If you’ve been following along or happen to know a little about me, you’ll know that I started training for triathlons back in August 2003. My life was somewhat in a slump - my marriage of just two years had fallen apart and I was living a rather unhealthy style of not eating well and not exercising at all. All of this is pretty atypical of how I was when I was younger. I was always a pretty active kid and played a multitude of sports growing up. I swam on the varsity teams both in high school and college. Perhaps I was a little burned out from it all?

The idea of getting back into competitive sports was very appealing to me. I needed an outlet and something to do to get my mind off of things. I longed to get back into shape and to lose some of the excess weight I had gained from my inactive and unhealthy lifestyle. My best friend was a triathlete and there was a network of folks that existed through him who were also interested in the sport. I decided to give it a try.

Just for kicks, I signed up to do a local sprint triathlon about a month after I started training. I did some of my training on an el’ cheapo bike that I bought from Target, I bought a pair of running shoes and pulled out my old swimming gear from my college years. I was in piss poor shape unable to run more than a mile straight and with probably less cycling fitness than that. But I wanted something to look back on that I could make fun of myself later for. This race with official splits and times seemed like a good point to draw a baseline for where I began.

I didn’t do too badly for my first race, I guess. Considering that I only had about a month of training under my belt and that I had been sedentary for about seven years before that (there were spurts of a few weeks of running here and there, but nothing serious), I finished my sprint swimming half a mile in about 14 minutes, averaging 18.4 MPH on the 14 mile course for the bike, and running just under 10 minute miles for the 5k run. Certainly nothing to brag about, but I now had a starting point.

I knew my serious training would happen during the winter. I was determined to do a longer race in the Spring. I didn’t care what it was. I just wanted a goal to look forward to and to train for. My friend picked out the Gulf Coast Triathlon 1/2 IM in May and I had a finish line to reach.

I read through various triathlon books to help me create a schedule of workouts from then until race day. I did about 10 hours a week of preparation training and started my Base 1 period around the beginning of February. I chose the 600 annual hours route and planned for three solid base periods before tapering for GCT. I followed my weekly hours that I wrote in my scheduled to a T. There were plenty of days where I didn’t want to do everything on my schedule, but forced myself to do it anyway. I was a slave to my scheduled hours.

My diet was another hurdle that needed to be addressed. I was used to eating whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. I tried this during my first base period figuring that I’d easily burn more calories than I was taking in since my workout volume was going way up. To my surprise, I actually gained weight despite my hard training and all it took was a mirror and my finger calipers to know that it wasn’t all muscle. If I was going to be serious about training, I had to get serious about my nutrition. I started closely monitoring my food intake and my calorie expenditure and always ensured that I maintained a calorie deficit. By then, my goal was to lose about 15 pounds in just under two months.

As race day grew near, I grew more nervous. I knew that I had put in the training hours, but I had never done a race or workout that would be as long as the effort I’d have to put out on race day. It hadn’t been that long since my separation from my couch and in the back of my mind I thought I was in over my head. Race day inevitably arrived and it proved to be a big success. My goal, having never done a 1/2 before, was simply to finish. I thought if I had a good day, I could finish in under six hours (30 minute swim, ~19 MPH on the bike, and maybe just over 10 minute miles for the run) as that seemed to be my paces during training. As I made my way through the course, I was amazed at what my body was doing. I swam an effortless 31 minutes for the swim, I negative split my bike leg averaging just under 21 MPH, and I was on pace to run under a two hour half marathon until I tired at the end (2:04 was my run split time). I finished in 5:26:42 and am still a little shocked while I write this about how well it went.

Of course, everyone was asking how did I make the progress that I made in such a short amount of time? There seems to be an air of doubt if I’m telling the truth or if this is one big tall tale. If you really stop and think about it though, nine months is a pretty darn long time! There were hundreds of hours spent training during those nine months - masters swimming in the mornings three times a week at 5:30 am, riding countless hours on the bike trainer which is one of your only options here in Minnesota during those winter months, running in subzero degree temperatures through loose snow which I can only guess is similar to running on sand. Sure, it was only nine months, but to those folks that still can’t believe it can happen for them in that amount of time, I challenge you to working out two hours a day for nine months straight while maintaining a strict diet (lots of fruits and veggies and under 2500 calories a day) and to reevaluate your fitness at the end. You will surprise yourself.

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So enough for a lengthy introduction. People probably want specifics. My suggestions come from a newbie to the sport so take them for what they’re worth. I’m certainly no coach, although I’m pretty well read on the sport and training for it, at least. Here are some tips off the top of my head (that I reserve the right to change since I’m probably missing some things - I’ll have to go back and check my books for reference):

1. Establish your goals. Where do you want to go this season? Goals should be difficult, but obtainable. No point in attempting the impossible, but shoot for something that you can for see yourself doing if all things go well.
2. Educate yourself. Read books and ask questions on forums. If you don’t own a copy of The Triathlete’s Training Bible (TTB), stop reading and go buy a copy NOW. It goes into quite a bit of detail, but if you read the book carefully, it’ll tell you exactly how to setup your annual training plan step by step.
3. Develop a realistic training plan suited for you and stick to it. Pay attention to your annual and weekly hours and your training zones.
4. Stick to your training zones and “light” RPE during base training. I get the feeling that people that just start out having too much motivation and think “more is better” and “faster is better”. All you’re going to do with that attitude is burn yourself out quickly. The goal is consistency. You should leave every workout feeling like you could have done more. If you’re out there killing yourself everyday, your motivation is going to drop quickly and you’ll fall off the bandwagon. Consistency is key.
5. Believe in the plan. It may feel like slow going at first. I certainly wondered what good it did when I was out there running just three miles at a time and having to take walk breaks during those run. But your body adapts and gets stronger. It will get there. A little consistency and patience will take you where ever you want to go.