Training Skills To Make You Go Faster (Part 1)

The majority of the people that are in the program are doing a brilliant job at this. They are totally prepared and up for the session's requirements, and they're knowing their numbers and they're telling me, last week I did these numbers and they're actually texting me saying, I'm so wrapped. I improved on last week's session.

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 Trivelo Coaching, Jared Donnelly. Ask yourself this question, are you good at training? Do you think you train effectively or efficiently? And in our experience, two athletes can get the exact same program and have wildly different experiences from the same session or the same training week. That's because there's an art to training. And today we're going to take you through the top training skills that you should master to get the most out of your training and ultimately go faster. So, dad, welcome back to another episode. Firstly, our starting segment. What are you grateful for?

Thanks, Jordan, and looking forward to this episode as always. I just want to clarify. Yes, training is so important to our performance. Before I get into the gratitude, but don't forget, we are there to race. And training. We should call it practice. Get your practice right and you'll train very well. Don't train like you're racing. You should be training to race. Practice to race. So just before I move on, that's a point I want to make at the start. So really good topic, and we've got a lot to say about it. Actually, my gratitude. It's interesting because I've had to really understand and learn a lot of the tips that we give out on this podcast I've actually had to really use in my own rehab, and it's been a really good learning lesson for me. So just don't want to bore too many people too much. But I want to keep people updated on how the rehab's going and the progression is slow, and I'm okay with that. But I'm progressing a couple hundred meters of walking further each day, which is fantastic. But my gratitude is that I know that if I trust the process, I will actually get the right outcome. So I'm grateful for knowing that knowledge, for having that knowledge thrown down everybody else's throat that I've. That I've passed that onto. And now I'm grateful that I can actually use that knowledge for my own purpose to If I just concentrate on trusting the process, taking each session and each day one day at a time, in 3 weeks time I will be 15 minutes further up the road than I was today. So trust the process and it will end up being where you want it to be. It might take longer than you thought. It might take 12, 12 months before I'm actually the way I was before. But. But I'm just going to trust that process. I'm going to stick to that. So I'm grateful for that knowledge.

Yeah. And I'm looking forward to the day you have your first ride and you can update everyone on the podcast and then you do your first FTP test again and then we see where your watts are at and then we see your improvement from there. So it should be good audience to join in. My gratitude is for my current new running shoe rotation. A couple months ago I went and saw Mitch who was on the podcast. A couple of episodes ago my shoes were due for an update. I had done enough mileage in them or kilometers in them and of course had the usual experience of going into the store and trying on a dozen shoes and got a daily trainer shoe which ended up in the Asics Novablast. And we shouldn't really say that specific shoe is better because if you listen to the podcast with Mitch, he's saying the brand doesn't matter, but I'll. I know people are always curious as to what you're running in. And then my kind of speed work shoe, a bit more tempo threshold sessions or any speed work I'm in the Endorphin speeds. And then the racing shoe is actually I've moved away from not, not the alphafly, not any Nike, not the Asics Meta Speeds, but actually Saccony as well in the Endorphin Pro. And they've got a really interesting shoe in that they're the first time ever where the heel has no material, it's just basically mesh. So it's a really interesting feeling but they feel unreal to be honest. So yeah, it's some of the best shoes I've felt in. It's been a slow process of a couple of years of transitioning out of getting used to running into smaller shoes. You know, Mitch's advice has been get into bigger shoes and he still started me on some kind of supported and heavy issues. Just the change wasn't too big. But we've kind of slowly moved up to some shoes that really have you give you some. Some return on the run. And I'm now running in Daily trainers that are quite bouncy and quite fun to run in. So, yeah, it's the best shoe rotation I felt I've had ever. So really grateful for that.

That's a good point too, Joy, because your body's actually adapted to the load and as you get fitter as a runner you can, you know, you know, the body can cope with, with some upgrades. So it's, it's a really good point to make.

Yeah. Moving on, before we get into the topic, what's caught our attention around the world? Some, some quick points to make up that we feel like you can definitely learn from. The first one I want to start with is Lionel Sanders, who is one of the best characters in triathlon. I think he's just. His YouTube channel has grown in popularity because of his raw, unfiltered nature. He gives pre race analysis of how he thinks he's going to go. He uploads the race itself and a post race analysis. And he's always, never hiding anything. He lays everything on the table. He puts his ego aside and it's really, it's a really good watch and listen. But he just put out a recent vlog which just honestly shocked me and I sent it in a group chat to our kind of trivelo team just going, this can't be real, Kenneth. And he admitted that basically his diet has been incredibly poor and he feels like that is a big reason for why he's had some pretty poor results in recent months and he needs to fix it. And he went into detail, so much detail. As to saying that he has no nutrition plan. He doesn't watch what he eats at all. He eats absolute crap. He barely eats any protein at all. He's a vegetarian and he doesn't really eat any kind of servings of fruit or vegetables. And you can be a vegetarian and get enough protein or vegan get enough protein. That wasn't the part that shocked me. It's the fact that he is choosing to be vegetarian. But he hasn't replaced his lack of meat source with any protein intake, which we know from every single nutritionist that's come on this podcast is probably the most vital macronutrient for an athlete. For him to just not be having enough of that and competing at the top level and coming second at the world champs last year, that absolutely floored me. I just could not believe that this is his diet. He's just not. He's getting a severe lack of nutrients in one, that he's performing so well, but two, that no one around him has fixed this yet. And he kind of has. He's talked about constantly feeling fatigued, constantly feeling like he's not recovering from sessions. He put it down to old age and now he's realized that it's nutrition. So kudos to him for admitting that. But that still just absolutely shocked me at almost the amateur ness of going about his nutrition this way.

Yeah, I actually watched the same vlog and I was just. My jaw dropped a bit. And what you just finished with really was the good point. I thought, well, he's actually thinking deeply about his form and his, his form is deteriorating at a really scary thought. And you know, I heard him say things like, I'm washed up. I'm, you know, if I can't do this anymore, I shouldn't be doing what I'm doing. And they're all the thoughts, the, the demons that come into your head. And you know, he, it really affects you mentally when you, when you know, you've got scores on the board that you have performed at a high level and for some reason you can't attain that level again, you start to question everything. And, and finally he got around because he questioned everything else. The type of training he was doing, recovery sleep, the intensity of his training, the environment, you know, all these things. Was I racing too much? Was I racing not enough? Was it being specific enough? And finally, you know, you've got to look at, you know, has my strength and conditioning and diet and all of those things all contribute. Every one of those things that I mentioned contribute to an overall performance. Good, bad, or the same. And if you don't analyze things in a really. Transparent manner, then you're going to sugarcoat everything. You know, I think I'm eating okay. Well, no, let's just go through and find out what I am eating. And basically that's what he's done. And he did point to back in 2017 when he felt that it was the best form of his life. And you know, that was what it took him to realize that, Geez, actually, what protein am I having? And you know, when he looked back since that time, virtually none. And it is a, an amazing feat that he's been able to compete. Imagine if he actually has the right fuel in his body. It would be interesting to follow the progress now if, if he starts to eat correctly, how long it's going to take for him to get back to, to where he, you know, he probably deserves to be on the podiums. He is a, you know, uniquely open and honest athlete and I love that about himself. And I mean, I feel that he hasn't really done many posts lately because I think he's just been so down on himself because he was quite a regular poster and he's gone very quiet and it's almost like he's had an aha moment. Like I think I found the answer here. So it will be interesting to see where and how he goes. And so looking, looking for reasons as to why your performance is, is deteriorating and finding the right answer is. Is kind of the number one thing that you're trying to. Trying to establish here. And when I look at the training that Lionel's been doing over this period, he's been training, you know, really great sessions and he has a training partner. I think, I think it's Trevor Foley Jord, if that's the right, the right person we've got. I could be wrong there. He is actually improving out of sight training with Lionel, doing the same program and his performances. He's now come into the top 30 in the world in the PTO rankings and I think he got second at St. George 70.3 in his last race. So they're examples of two guys doing the same program and one guy is really performing well and one guy's not. So what about that? Training is working for one person, it's not working for the other. It could be many reasons. We don't know exactly what they're doing or how they're going about it, but. But one person is in good form and the other person isn't. Lionel's not, he's not performing well in any races to his expectation of being a winner or on the podium every time. So he's still performing quite well actually, but it's not at his level. So this guy who's training with is actually, you know, doing PBS every time he races. And yeah, there's an example of, you know, trying to establish what is not going right. And I think, I think that's. That's really worth worthwhile for every age grouper out there to, you know, feel like your form is not going well. Just really go through with a fine tooth comb about what things are you doing well, which is really relatable to what we're going to talk about in today's topic.

Yeah, and it has to be said that we are the biggest supporters of Lionel. Anytime he's on the start line at a race, we want him to win because we just love the way he goes about it. We love just his mental resolve and how much of a fighter he is. And again, kudos to him for going through this process because he was having a lot of doubt and he was saying, is it true? Am I washed up? Am I just too old? Can I just not compete like I used to? Did I peak five years ago? And he really dug deep to search with himself and find some answers. And then, not only that, he's admitted to the world a pretty, almost embarrassing truth as an athlete that I've been making this basic mistake and I need to fix it. So massive kudos to him and we love to hear it and it was a shock, but we're hoping that, you know, it's really, actually really exciting opportunity for him because it's like, well, he's been performing this well with such a poor diet and not focusing on the right things. You know, if he fixes those things and, you know, coming second at the World Ironman Championships, coming fourth still at St. George a couple of weeks ago, which, like you said to him is not up to his standard, means that, yeah, he can start pushing for wins again, which is really exciting. Before we go to the topic, what's caught your attention? What point did you want to bring up?

Yeah, it's kind of a little flow on from what we've just been talking about. And I find myself a lot of times having to almost counsel some of the athletes that we coach who might be going through a bad patch. And having Lionel's example is kind of a good segue to talk about. A lot of the pros have periods where they're not performing at their best. And whether it's a test team situation or an individual, you know, the expectation is that you perform day in, day out, year in, year out, and, and that's just not possible. And, and the sooner people understand that as an age grouper, when the best in the world are still struggling with, with actually understanding how to, how to get themselves to, to perform the way they want to as regularly as they want to. As age groupers, we need to actually understand that, you know, there's only going to be certain periods that we can actually have really good breakthrough improvements. And it's not going to be something that's going to be happening every day, every week, every year, and there will be periods, if you're training towards an A race and you have a great preparation, you have a really good taper and your form on the A race is spot on, you've done a great job, that's a huge tick. But then after that race, you need to recover and that might be for anything from one week to four weeks, both mentally and physically. So your form for that period might be going up at a really sharp angle. And then the minute you take a break or a period of recovery, your form will drop instantly over a period going in the other direction. So then you restart your program for the next campaign that might be another 20 weeks away. And then you're so disappointed that your FTP when you did prior to the. As an example to the. A race you've just done might be 300 watts, and here you are struggling to do 265 in your next test four weeks later. I find it, I. I find it's a struggle that I have to explain to them that it isn't expected you would be at 300 watts. The expectation is that you would be anywhere lower than 300. And if you are at 300 watts, that's quite remarkable, in fact, that you would be able to maintain the power that you could do a month ago without training, really. So I want to get the message across and what's caught my attention is there are so many pros who are having struggles with form. Look, Sam Long, who's a big vlogger as well, he was basically told by most of the people who follow him to also give up because he's nothing more than a BE grader. And all of a sudden he comes out and wins two races back to back. So form is something that people go through, the pros. So as age groupers, give yourself a break and don't have expectations that you are going to hold form forever. And you know, your. When we talked about this before, look at Gustav and Christian, you know, they're, they've gone brilliantly. Could not have had better seasons.

Two of the best triathletes in the world last year.

Yeah. And now they're trying to change from endurance athletes to sprint and Olympic. And. And where's their form, Jord? Yeah, yeah.

At the. Another World Triathlon Series event on the weekend, Olympic distance, because that's what they're training for. And once again, completely poor results from both of them. Christian was 30th, I think, and Gustav was second last again. And this is a really good point to bring up because we've spoken about Gustav and his results multiple times over the last couple of months, and he's basically last or second last in every world triathlon event so far in the Olympic distance. And he just posted on Instagram last week that his mum lost her battle to cancer and it was quite an emotional post. And he Just said he's really been struggling to deal with it all, you know, to deal with that process with her. And it's really had an effect on his mental state and training and of course is there can always be a story behind it. And we talk about this so much and, you know, part of his form might just be like Christian. He's getting back used to the Olympic stuff and a lot of it will probably be to do with, you know, his mum and the illness and the cancer she's been struggling with and now she's passed away. So, you know, that says a lot. And it's exactly what you're talking about. Like these things happen and you're going to go through bad periods because of it.

Yeah. And I think, I think Jordan, I, you know, just like the example you gave with Lionel Sanders. And now you've talked about Gustav finding the, analyzing what you've been doing and finding the reasons is half, half the battle so that you can actually do something about it. And in Gustav's situation, the stress and anxiety that he would be feeling would be the furthest thing he would want to be doing, really would be concentrating on training and racing correctly when his family's going through this period. So there's always reasons, probably. As long as you can find out what the reasons are, then you can do something about it. And that's the key to probably having a really great career is understanding what's going on in your world and making adjustments. And I suppose that's the segue to, to the next topic, isn't it really? I think, I think everything we've talked about in gratitude and caught our attention is really an analogy for what we're going to talk about next, for sure.

And one last point I wanted to make was the first Diamond League of the year was on last weekend in Rabat. And it's awesome to see that at the start of the season. You are just not seeing anywhere remotely close to these athletes best. You know, they are starting their athletic season. It's their first race of the year. The times they're putting up are way off what, what their season best or personal best could be. And that's not true for every athlete. There are athletes in there that are getting season best or pbs. You know, there's often at this early stage, a lot of athletes that aren't quite on the world tour circuit might not be there at the end of the season getting pbs, but you know, the times are just, yeah, you're looking at Olympic metal athletes running 2, 3, 4, seconds slower than 5 seconds slower than what they're capable of. Apart from good after guy, who I have to say ran one of the most incredible 1500 meters we've seen. She ran a 354 basically solo. It's, I think it's in the top 10 fastest meter times of all time for women. So that was a massive ally. But it's this form thing again. You know, they're not coming to this first race demanding that they're in peak form and they can expect that and the whole kind of field is in the same position. And that's really important because if they had the expectations of, you know, doing every single Diamond League race from the start to the finish in peak form, then they probably actually wouldn't have a very good season because they wouldn't be getting any improvement. So that really has to be said.

It's going to be interesting, Jordan, to see if Sergey can continue this form because the Diamond League calendar goes for quite a long time leading into the World Championships and this is a high standard and I'm going to be so interested to see where this goes and whether she can hold it and, and whether this is her preseason form and she's going to get better. So one or two things are going to happen. She's going to hold this and get better or it's going to progressively get worse as her form diminishes because as we know, the majority of people can't hold form for four months.

Yep, spot on. Getting into the main topic, top training skills that you need to master to get faster. And we've created our own list separately and we're going to go one, one by one, talking about what's top of our list and kind of go through a bit of an explanation of why we think it's so important. So give us your number one on the list. Ad what was the top training skill that we see athletes required to master to improve?

Okay, so I'm not putting them in order of priority. These are all that. They are all equally as important as each other. I've got to get that out in the first sentence. So one of the things that I think really helps a lot of the athletes that I coach is and when I go through this with them, they really then understand what to do going forwards from this point on and preparation for your session. So understanding and knowing what the session's expectation is and knowing what your level of ability is to meet those expectations. So preparing properly for every session. And that doesn't mean if you're On a bike session for the day that you get on and you start warming up and then you open up the session and see what, what it is today, that is the worst way to go about a session. And even worse than that, not even looking to see what's coming up next, just waiting for your garment to change resistance and go, oh, okay, now I'm doing five minutes, it says five minutes and not knowing that there's eight five minute efforts or three five minute efforts or it goes five minutes, eight minutes, ten minutes. And I've had people tell me that they didn't really know what the session was. And so that that almost makes me throw my, you know, every bit of paper that I've got on the desk up in the air and go, you know, I'm beating my head against the wall here. If you don't understand what the session's requirements are and knowing what your ability in that session should be around so you're in the right swimming zone pace, running zone pace and riding power pace, then what hope have we got that you can achieve the outcome that you want? So really understanding and preparing properly for that session.

Yeah, and that was actually one of my points. It was very similar point, but a little bit more based around the planning of the week and the training sessions and how you're going to approach them. But yeah, being organized and being prepared was one of my key skills. Because when you think about a training week ahead, there's a lot to consider, especially if you're doing multi sport swimming, cycling, running. But even if you're just doing one of them, cycling or running, you need to be prepared for where are you going to do the session, where's the best course to complete that session. For example, today I've got running VO2 intervals and I'm in a different city. So all week I've actually been kind of just subtly scoping out what area would be best to do the intervals on, what kind of flat section, where can I do a warmup? And then I'll do my warmup and my trainers, then I want to switch to my speed shoes. So where can I potentially leave those shoes? When I get to a session, I want to know exactly where I'm warming up, where I'm going to complete the session, what kind of area it is, what terrain it is, be prepared for any weather conditions. And we should be doing this for every session of the week, you know, looking ahead and going, okay, we've got a Zone 2 ride this day, where am I going to do it? Am I going to do it outside. What's the weather looking like for that day? What course am I going to do? Is that appropriate? Is that got uninterrupted traffic lights? Usually, if it's a home course, you might do the same course every time. You might be prepared to go on the trainer. If you're going to go on the trainer, what time are you going to do it? You know, all week you're thinking about, where am I going to fit these sessions in? And just being really prepared and really organized is so key to that. And I just hate turning up to sessions under prepared, rushing through things, because I haven't thought about exactly what's going to happen, especially these hard sessions. Like I used today's example, which is a VO2 session. It's a really hard session, you know, and I kind of mentally prepare for it all week and think about, okay, what pace am I going to have to hit, where am I going to do this? And when I do that, I find I turn up to the session just like I turn up to a race, really prepared for the day. And I prefer to train that way. And I think if everyone stays organized and knows their pace or power plan and knows exactly how they're going to complete each session and make sure that you're doing it to the requirements of the session, if you can do that, you are training way more effectively than the majority of people out there.

And look, to be fair, I'm really picking on a small percentage of people. The majority of the people that are in the program are doing a brilliant job at this. They are totally prepared and up for the session's requirements, and they're knowing their numbers and they're telling me, last week I did these numbers and they're actually texting me saying, I'm so wrapped. I improved on last week's session, and that's someone who's actually doing the top training skill very well. And sure, they'll have days where they actually didn't perform as well as they wanted to, but they still got the session. They still were ready and prepared to do what they thought they could do, but they didn't actually feel that good on the day. But that's not the point we're making here. It's really making sure you know what the requirements are so that you can execute according to how you feel.

And more importantly, what happens when you're not prepared and you're not organized. We've spoken about those examples. You can potentially miss a session because you've run out of Time you turn up to a session, as you said before, not knowing the requirements, you're not getting the most out of the session. And it's not just about the main set. I count every part of the session from the start to the end. Just as important to practice your routines, practice your warm up routine, practice how you feel. Practice getting your pace right in those warm up routines, in the 30 second warm up efforts, in the little surges in the ramp, on the bike or the run, and then the main set itself, executing that. So when you don't do this, you're really doing yourself a disservice. It's interesting that we had a similar point in there. Go on.

Yeah, I was just going to say, and you've made me realize another point that I wanted to say, which is sometimes a session might be 50 minutes, sometimes a session might be an hour and a half. And if you've been in a program that's supposedly progressively overloading and for some reason the program has changed slightly because it's going to work for you better, but you haven't taken any notice of that. You're just presuming it's going to be the same as last week. And don't presume anything. Make sure that you check the program because it could have a subtle slight variation of adding five more watts or two more minutes to the actual effort. Instead of doing six by six minutes this week it's six by six and you know, all of a sudden you're getting to the end of the six minutes and you go, oh heck, why didn't it finish at 6? And all of a sudden, oh, damn it, I've got 30 seconds to go. And oh, those 30 seconds are at 120%. And you know, you're actually not getting the value out of the session because you, you're realizing it too late. And also the time. If you've only allowed 50 minutes because last week was 50 minutes and the session's asking you to do an hour 20 and, and you start that at 8:30 at night, they're really poor organizational things that are going to cause you not to be able to fulfill the requirements of the session. So understanding the length of the session, the intensity of the session and the variations that might happen if we're doing a period of training where it's all zone two strength and endurance, for example. Well, there were very subtle variations from session to session. Don't just presume it's going to be the same spot on.

What is your second key skill?

I suppose this is really relative to me in my own personal journey right at this current time, which is be patient with your rate of improvement and trust the process on a daily basis. You know that there are thousands of people in the world who have had to start a program and aim to get to a point, an end point. Whether it's two years down the track with your main goal, or whether it's six months or whether it's 12 weeks. You have to actually go through the process and trust the improvement will come with the time that you've allowed for it. And it won't come in the first seven days or 12 days or 14 or 20 days. If you want to have trust in the fact that the program will eventually get you to improve, then you have to be patient. So my key point here is being patient and understanding that, that if you just tick off the stepping stones or the bricks that you're accumulating to build your house, you've got to do them one at a time. And patience is a key thing. And I get a call saying, I thought I'd be better than this by now. And they've been 16 days into a program or 40 days into a program. And the first time they did their test they were at this level and the next time they improved 15% and the next time they do a test they've only improved 2% or they haven't improved at all. So it's not just going to happen in short periods of time. And we've used this example many times where athletes who we've coached for two, three and four years get to a point where they're just going to another level where the first two years, sure they've improved, but it's not a level. That's where they're at after year three, four and five and, and that's something that takes a lot of patience to give yourself that big picture goal. And as a 22 year old, that seems so much easier than a 58 year old who thinks they've got limited time to be a competitive athlete. Whereas a 22 year old actually wants to be quicker, sooner, but they've got all the next 10 years or 15 years to be as competitive as they want. So don't expect things to happen in a minute. Be patient and trust the process.

Yeah, and I like how you refer to it as the boom, bust cycle. And it's just this cycle of, you know, getting really motivated and pushing above what the process requires. And that's the boom part. And then that results in a bust by you not being able to actually do the program properly.

Yeah, and you know, we've said so many times and it's one of the other points that I make is which we won't talk about now, but you know, your program improvement will always be better if you just stay with the zones that you're meant to be in. You know, if you feel good on a particular day and you're meant to be doing zone two. But geez. Well, I had great legs today, so I just, I hope you don't mind, I just, I just did one of my PB efforts on a circuit that I really, I really am good at. You know, I've really tried to break my PB on this circuit for years and I felt great today. So I had a crack at it and I said, oh, what was the circuit? Oh, it was an eight minute effort and here, you know, and I said what, what did you write at? Oh, it was my PB 8 minute power. I said, yeah, but today you weren't allowed to go over zone two because tomorrow you've got, you know, VO2 sets of, you know, nine by one minute efforts. And sure enough the next day, you know, they can't hit the targets they were aiming for because they did that really great session. And that's okay occasionally. And then you should adjust the next day so that you're not doing the hard session the next day. So that decision you make, the process, it has a flow on effect that's going to actually, if you don't adjust it very quickly, could put you in an actual bust cycle rather than a boom cycle. Because the improvement be the boom cycle. You know, housing prices started at this particular rate and over the next six months the price of the houses keep going up and then people go, eventually it's going to actually, you know, bust on itself. And sure enough it does because it's unsustainable to do the price rises that houses are doing. And that's why there's a bust. But you don't want to be that person who's just pushing the envelope too high, too much, too soon. You want to be more balanced so that you're gradually progressing over a six month period. And the best way to get the self satisfaction is to continue to look at what you did in week one. I always say get perspective. If you're in week 16 and you think, oh, I haven't improved much from you're only thinking about the last three weeks. Well, I always say what did you do in week one? What was the numbers you were pushing there and they go, oh yeah, that's true. I've actually improved 55 watts since week one, in 18 weeks. And that's where you get that feeling of it's okay. And that's the patient think and analyzing things that you can get perspective around.

Yeah, I totally agree with this point of trusting the process and avoiding the boom bust cycle. It's such an important skill for an athlete to understand because we see this mistake from beginners all the way up to experience. And I have made this mistake recently because I am currently on a basically a full time running program giving the bike away for a little bit. And I started trying to train as much as I was training normally bike and running. And I just found I was so sore so quickly because I was just doing all running. And as someone who's got a lot of training experience, I just did exactly what we're saying not to do and just try to replace all my bike sessions with more running sessions which is not going to work because my body's just not used to that volume and you can really risk injury very quickly. And I got very sore very quickly and so big alarm bells and I just really found I was too fatigued too quickly just by doing too much. And I have to say that I think it is the most common mistake that beginners make is just doing too much too soon. And I have so many friends come to me and they say, I want to start running, what's your advice? And I say, I mean, there's a billion things I could say, but I just say, please don't go, don't go so hard so early, just be really prepared to go easier. And you think that's such a boring answer and you think it's not going to help you and people just dismiss it and go, oh, no, no, whatever, be fine. But guarantee two months down the track, three months down the track, six months down the track, they've stopped running. So what is it that you need to do to make sure that three months down the track you're still training consistently? The six months down the track you're still training consistently. That's just the golden question. Because if what you're doing now isn't sustainable for that long, then it's the wrong program, it's too much and you're in the boom bust cycle.

And that's why trusting the process is the key. And you know, I've had really good runners who can run 5K in 16, 17 minutes, which is quite, quite elite. It's not super elite, as in Diamond League elite, where they're running, you know, sub 12 minute, sub 13 minutes, there'll be a day when they run 12 sub 12 minutes. Might have some sort of jet shoes that have got power in it. But anyway, the point is, you know, I've had them starting with 30 seconds on, not 90 seconds off as their rehab program and they can run brilliantly and they're on board with the process because they've been injured, they've been out for a period and they don't want to get injured again. So for a beginner runner, why would they be any different from someone who's actually an elite, experienced runner? And when they say to me, I thought I could be able to go for a 30 minute run, well, you haven't run for 15 years or five years or three years or three months. You just can't resume to where you, you left off. So that's a training skill that people need to understand that, that totally. If you're on board with that, then you will be able to improve at a rate of knots. And all of a sudden, you know, we've got one of our coaches, Nick Lecandro, doing exactly that. He wanted to start a running program and he's a, he's an elite cyclist, you know, as fit as possible, but he's fit for cycling, he's not fit for running. And he started with 30, 90 and he just copped it and said, yep, I'm going to do that. And already in this program he's up to probably week eight or nine and he's now running six by four minutes, six by five minutes. And he's trusted the process, not got sore and he's improved.

And with dad, we had another athlete with the opposite experience, someone who also hadn't run for 15 years or so and wanted to start getting back into it. And we gave the example of, of 30 seconds of running, 90 seconds of walking, and they took that and went and did 60 seconds of running and 30 seconds of walking and then called you up and said, I'm so sore, they've almost done a calf injury and it's just the slightest detail and they've just done too much, you know, and that's exactly how easily it can happen. It's what we're talking about. So my next point that I want to bring up and it kind of takes it back a, back a level, but it's really a skill that you need to master and keep learning to master, is your ability to use data. And from a beginner's perspective. This means actually understanding what power is and how to read it and how to use power and what you're actually looking at and understanding those numbers as well as pace in your running and pace in your swimming. But using other elements of data as well, especially while you're cycling. It's comparing your power with your speed. So you're getting good gauges of when you push 200 watts. What does that generally speed wise for you in a training session? When you've got your full kit on, when you've got your full racing wheels on, your racing kit on, maybe your aero helmet, what does that power equate to on race day? So you can actually get experience of when you come to race day, knowing what your general power should be. And how does that feel for you? What does 200 watts normally feel like for you? What does 250 watts normally feel like? What does 300 watts feel like for you? And you can do this in the warmup of your training sessions, which is why the warmup is so key. But you're constantly getting a gauge of how am I feeling today? Is, is, is my normal ramp warm up of 150 watts to 180 to 210. Does that feel comfortable? Today it feels like a 5 out of 10, which is normal or today it feels like an 8 out of 10 in toughness. I must be really tired. You know, this is what we're talking about in under. In starting to learn the skills of using data, comparing it to your potential heart rate, is your heart rate slightly higher than normal? Are you using your resting heart rate consistently? Are you using your starting heart rate of a training session? Are you using your, your potential max heart rate in side your main sets? You know, when you do 5 by 5 VO2 intervals, is your heart rate normally sit around 170, but today it's around 180? Does that mean you're pushing harder and you're getting fitter? Is your heart rate getting lower? I'm just giving constant examples here of your ability to use data and understand data is so key to getting the most out of your training sessions.

Yeah, look, I just had literally this afternoon an example of an athlete who's just started the program and not quite across the ability to use data. And it's not his fault. It's a training skill that needs to be learned. And I was not getting cross at what he'd done, but he just didn't understand how important that aspect of it was. And what were we talking about he was using the Zwift app, which we think is fantastic. But one of the key downfalls of the Zwift app is it doesn't have average power. It only has instant power or three second power. And so here he is trying to do, you know, threshold effort that, you know, probably 20 minutes. And he's looking at the Zwift screen and he's just getting so frustrated because every pedal revolution is jumping from. He's trying to ride at 250 watts and he's doing 265, then he's doing 240, then he's doing 250 again, he's pressing harder and doing 270, then he's trying to ease up and next thing he's doing 230. And he's just got no idea of what his average power is for that section of time. And when he's finishing, he's asking me, what did I do? And so straight away, by just using one app incorrectly and not using the lap power function of his bike computer, where he would see what his average power is from the minute he pushes lap to the minute he pushes stop, he would see what his average power is for every, every second that it's going for that segment. And, and that's, that's a learned skill in, in, you know, training. And not his fault. He just didn't, wasn't aware, you know, it's a downfall of Swift not to have that option. But, but you know, the majority of us who use that, we use the Swift functionality for other reasons and we use our computer to keep a tab on the segment that we're trying to ride the power to perfect.

Yeah, that's as accurate a summary as I can give for an example of my point. So that's really good. Your point number three, your skill number three. Yeah.

The majority of the listeners in this podcast are really into endurance sport. And, you know, it is a great sport to be involved in, whether you're a marathon runner, an endurance swimmer, or a triathlete, or a cyclist who, who just loves doing gran fondos that are 5, 6, 10 hours long, gravel riders who have got challenges that are unbelievable. So endurance is the thing that this podcast is, is all about. And the, the summary of endurance could be literally from, you know, an hour onwards, you know, because there is time is probably the biggest accurate identifier of what endurance is. It's an event where you can't do your maximum, but you have to measure your effort at a submaximal effort or less. So we're in an endurance sport, so I think we need to give more respect to the key training skill, which is the endurance session. And all the other sessions are unbelievably important in your program. But the endurance session is the number one thing that's going to help you the most. Not only improve your aerobic fitness, allow your body to cope with the load that an endurance event handles, understanding how your nutrition gets burned and the amount of fuel you need, and the list goes on. So you need to be practicing that one session and that is a skill to learn how to get the most out of that endurance session and give it the respect it desires and requires. And it is a training skill that's learned. You can't. If you're trying to do an endurance sport and the longest run you've been for is 30 minutes, that's your endurance run at this particular point in your program. If you're an experienced runner and you've been regularly doing two hour runs, then that's where you would absolutely be starting in a program that is based around you doing some endurance type of race. So respecting where your ability is and your experience is, and then applying that to your program as a starting point and working upwards from there, so making sure that it is very specific and relating to the sport you've chosen. And we always list whether it's a marathon or an ironman triathlon or 70.3 triathlon or a gran fondo that's 140k or a swim event that's 10k. So you need to understand the requirements of that sport. And then you aim your endurance session and you train your skills around that endurance session to replicate something that's going to happen on race day. And you know, aerobic fitness really is the cornerstone of our ability to actually then ride, swim or run faster on the day that it counts. So if you don't have that aerobic fitness, you can't actually do the other sessions well and you can't improve on race day. So the biggest improvements come from a combination of all of the sessions. But in my opinion, if you're more aerobically fit than you've ever been before, you can actually ride, run and swim faster than you have ever before. Because we've been doing experiments on ourselves and every athlete we coach. And the more aerobically fit they are, funnily enough, the faster they do PBS day in, day out, year in, year out.

Yeah, it's just so spot on. And the key question that you ask any new athlete or any athlete that's potentially sign up for a program and often they'll be preparing for a race that's coming up and you ask them this golden question, which is what was your longest ride or what was your longest run? You know, if they're doing a half Ironman or Ironman, if they're doing a, like you said, a Gran Fondo bike race, endurance race, it's eight hours or a marathon, you're going, okay, what was your longest session? And more often than not, Jordan of the time, the answer is way under what it should have been. You know, if it's a, a, if it's a Ironman distance they're trying to complete, the longest ride is, is 80k or 90k where it needs to be 160k or 180k, they need to have done that before the actual event. Same thing with a marathon. You don't have to have completed a marathon. But a lot of people, their maximum run was two hours whereas they're going to be running for four and a half hours on marathon day or five hours, they need to have completed a three hour run. You know, and, and even we've got some ultra runners that are doing 16 hour events and the shock at first when you tell them that they need to go out and run eight hours on a Sunday is extreme. But if that's the requirements of the event, that's what you're talking about. And it really is such an important part of a training program to get right. And my point was basically a subset of this, which is my next point, which is pretty funny, but yeah, the understanding and the ability to execute the required segments of a training session. So you're talking about the endurance. And my point was understanding that this is what the session is, this is what the goal of the session is and this is how you have to execute it. And getting that right will just make your training week so much more efficient for every single session. So you're required to go on this endurance run and you're not required to go above zone two. And we don't want your heart rate of going above zone two. We don't want your power or your pace numbers going above that zone two threshold. And that is your goal for the session. And then it kind of translates to every single other session. But here's your VO2 session. We need you in these zones and executing that segment of the session in your warmup. We don't want you going over, you know, in your Zone 2 ride or in your recovery ride. We absolutely don't want you going over this heart rate or this or this power. And your ability to do that will just ensure that you are getting the absolute most out of your week and getting the most out of each individual session.

Yeah. And look, I can give you an example of someone who told me on the weekend they, they had a zone 2 endurance ride and the Trivalo bunch happened to go past them and. And the Trivalo bunch for that particular day were riding with some intensity, a group of the Tribala guys training together, and the guy decided to jump on the back and it was way above the level that he was meant to be doing for that day. And you know, it sounds really harsh to say, oh, you did the wrong thing there. But my answer to him was there would be some days where an endurance ride, there could be segments where I want you to do some intensity and it's just not a Zone two day. That wouldn't be every week. And every week it wouldn't be just zone two. There would be, you know, variations of that session, which is what you're talking about, executing whatever the session's requirements are. And endurance as an example for that particular day is not the day for that guy to jump on the back of any bunch that he sees going faster because it looks like fun, but the days where he has endurance and there is intensity, I'll be saying, yeah, go for it. Jump on the back of any bunch that's going faster than you are currently and have that unpredictableness of intensity. So it's really understanding that there are certain days when you can have some fun and do something outside of the box that will contribute to the requirements of the session that you've been asked to do. But don't do that every single time you're out training. And some other bunches ride past when you might be on a recovery day, you might be on a zone 2 day and you might be expected to do VO2 sessions, but you find a group that you like riding with for that particular day and they're only riding zone 2, so you're actually not doing the hard set session. So they're examples of getting the day right for the particular session and that's a hard one because it feels like we're being restrictive and almost like a spoil sport coach. But it's not. There are days where you are allowed to do those hard days, but get those days right and coincide with if your mates are doing that on that particular day, then ride with them on a day that they are riding hard when you're supposed to be riding hard but don't ride with them on the day because you may mates probably don't have a really good program. Their program is ride hard every day and the days that you want to do something different, stay away from them. The days that they're doing something that's relatively similar to you, join in with them and that's enabling you to execute the segments of the session that your goal session is. And that takes a bit of skill and that's what the topic is. What are the key training skills? And that's one of the of them understanding which days to join in and which days not to.

I think it should be said that the fitter you are, and you might not like me saying this, but the fitter you are, the more experienced you are, the more flexibility you have. With this, you can sometimes afford to go a little bit out of the range of the sessions because your body can recover, you've got such good training experience in you, you can afford to have a little bit more fun. And that's not always the case because that can lead to going way outside and ruining the next few days. But generally when you're fitter, you could jump on the back of a of bunch, you know, finish off your ride with them and it won't affect you next day. And that's, that's really fun point to get to. But for the beginner it's so important to kind of be a little bit more rigid in the training and to understand this skill and to get your training right while you're building up your experience. And that's just the way it is. And we're not, like I said, we're not trying to be spoil sports but this is going to be the best way for you to improve and the fastest way for you to improve and then that can come later once you have a bit more experience.

So I absolutely agree with what you said, Jordan, and, and I'm so happy you said that because it made me realize that the measurement of whether it's right or wrong is proof in the pudding. What does that mean? Let's just check what happens the next day in the next seven and the next 14 and the next 21 and the next three months. If you continue to do that, take the alternative route, we might say, and if you find that you're not improving and you're getting fatigue, then you need to be more strict on yourself and stay within, within the zones that you're asked to. But as you said, the beginner person needs to be very strict with that. Whereas the person who's got lots of experience and it has no effect to their next performance, by all means, you know, have some fun most days. But. But, you know, there. There has to be a. Almost an L plate learning process before. Before you get to that point. You have to earn your due, and it will take you longer to get to your destination if you continue to not understand the rules of learning to drive a car. And you just skip all those and you keep failing the test and you have to go back and reset the test was because you didn't do the process properly. And that's understanding the segments of the session. And it's worse if you're a beginner and it's a lot easier to get away with if you're experienced.

Yeah. So we had six points each. We've gotten through three each so far. We're getting towards the end of the episode and I don't want to rush to the point, so I think we're going to do a part two here and we'll go through the final three points each in part two in the next episode. I think that's going to be the best way to do it. So anything final from you, dad, while we finish off this episode?

No, I think this is. It's great that with all the things that are happening around the world with sport and so many exciting things, and most of the sports are coming into the. You know, the Giro's just been on and the Diamond League starting and. And a lot of the main triathlons in the world are starting again. There's so much to talk about. It's been great just to talk about training for the age grouper and giving really good tips. And this is what our podcast has been really trying to aim at. And I really love doing these sessions because it gives free advice to people who really are looking for help in their program. And so hopefully we're getting the messages across. We're not trying to be a dictatorship here. We're just trying to give tips that will help you become a better athlete in your own. In your own world and journey.

Brilliant. That's. We're going to end up for this episode. Join us for part two on the next one, and we'll see you next week. Cheers.