart. I would know that everybody that I know is up the road somewhere or behind me or around me. That's how you should be measuring and preparing and getting your group if that's what you want to do. Ride with a group, meet as a group and then meet afterwards, fulfilling your social requirements. But do the session on your own, do the session in your wind. Spend the time where you've got pressure on the pedals with no one in front of you, have someone 50 meters in front of you who's pushing you if you want or if you're doing a specific session that's in the zones you're supposed to be in. Doesn't matter who's around you. All you're concentrating is here's a hill. What zone should I be in here? What power number should I be in? You should be practicing that week in, week out. And the second thing is, if you ride that group ride, six hour group ride, your fueling will be completely different to when you ride by yourself. Why? Because you're burning fuel at a different rate. In a bunch you could be averaging normalized. Say you're supposed to ride by yourself 200 watts for the six hours you could actually in that bunch ride six hours in a time with the bunch that's cost you normalized power of 150 watts. So your fuel requirements are so much more less than if you ride it at 200 watts. So you're not actually practicing your fuel strategy. So people get shocked when they come after they've trained with all their buddies come to the race where they have to ride by themselves. I bonked. I ran out of fuel. I don't know what happened. I know what happened. You trained without training in the right zone to practice your fueling. And this actual point I'm making is the make or break of most Ironman results that people love to train in groups. And we've talked about group training a lot and everyone knows our philosophy on it. There are periods where it's great every now and then to train in a group, to be pushed, get in a group that's way better than you so that you would be actually riding at the same pace you're going to do on Ironman day, same power, that's fine because it's relative to what you're going to do. And your fueling will be required the same amount. Because if you're in a bunch that you have to push 200 watts and you're still sitting in and pushing 200 watts, goal achieved, you're getting the outcome you want. So bunch riding can work if you're in a group that's way better than you. But if you're the best guy in the group and you're sitting in getting a free ride for that six hours and you know they're the things that are going to derail race day. And, and it does seems insignificant, but it's actually the key thing that causes the majority of failures in Ironman. So you can do all the high intensity training midweek. You can do all your tempo, your recovery stuff. If you don't do that endurance ride properly. The way I've just spelt it out, it can't be any more simpler than I'm telling you. If you don't do the majority of those rides where you're getting to practice the power you're going to race in, then come race day, you're going to be wondering what's happening to yourself. You're going to, you know, fade badly. And then it affects your run so much. No matter how fit you are as a runner, if you've burnt too much fuel, you know, we use that example of the car. If you've got an expensive car and you don't put fuel in it, it's still not going to go. It doesn't matter how much money you paid for the car. If you've trained your ass off and you haven't fueled yourself, you can't run no matter how fit you are.

So the course on the weekend was crazy hard. It was, it was 2000 meters plus of elevation for the ride. What, how do you factor that into your individual rides? And more importantly, it wasn't just the ride that was hilly, it was the run as well. So what are the things made you so confident in the athletes in that they were prepared for the day and how hard this specific Ironman was going to be. It wasn't a flat Ironman, but also.

Take into consideration the road surface and I'm sure the people who are listening to this podcast who did the race will go, yeah, don't forget the road surface. It was really average and a lot of people train on beautiful hot mix. That's not their fault. That's just the good roads they live around. The people who live in the country have got those corners, coarse hard surfaces.

Takes it out of you so much.

They're the sort of surfaces that Port Mac roads are. And there's lots of potholes and boy, there's some steep climbs in that, you know, it's 18 climb and there's, you know, you do that twice and there's a whole lot of other rolling hills that are really going to guess you and you know, a, you need to do a lot of training that's relative to the elevation that's going to be on the day. And you need to be in country roads so that you're not flying along beautiful hot mint surfaces every, every endurance ride. So you need to put yourself into similar conditions. So, you know, that's the thing that's going to enable you to be strong in a ride like that where it's got a lot of elevation. You know, if you go to Basso, it's Pancake flat. So it's a different. It's a different event, different course. You know, Port Mac is quite unique in how tough. It's a really fair course. If there were less potholes, it'd be a little bit fairer. But you can lose your drink bottles so easy because of the bounce factor on some of the shocking corrugations of bitumen that are. It's a bit like Paris Roubaix in some sections. So you can be disadvantaged because you've lost your nutrition purely because of the surface of the road. So there's a lot of factors that can go wrong compared to other courses. So this is quite a unique course. So you need to be quite prepared for all that. And, you know, how do you, how do you get that? Well, you try to design some of your training sessions and I'm always at the guys to say, you know, how much elevation did you get in your ride today? You know, and, you know, they, they all start with, oh, yeah, you know, it's pretty hilly and I'm saying, no, look up training peaks and tell me what your elevation was. You know, I'm saying minimum 1500 meters or 1000 meters today or 500. And yeah, I thought it was hilly, but I only did 350 meters of climbing. Well, you know, that's not going to cut it on race day. You need to actually train according to what your race course requires. So. So people might ask, well, if I'm doing bassos, do I still need to be in the hills? Well, yes, you still need to be strong to be able to actually ride fast on a fast course. So regardless of the course, I'm telling you, you need to have elevation in your training. But it's more important if your course that you actually do is a hilly course, you will reap the benefits on a flat course by a country mile. If people only train for busso. As an example, I'm using for those people, Busselton in wa, for those international listeners who don't know what course I'm talking about. It is a pancake flat course and the temperature is the thing that gets people. It could be 40 degrees, be 45, it could be 38. So it's a really hot, fast course. And it's renowned for being fast because it's flat. And so you would think that requirements are, I just need to be fast. Well, you need to be strong. And as I said earlier, you pick the intensity you're going to ride at and can you sustain that? Well, what makes you able to do that as a rider and a runner and a swimmer, well, you need to actually be strong in the back half of your ride so that you can run properly. So you need to be a strong bike rider to be able to run well. You need to have really good strong legs to be able to run well. So you need to be in the hills for riding. You need to be in the hills for running. And you know, I've said that many times for two years, but people still avoid them. It's not convenient to go to the hills. It's too far away from where I live. Just speaking to someone today about that. I was asking them, how far is it to drive to your nearest hill? And she was telling me that her nearest pool was 200k away. And she did that twice a week to make sure that she got her swimming in. And then she eventually got a swim spa at her house, which is, that's commitment. And so don't tell me that you can't do something because it's inconvenient. If you want something bad enough, you need to be inconvenienced. You know that where we live, I can't do the sub threshold TT training session in the hills because it's just too hilly. I need a flat road, so I have to drive 50 minutes every Sunday morning. So I have to get up at 5:30, get in the car at quarter six, be on the circuit that I want to ride on at 6:30, and then do the session, then drive another 45, 50 minutes home. So I'm only riding for an hour and a half, but it's actually a three or four hour session because of the drive I have to do. But I'm doing that because it is specifically what I want to get out of that session. If I did it where I live in the hills, I've got. The outcome's not right because I'm actually just, you know, riding uphill, downhill. And there's no section where I can actually ride properly in the zones I want to ride in. So you need to be inconvenienced and be willing to do the extra things that are going, you know. You know that we moved here to Belgrave so that I could train in the hills for running and for riding.

And it's not just about doing the hill session, it's about how you do it. Right.

Yeah. So.

So there's a really big difference there.

Yeah. And, and a lot of people think, right, I gotta, I'm in the hills, I gotta smash myself, I gotta get around those hills. And ride hard and then get in the hills and run hard. And if you do that right off the bat, you won't be able to train all week. You will be that exhausted. So you have to start off slow. You have to start off with a small amount of hills. And you're a classic example of this. You can injure yourself if you actually haven't done any good running base. And I mean stay on the flat. So I'm saying the opposite here. If you're not fit as a runner and you're hearing me say go to the hills, that doesn't mean you go to the hills. Day one of your running program. It means you go and get fit on the flat, get strong in the legs, and then you gradually introduce, you know, a half hour hills run, a 45 minute hills run, an hour's heels run until your body can cope and adapt and absorb. Because you're running at different angles, you're running downhill and uphill. Eccentric concentric contraction, your Achilles, your ankle, it's all been strained differently from when it's on the flat. So you can't just jump in. I've been running an hour and a half on the flat. I can do an hour and a half on the hills. You know yourself, that just doesn't work. I had to be sore.

I had to eat a bit of a fairly big slice of humble pie. Not long ago, making that mistake. I was doing the equivalent on the flat. I hadn't been out into the hills for months, but I. The hills is my home. I grew up in the hills. So I, I just, probably arrogantly just thought I could. I'm a bit of an exception. I can go back whenever I want.

And smash out an hour and a half.

Yeah. And did what I'd been doing on the flat, but hadn't been to the hills for months and almost gave myself a massive Achilles injury. And I think the only reason I didn't was because I've probably had that experience before, but I couldn't run for the week and it really affected my running training the next couple weeks. And yeah, it was almost a massive, major, major mistake. So.

Yeah, but that's from someone who understands, you know, but motivation is high. People listening to this, they're just, I can't wait to end this podcast because I'm going in the hills. And that's great, but you need to understand, you need to build up to this and you just don't start going out and riding four or five hours in the hills, six hours in the hills, you just need to gradually introduce it over. And that's why you need 20 weeks for an Ironman minimum or 26 or 30, because you need this period to get your body adapted to not only the six hours that you expected to do, but the strength from climbing, you know, mountains. 1500 meters worth of elevation, 2000 meters worth of elevation. The body doesn't cope with that very well just if it's thrown that at it straight away. So you have to ease your body into it and that way you won't break down and. Interesting. We're just talking to someone about having a great season. A whole year of not missing one session. The only session they half miss is when they got hit by a car, but they did not miss a session in that whole year. That's remarkable ability to manage your training and the load because, you know, injury is massive in triathlon. It is one of the biggest things that affects consistency, affects you getting to.

The line, the start line.

It affects your consistency of training and the possibility of not doing the race.

So you mentioned quickly There, you know, 20, 26, 30 weeks, we would probably say that conservatively 30 weeks is the minimum. We'd want someone to prepare for an iron man.

It depends where you've come from, George. If you're someone who's never done one before and you're new to the sport, I would be saying 30 to 50 weeks. You need to give yourself a year. You're running a marathon. The more beginner you are, the longer time you need. But you know, even some guys who've done 10 Iron Iron Mans or been in the sport for 10 years and they haven't actually train properly, they still need, you know, they come to us from what they've been doing for all those years and have been unsuccessful and then they come to a different style of training. The way we're doing really is taxing on the body if you expect to just jump into the strength stuff that we do.

So it's, it's getting, it's doing the session in the first place, doing the strength stuff, doing the volume requirement, which is one big hurdle to tick in the first place. But then it's, it's not doing it really hard and injuring yourself. So how, how do you do it to prepare yourself best on race day? And this was just so evident at Port Mac, you know, the amount of people gassing themselves up and down hills and.

Yeah, and, and understanding that is the key point. And you know, one of the guys in the post race analysis that we do and it's really not even a post race analysis. It's a euphoric conversation. That's what I call it now. Yeah, we're saying only if they've done a pb. I now understand what you've been banging on about, about not being in Zone one and not being in Zone five or six or seven, I get it now. And even on a course like Port Mac, where honestly, you had to be riding, you know, 120 for two or three minutes to get up that hill, you know, that was brutal, that hill. So. So you will, you will feel a period where you are over your limit. You know, we talk about your average power being 72% for the day, just selecting a number. That's what your goal is for the day, 72% of your FTP. But during the day, there'll be bits where you'll be at 80 or 90 or 100% or 110% for short periods. The more times you do that, the more time you'll spend in Zone one. Why? Because you're gassing yourself. And this is the key to actually understanding how to ride these races, these endurance races, is staying out of the high zones will keep you out of the low zone, which means you'll ride faster. So the more time you're in Zone one, the slower you're going to ride on the day. And people go, why would you be in Zone one? What would cause you to be in Zone one? Because you're riding some of the bits too hard and you have to recover. And the joke amongst our guys was they were going up the hills and getting smashed early on, people were flying past them and then as they got over the crest, they were continuing the pressure on the pedals evenly, like they were up the hill and down the hill and they were just motoring past the people who are huffing and puffing out of breath from gassing themselves way over their threshold on the uphill and having to coast on the downhill or soft pedal. And so they're spending massive amounts of time in zone four and then equal amount of time in zone one and. And before long, as you go through 50k, then 80, then 120, then 140, those people stop gassing you, they stop going past you, you're just riding out of sight, you're leaving them for dead because you are measuring your effort and spending no time in Zone four, no time in Zone one. And that's the key to it. And if you practice that in training, that's giving away our biggest secret is and it is so simple that even on race day, our guys were laughing that that's what they used to do. They're almost laughing at themselves because that was me. What that person's doing, that was me. And isn't it funny and ironic that they had the best days of their lives this year because that's what they did, right? They actually stayed out of zone four, five, six and zone one and stayed in zone two and three. And you know, the good guy can stay more in zone three. The pointy end age grouper and the middle packer or the guy who's first go at it or is a 14, 15 hour, he needs to be in zone one, zone two. I shouldn't have said zone one there. Zone two, but the majority of the time in zone two. But a course like Port Mac is really hard to execute that on. You know, it's easy on a flat course when there's no wind or no hills. The minute you introduce hills and wind, you know, I can't do it, Jared. How do I do it? Well, that's what the training sessions are all about, learning how to measure your efforts with wind and with undulations. And I think if you're asking me what, what the two things are, it's being strong and understanding how to ride in the zones.

There is a lot to an Ironman, it is an epic event and we could talk about hundreds of things that would get you ultimately prepared. But you could say with strong, strong confidence that if you tick those massive dominoes off that you just explained that you will have a totally different race day. Let's finish off and give the people some other quick wins, some, some really big things. You think that if you're, if you're 16 weeks out from an Ironman with an athlete, what are you ticking off in that 16 weeks? Just to make sure you're really happy with them and you're going to be confident that they can go into the race and be well prepared.

Yep. They've reached their, their longest distance in the run. They're. They're approaching that and you know, we do the split run, but that's another story. But they need to be comfortable with the volume on one day, whether you do it in the morning and the afternoon as a split run is that you're getting the time that you're going to be in the race. So you need to be getting close to that. And you know, we had guys who didn't achieve that and so therefore they had to have a more conservative race strategy. So if you haven't done the training, you have to re look at this race strategy and be more conservative. So, so if you come in with the ideal training, that's what you need. You need to have got yourself to a six hour because most people are going to ride between five hours and 6:30. There are a small amount of people who can do four hours 10 to four hours 55 and a small amount of people who do 6:30 to 7:30. That's the majority of people are in the middle five to six and a half hours. So you need to be on your own, in your own wind, in undulating courses doing that solo. And that's so easy to say that, but go and try and do that multiple times. Multiple times. So that's key. You actually need to then practice out and back riding to your number that you think you're going to do on race day. And at 16 weeks out that number could change, it could go up. Because during the week we're trying to improve our threshold so that, you know, we've picked a number that might be 70% of our threshold and 16 weeks out that could be 200 watts. But I want to, I want a 200 watts equals 30Ks an hour. I want to ride 31Ks an hour. The only way I can do 72% of my threshold is if it's two hundred and ten or two hundred and fifteen, then I'm going to be 31Ks an hour. So during the week we're still trying to lift our threshold by training at threshold or training over threshold. Yep.

Some other big things on our list and I'll just rattle them off. You jump in when you want to explain something in more detail. But nutrition, obviously like you said, you have to have practiced that properly to the race specificity that you're going to experience that comes from doing a majorly long time trial or these, these long training sessions at your intensity to know what nutrition is going to be appropriate. Combining the two. So making sure that you're doing some sort of big day here or there with a big ride and a big run, not just keeping it separate. Um, understanding the swim requirement, we, we skip over the screen swim sometimes. But understanding that you have to make it, you know, and, and you actually have to be able to get that distance at a minimum and, and be able to do it and hold your pace. Same, same principle.

Yeah, there's no doubt you've just rattled off some really important things. And you know, we often say because the swim is such a small part of the race that it's, it's, you can't actually get big improvements in it. You can, we've got examples of, you know, wangi's knocked off 30 seconds per 100, you know, and that's a great result. But, but that only improved him five minutes in a, in a 12 hour day. You got bigger improvements over 180k in a marathon where you can get 10, or in his case an hour 50 improvement. You know, he improved five minutes in the swim or 10 minutes in the swim, but he improved an hour 40 on the bike and run. You know, that's, that's why we're pushing the bike and run segment. We're not saying the swim is insignificant because if you can't get through the swim and you're exhausted, you actually won't ride and run well anyway. You still have to be fit. So let's not dismiss that.

Exactly. Yeah. And one of the last ones that we're really proud of is the race plan. And we are really happy with our race calculator. And you would say that almost every single person overestimates their race plan the first go. You know, you get them to send the race plan to you and almost every time it's over what you think they should do and what ends up happening. And if you're just doing a race plan, you have to understand your human bias and know that and this is just such a big thing to make sure you're well prepared for the day, is that picking the wrong numbers to start with and overestimating yourself is just setting yourself up for massive failure.

What you want and what you can do, they have to be correlating. You know, I always say, don't get your ambition and your ability confused. That is a thing that people are sick to death of hearing from me. But that's such a, it's such an important thing. How do you come up with your race plan? It's based on your training sessions. So I force our athletes to send me a race plan with evidence about how they've come up with 200 watts as their go to power number or 455 as their running pace. Prove to me from your training that you can have this as your race plan. And they, they then get a realistic view of, oh God, maybe I haven't actually done that pace or that power. And it makes them rethink and they're across all their numbers. So you have to be real with your race plan. You have to understand that, yes, I want to achieve that, but Find out straight away is it possible? And if it's not, reschedule, reassign yourself to this is what I can do. And it's an endurance event, so conservative is the best way. I say that a lot. Believe it or not, that's how I won that race. I was the most conservative person in the race, but I endured the most. So I'm not saying anything good about myself except that I was conservative and I knew what my ability was and I stuck to it. Everybody else raced it and had a crack, whereas I was actually the guy who was just the turtle. Everybody else was the hares. And I'm just enduring better than everybody else, which is, if it's good enough to win the race outright, why wouldn't it be good enough for an age grouper? Yeah, that's exactly what your mindset should be. You know, it might not be the fancy way to win, but you're going to get the outcome you want.

Speaking of winning the race, let's finish off with some predictions for the pros this weekend. It's the World Champs. We're really excited. It's obviously quite hard to watch because it's the race starts, I think at 10:30pm for us and finishes at 6:00am, 6:30am but it'll be great to watch the highlights anyway. It's a hard phrase to watch and I'm in eight hours worth. But we just do want to go through because we have been watching what a lot of the pro athletes around the world have been doing and comparing their training programs and thankfully a lot of them put it on their social media or their YouTube. So it's really fun to get a glimpse in and see. And you don't get the full picture, obviously, but we wanted to throw our. Our little two cents in and with all the other pundits out there and I have had a listen to some of the top pros around the world and who they're predicting. So it'll be interesting to see who comes up. So we'll start with the women's side. Lucy Charles was the outright favorite, obviously, but. And she's out with a stress factor, which is really disappointing because she was pinned to win the Iron man quite comfortably as well as the next favorite. Who was the favorite behind her? Laura Phillip. Who?

Multiple winner.

Yeah. Who. Who has come down with COVID this week. Yeah. And something a little bit annoyed me about the commentary this week around specifically Lucy Charles being out was that a lot of people kept saying things like, oh, she would have won, no doubt you know, and I, I thought you just can't ever say that for an iron man. It, for me it really disrespects race. I mean you can't say that in any race, let alone an eight hour event. Every race has some, has some spontaneity in it. Every single race at a world championship level, anything can happen.

Anything can happen, George. It's just such a bad mindset to think that, you know, sure, she should win, but what happens if she has multiple punctures? What happens if she cramps? What happens if she drops on nutrition? There's so many things can go. What happens if she's sick the week before and it's not at her best? Far out.

It's an eight hour event.

It's never over until it's over. And if you go in with that mindset that I'm not going to win this because the best person's here, well, you're not going to win anyway.

Yeah, so, so, so on that note, the floor has opened up now for a lot of athletes where the two favorites are now out and that really opens a field which is really exciting.

Fantastic, isn't it?

And I wonder, you know, did people come into this race fearing those two and think and maybe they didn't train as well the last six weeks they thought what's the point? My best, best position I could come is third. And now they're thinking, well I wish I trained a bit harder and I doubt that any single pro would be thinking that. But it's just an example of the wrong mindset you could get into. You know, these are professional athletes that.

Going through the motions rather than actually feeling like I'm a contender and, and you know what's happened in the last six week period that can happen on the day, you know, there could be catastrophes everywhere. It is a quite a technical course. You just don't know what's going to happen. And the person who persists and perseveres is going to be the winner on the day and you know, now it's the person who wants it the most. So the, the race is wide open.

Yeah, exactly.

I'm very excited to see how they go.

And as you just mentioned, the next favorite is probably the multiple four times I am world champion Daniela Riff and Rifle Reef. I can't, I can't ever know who, who pronounces it which way. But she has not been as in, as good a form. But you mentioned to me before the thing being a four time champion, you know how to Win and so she seems to be the next next best personal. A lot of people are doubting her. And lastly, Australia's Corey Alexander, world champion himself has predicted Sky Monarch as the inform athlete to win. So that is an expert pundits look. But it'll be interesting to see how it all plays out.

It's open to anybody, isn't it? And I just hope someone steps up and some. Some newcomer comes along and, and gets crowned World Champion. We're talking before. It's a pity they only get World Champion till October. Yeah, they don't even have it for a year.

Yeah.

But yeah, it's a great opportunity for someone to stamp their mark in triathlon and the. On the women's, women's side of affairs. So I'm really excited.

And speaking of newcomers for the men's side, only one previous world champion is in the race and that's Sebastian Kienle. So it's going to be very exciting that if he doesn't win it's a, it's a newly crowned champion. And obviously we've got our new Norwegian loves, Gustav and Christian. We can't wait to see how they go and more importantly how they go against each other. Because Christians had Gustav's measure in a lot of races. But a lot of people are saying that Gustav is unbeatable, which I just don't think you can use that term in an iron man.

Look, they are the standout too. There's no doubt that they on paper should. But think like one came first at the Olympics and one came ninth.

Yes. Yeah. And he had a poor race, so seventh, I think.

So there's, there's an example of probably someone who should have won not winning someone who shouldn't have won one. That's a bit, bit hard to say that but you know, nothing's. Nothing's done till it's done. I just hate that, that commentary.

Yeah.

So, so yes, they are the two standout and they should be head and shoulders above everybody else. But this is an iron man and anything can happen.

Jan Frodeno, the goat of Iron man has predicted Carl Smith as a smokey, which is quite an outside chance. Sam Long, who we love him as a character will be interesting. He's so young to see how he competes at this level. But I think we just wanted to mention our man and our prediction for this year. Who we are absolutely rooting for is Lionel Sanders.

I just love the way he's just embraced everything about it and yeah, I just, you know, if you have favorites, he's he's my woot van art of the cycling world. Yeah, he's a great character. They're all great characters. And good to see a Brownlee in the race. That's going to be exciting. And don't underestimate that unbelievable freak of an athlete. He has done everything in triathlon. He doesn't have to prove to anybody. And sometimes when you're in that position, you're free to do whatever you like. Those guys know how to push themselves. You've seen them carry each other over the line in races so they can push themselves beyond. But that's what Lionel thinks that he can do. He reckons he can push himself more than anybody else if he just gets a chance to be in contention, attention. That's his strength, he says. So I'm looking forward to seeing him in that position and I really hope he can show everybody that, you know, he's a. Isn't. He's a. He's a genuine contender.

It's worth mentioning that they're. One of the reasons we love him, and you love him specifically is you're just loving his attitude towards racing. And it's so important for all of us to remember is that in one of his videos he just said he's so excited to race and that is just infectious. And that's what it should all be about. When it comes down to it, you want to be really looking forward to race day and to have some fun doing.

Yeah. And he's not afraid. He's not afraid to muck up. He's not afraid to make mistakes. He's not afraid to come 20th. He said he set it out. You know, it sounds like a cop out, but all I want to do is enjoy myself on the day, which is what I say to all of our trivalo people. The last thing I say is, have a great day, but don't forget to enjoy the experience. And if you're enjoying something, you will. You know what it's like. You do better at things you like doing. If you're not enjoying it, you're going to go progressively worse. So I love his attitude. I love the fact that he's not fearful of poor performance because most people are fearful of their own performance, whereas they should be actually the opposite. They should be confident that they're standing on the beach as well prepared as they possibly can be. They should be just smiling, saying, I've done everything possible today to get here today and that's going to give me confidence for the whole day. I'm going to be challenged. I know, but I'm up for it. That's his attitude and I think that that endears me to him and I, yeah, I've got, I've got my, my, my flag cheering for him.

By the time you listen to this episode the race will have already been done. So you can either, you'll either know the result and know that what we're talking about was either right or wrong or you can go look it up after this podcast. But we'll finish there. This has been all about Ironman. We hope you've enjoyed it and made it. Maybe you are inspired to sign up. Just pretend that if you do, dad will be giving you, just pretending your head that he's grilling you about. Can you actually do it and are you willing to sacrifice all these things? That's it for this episode and we'll see you on the next one.

Sam.