Join us for part one of a two-part episode series focused on short-course triathlon racing! Coaches John Mayfield and Jeff Raines discuss planning and preparation for your next sprint or Olympic tri. Whether you are looking to race your first or your fastest short-course event, John and Jeff offer insight into scheduling your race and making the most of your training. Learn what type of training is key to maximizing your potential at these distances and some key things to practice in the weeks before race day!
TriDot Podcast .130
Short-Course Triathlon: Planning & Preparation
Intro: This is the TriDot podcast. TriDot uses your training data and genetic profile, combined with predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to optimize your training, giving you better results in less time with fewer injuries. Our podcast is here to educate, inspire, and entertain. We’ll talk all things triathlon with expert coaches and special guests. Join the conversation and let’s improve together.
Andrew Harley: Hey, hey, hey. Welcome to the show. I am psyched for this one today. Actually, this week and next week we are hitting you with a one-two punch, talking about short-course triathlon. This week we're talking about training and preparing for short-course events, largely sprints and Olympic distance events. Then next week, we'll circle back to cover short-course race day. Joining us for this conversation is coach Jeff Raines. Jeff Raines is a USAT Level II and Ironman U certified coach who has a Master's of Science in exercise physiology and was a D1 collegiate runner. He has over 45 Ironman event finishes to his credit, and has coached hundreds of athletes to the Ironman finish line. Jeff are you ready to go a short and fast today?
Jeff Raines: I feel the need, Andrew, the need for speed.
Andrew: Next up is coach John Mayfield. is a USAT Level II and Ironman U certified coach who leads TriDot’s athlete services, ambassador, and coaching programs. He has coached hundreds of athletes ranging from first-timers to Kona qualifiers and professional triathletes. John has been using TriDot since 2010 and coaching with TriDot since 2012. John, how are you doing today friend?
John Mayfield: Doing even better after you didn't even acknowledge that horrible pun from Raines, so going from good to better.
Andrew: I'm numb, John. I'm just numb to them. I'm Andrew the Average Triathlete, Voice of the People and Captain of the Middle of the Pack. As always we will approach the show like any good workout. We'll roll through our warm up question, settle in for our main set conversation, and then wind things down with our cooldown. Lots of good stuff, let's get to it!
Warm up theme: Time to warm up! Let’s get moving.
Andrew: The more triathletes and tri accounts that you follow on social media, the more great triathlete memes and picks you see throughout the week. And I saw a doozy of a picture the other day that I wanted to highlight on the show here. There is a great photo a triathlete took showing his pet bird. It looked like some sort of parrot caught in the act pecking away at the carbon rims of his race-day wheelset. By the time the athlete had discovered what was happening, a good chunk of the carbon had just totally been pecked away, ending the life of an expensive front wheel. It got me wondering, have you had a time where a pet, a kid, or even a friend's training partner or a family member damaged a key piece of tri equipment? Jeff Raines, has this ever happened to you?
Jeff: Man, I've kind of seen it all, heard it all. I've had athletes where, you know, bikes on top of their car, they tri to drive into the garage, forget they're up there, wrecked their bikes.
Andrew: I literally, Jeff, have not gotten a roof rack because I know 100% I would be that guy that would do that. And so I'm just not I'm not even putting one of those on my car to put myself in a position to do that.
Jeff: I know, right? And you know, I've seen it where I had a buddy, a Madone, a really nice carbon Trek Madone bike laying in the back of his truck, you know, on the highway wind caught it, you know, bump whatever it was, out it went, you know, shattered everywhere. But for me, nothing super-detrimental, but my kids are always playing with my pedals and stuff and maybe knock my bike down. And I'm like, "No!" And actually, this happened a few weeks ago, my one year old, she got a hold of my wife's Theragun and then accidentally turned it on. And it scared her, the vibration, and she dropped it and it smashed into multiple pieces. You know, funny little things. I've been at the gym and found a TV remote in my swim bag, you know, stuff like that.
Andrew: Did you really?
Jeff: You know, and you just kind of, "Aw, kids!" But no, luckily, knock on wood, nothing super-detrimental for me.
Andrew: Okay, so just Sarah's Theragun got shattered, you got to buy her a new one of those. But other than that glad to hear, particularly with the amount of kids you have in your household, that you've been incident free, I suppose, when it comes to your tri equipment. John Mayfield, what is this answer for you?
John: Pretty similar. You know, a lot of kids, a lot of pets, but fortunately nothing too bad. You know, it's almost like in retrospect, like in the moment especially when my kids were smaller. They're high school age now. So, you know, I was the less patient father a decade ago when they were more mischievous and more energetic. So yeah, the bikes got knocked over. That's probably the main thing. Either the kids would knock over the bike, the dogs would knock over the bike, something like that. But, you know, in the moment it's a freak-out. But, you know, a decade later, it's kind of "no harm, no foul." It's kind of like scars, they just tell a story and remind you of the past. So fortunately, yeah, I would have a very different reaction had my wheelset been destroyed, especially by a pet. That would be a bad day.
Andrew: Yeah. No, it sure would. And John, I'd be remiss to not bring up here, you have three dogs in your house. Two of them largely ignore all of your triathlon equipment. Maggie, your, I guess, middle-aged dog sleeps on your treadmill. And that's about it for Maggie. But your youngest dog, your newest dog, the newest addition to the Mayfield family has a very interesting and weird relationship with your triathlon equipment. Why don't you tell everybody about that?
John: So not so much the triathlon equipment, but more so the recovery equipment. Penny is our little rescue. She is a Chiweenie, half Chihuahua, half dachshund, and she's not really afraid of anything except for my massage. I call it the rolling pin. It's the one for like rolling out quads and that sort of thing, and for whatever reason, she thinks it's the devil, and we think it's a lot of fun to mess with her. So, yeah, that's like just nothing else. But if she gets near it, she growls, she barks, she attacks, and she thinks she's fighting for her life, and we just think it's hilarious. So we're those pet owners, but it's a lot of fun.
Andrew: Naturally.
John: Maybe I'll have to post a video.
Andrew: For me, kind of similar thing, no major pet incidents. I don't have any kids in the household to do any damage. My cat, Pancake, my cat's name is Pancake. We thought that would be funny when we were naming a cat and it stuck. Pancake has a lot of fur. He's very fluffy. So his fur gets on things, you know, I'll have to kind of dust some of his fur off the treadmill or out of the out of the spokes of my bike as it's sitting on the trainer, or he likes rubbing his head against my running shoes, and so my running shoes will end up with a little Pancake fur in the laces that I just got to pick out from time to time. But that's a really it with the pet. I've ruined tri equipment all on my own. I apparently don't need help in this arena. I think the most devastating thing I've done to a pair of tri equipment, shortly before flying to Greece for 70.3 Greece, I backed over my cycling shoes with my vehicle. And one of them was fairly okay, one of them, the sole was kind of starting to separate from the carbon base of the shoe, and so I was a little concerned in Greece about would that rip further as I'm pedaling on the bike course. Almost bought a new pair beforehand but decided to risk it. Thankfully had no problems, but after that trip those cycling shoes were officially retired. But yeah, so nobody in my life has ruined my own tri equipment besides me. So oddly, no crazy stories from any of the three of us. All the things that we own, and the pets we have, and the kids we have, collectively between the three of us. But I'm excited, guys, to throw this out to our listeners, because I know there will be some folks out there who have some stories about somebody in their family, a pet in the family, maybe ruining a piece of tri equipment.
So you guys know the drill. Make sure you are a part of the I AM TriDot Facebook group. We will throw this question out to you the Monday, the day this show comes out. Go find the post on the I AM TriDot Facebook group asking you, has there been a time where a pet, a friend, a family member ruined a piece of your triathlon equipment?
Main set theme: On to the main set. Going in 3…2…1…
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So guys, first thing's first. For all three of us, before we were Ironman finishers, we were towing the line for our first sprint tri. Take us all back in time, and tell us what your first short-course triathlon was. Where was it, what was it, and how did it go? Jeff Raines, what was it for you?
Jeff: Well, being a runner in college, you know, I had always made this pact with my sister that someday we will do in Ironman. And so in graduate school, I got into triathlon or after grad school. Anyways, 2009 decided to do my first sprint tri to work my way up to that Ironman distance. Gosh. 13 years ago. Wow. Almost to this to this exact month. But the St. Patty's Day tri in Keller, Texas. Sprint tri, indoor pool swim, run outside, it was freezing cold, you know, do the bike and run outside. So I actually went back to that race last fall. It's still going on. It's an awesome kind of an iconic DFW Texas-area race. And so I actually went back and did that race 12 years after I had done it, because it was his first-ever tri, and I decided to be there for him and with him, and went back went back down memory lane and raced it again. It was a lot of fun. But yeah, kind of like everyone else, you know, I got a road bike, a Specialized Allez. I loved that aluminum road bike. I wish I still had that. But, you know, I had the stirrups, I didn't have clip-ins, so I put my run shoes on and, you know, kind of rode on normal pedals for that race. And the Profile Design aluminum aero bars, you know, those little triangle setup that goes on there. But a great race, great memory. Never forget it, and, you know, hopefully I'll get to keep doing it as long as they have it.
Andrew: Yep. So, Jeff, yours and mine were very similar experiences. Same exact race, St. Patty's Day sprint in Keller, Texas. For me, it was the year 2014, so just five years after you. That's not right. For me was the year 2015. I just looked at the metal. For me it was the year 2015, so six years after you. And Jeff, literally same thing as you, I had a Specialized Allez road bike that I bought. It was just the entry-level road bike. I just had the flat pedals, no stirrups, no clip-ins. And that was my first one, and just like you I've gone back and redone that course a couple of different times, and it's always fun. It's always a blast. Who knows? I might even do it again this year, just to just revisit that. It's not it's not far from me. So very cool that we had very similar starting experiences.
John, yours was elsewhere in Texas. Tell us about your first short-course triathlon.
John: So before we get into that, I think we would be remiss if we did not acknowledge what just happened. So every once in a while we get asked about bloopers on the podcast, and I'm going to veto this being edited out, Jeff as my witness. But what just happened was Andrew started his story of his first triathlon and declared that he started his race, what was it, 2012 that he said?
Andrew: I said 2014 initially.
John: So then all of a sudden Andrew just disappears, and Jeff and I are looking at each other like, "what happened?" He returns a minute later with a corrected year, and tried to pawn it off like he was started the whole thing over from scratch, like nothing ever happened. So yeah, that was fun. Andrew just disappeared and came back and all of a sudden he started his triathlon career at a later date. That was fun.
Andrew: Yeah, my pain cave is one room over. So I just have to go look at that medal and see. I knew the year was printed on that medal, and yeah I was wrong initially and we got to correct it. And now, John, because you vetoed it, everybody heard me get it wrong in the first place and then come back and correct it. So I will, for time sake, trim out the 45 seconds of silence of you and Jeff being confused as I disappeared off screen. But anyway, John, back to you. What was your first sprint triathlon?
John: So I, too, have a medal from my first triathlon, and so kind of cool side story, I was actually on a Zoom call with Mark Allen., and behind me I have a few of my more meaningful medals there. My Ironman finishes, a couple of the big 70.3s. One of the races that I won, took first place, and a little bitty medal with a crappy ribbon that says "First Triathlon", so I have all these. And so it's kind of cool, I was I was on this Zoom call with Mark Allen and he's like, "Hey, it looks like you got some medals back there behind you." And I was like, this is Mark Allen commenting on my medals, which was just kind of crazy. I didn't even know how to respond, I was like, "Yeah, I've done some Ironman races." Anyway, so my first was a sprint in Sugarland, Texas, suburb of Houston, it was called Tri Andes Tri. A guy named Andy Stewart put on this triathlon for a number of years, kind of one of the OG triathlon directors. This this race was, I did it in probably I think 2009, 2010 was my first?
Andrew: Go check the medal, find out for sure.
John: I don't I don't think it's dated. But it had been going for like 15, 20 years at that point, so like way back in the day as far as triathlons go. Unfortunately Andy passed away a couple of months ago, but the legacy lives on. He transferred the race over to someone else, so it's still going. And for me it went well, I did not have a Specialized. I actually had a Cannondale road bike that I did my first one. It was a Cad. I forget which number Cad, but black Cannondale road bike, with the clip-on aero bars, and I did actually have shoes, cleats, and it was pretty good. You know, like I look back and obviously there are a lot of things I would do differently. And I did, I went back, I don't know how many years, three or four years after that. And it was totally different from year one to year or two. By year two, you know, I had a triathlon bike and everything pretty much, which shaved significant time and all that. But, man, I just remember it being the coolest experience. So you all had the St. Patrick's Day race, mine was kind of the opposite end of the season. My was in October, so it was more of like a Halloween theme. And the problem with that was it was at the end of the season, and so I went and I just discovered this thing you know, I'd done the training for it, I went and raced, I had my first experience at a race. Doing a race I was like, "Oh man, this is the greatest thing ever." And then it was just like, "Okay, well, I can do this again in like six months when triathlon season starts back in the spring." So that was it. I did the one in October, and then I had to wait until the following April or May to start racing again. But man, the bug bit me. It was a great experience, had a ton of fun. And all these years later, here I am.
Andrew: I want to be very clear about something as we dive into you guys coaching our athletes on short-course racing. I want to be very clear that it is not at all the case that sprints are for newer triathletes, and as you gain experience you go longer and longer. Short-course races are for everyone, and they're tough for everyone. At any given sprint or Olympic there are newbies, there are slow amateurs, there are mid-pack amateurs, there are elite amateurs, and there are often pros depending on the event. So talk to us about the strength and the depth of the field we will find that any given short-course event.
Jeff: You know it's funny, because as you get later in your career and you start doing half and fulls, you're kind of like, "All right, you know those sprints aren't a big deal anymore." But actually, I think we're afraid. They hurt in a whole different way. I mean, I would almost rather do a 70.3 rather than a sprint or an Olympic. It's just that that's super high-end raw speed and holding that uncomfortable for so long. So you are absolutely right that sprints are not for beginners. It's a great way to learn and build up to the Ironman if that's what you want to do, but holy cow those sprints hurt really bad. Now those shorter races, you got to be more on point. There's a smaller delta between you and first place, so seconds matter and there's less margin for error. So I talk about it a lot with my athletes, but being intentional is key. You can be the fittest person out there, the fastest person out there, but if you don't practice your transitions or flying mounts, then you might get beat in that sprint tri. It's just a whole other level of pain. So I think it's good. I recommend, especially in the developmental phase for my athletes, to go back to the basics, do that sprint tri, hurt a little bit along the way to their A race, Ironman or something like that.
John: So the sprint triathlons serve as a fantastic introduction to the sport. I mean, we all got our start there. Not everyone does. One thing that's always kind of fun at the Ironman mandatory briefings is they'll have everyone raise their hand, "Is your first Ironman," and there's lots of hands in the air. And then they'll say the next question, "Who is this their first triathlon?" And inevitably they'll be one or two hands still in the air. So not that traditional a route. Most folks are like us and start with the sprint races. I always encourage everyone to really explore the full gamut of those distances. It's not necessarily the sprint is for beginners and then we work our way up from there, even though that is a natural progression that a lot of triathletes take. I mean, there are several triathletes that stick exclusively to the short-course races for numerous and valid reasons. There's not any requirement in an athlete's career that they have to go any longer than a sprint race.
Andrew: Yeah, absolutely.
John: You know, we look at a whole lot of professional careers and, there's a whole group of professional athletes out there that never race anything longer than Olympic-distance races. That's what they do. That's what they're good at. That's what they make their living doing. That's where they set world records and win Olympic gold medals and that sort of thing. And what we see is some of those guys do go on to race long course, but, again, a lot of those, especially in the U.S., we don't get quite the ITU coverage of some of the other countries. It tends to be bigger elsewhere. But there's a whole very competitive field, professional and elite athletes, that race exclusively short-course racing. So that certainly can be a bit of a misnomer. You can make the argument, as Jeff stated, that short-course racing can be harder than the long-course racing. It's a different feel, it's a different kind of gear that you use, and those higher gears, they just hurt more. I think oftentimes why people tend to go longer is kind of referring back to the podcast that we did in that stamina versus endurance. We talked about the fact that that really even in a sprint race specifically, there's no endurance to it. There's really not even stamina to it. It's purely power. I mean, you're talking three events in the course of about an hour to 90 minutes in there. That's just going hard, and that's really uncomfortable to go that hard for that long. So I think some people find some comfort in going to those longer distances, "Oh, I don't have to go as hard. I can't go as hard. I have to go maybe Zone 3 instead of Zone 4 or Zone 5. I enjoy Zone 3 more, so let me stick with that distance." Or then Ironman, that's more like sometimes like a Zone 2 even, so I can go easy for long periods of time. So I think there's even that, and that can get into more so that endurance side that we talked about in that podcast, where you're not at that intensity that's really pushing you, really driving you, really making you hurt. It's a little bit more of a comfortable pace. So I think there's some people just enjoy that more. They don't thrive on that hurt, that pain. And I kind of put those in air quotes, we'll talk about that in a little bit. But yeah, I feel like you're either racing a sprint just because you're happy to be out there, you want to enjoy the experience, you want to just have a great time. Or if you're truly racing, it's going to be uncomfortable. That's definitely an acquired skill. But it's a very legitimate race. You know, no one gets across that finish line, collapses, and has a heart rate at their max heart rate and says, you know, "That was a great beginner race." It's all about how you do it, how you approach it, what your goals are. But it's definitely a valid, legit race distance.
Andrew: Guys, knowing there are so many different types of athletes in the field at a short-course event, what are the reasons that athletes of all abilities go out and do a sprint? As a coach even, why would you tell an athlete to work short-course races into their schedule?
Jeff: Great question. There's a number of reasons. It could be, your fitness as it pertains to that portion of the season, the training phase that you're in, or it could be just to hone in on skills. So what that means is, and what I'm referring to, is our "fast before far, strong before long." So we as TriDot athletes focus on that developmental work first, pre-season, early season, and then as we approach those bigger races later on in the season, then we add that safe stamina volume around those established thresholds. A lot of athletes are in that developmental phase now. It's winter, let's just say, maybe it's cold or races haven't started yet. Maybe you're A race is six, nine months away. So why would I kill myself for three extra watts on the bike? You know, it's really cold outside or even indoor training. Who wants to get up early at 5 a.m. when the race is nine months away and bust out this crazy hard effort on the bike, right?
Andrew: Not me, Jeff. Not me.
Jeff: I know, I know, Andrew. He's more like a noon wake up, and maybe by three or four, get his bike ride in. But anyways, sprint, Olympics, they're great to supplement into your developmental phase. You can really push that threshold. Maybe you're just working on that grit factor, right? Maybe you want to see a new max heart rate inside of that 5k assessment or just something like that. They're great, like John said, at focusing on getting more comfortable at being uncomfortable at that different type of pain. I actually encourage my athletes to mix in sprints and Olympics into their pre-season like that developmental. But even our Remote Racing, you know, virtual racing or Predictive Fitness's more fair, more accurate remote racing. They're great to do in these pre-season, colder months, maybe when you're tempted to skip an assessment or skip a hard day, just having that sprint four months out from that A race, maybe six, nine months from now. They're just great stepping stones. I encourage my athletes to have kind of B, C, D races, but also, steppingstone goals. Yeah, maybe you want to break 12:00 in that Ironman in nine months from now. But is that what you think about every morning when you wake up? Or is that enough motivation nine months out for you to get that workout in? So if you've got Predictive Fitness's sprint tri coming up in two weeks, maybe that's going to force you to get that workout in that you might just skip. Or hey if no one's looking, I can tone down my Zone 4 or skip that last set on the bike, right? But if you've got these steppingstone goals along the way, maybe it'll just improve your threshold that much more in that developmental phase. So I really as a coach, and even myself, I mix these in. They're great to supplement into your training, especially on a week or a month or a training phase where you may not just be super as motivated.
Andrew: Yeah. But I also like, Jeff, even the years I have been focused more on 70.3 and 140.6, I like going back to that first sprint tri that I did, because it's really a fun barometer of how far you've progressed in the sport. When you do your first one and you get that time under your belt, to go back two years later, three years later, five years later, seven years later and just see, with the knowledge you have now, with the way you've got your nutrition dialed in now, with the way you've improved in your fitness since that first time, it's really fun to see the progression from year to year, and what time I'm able to hit, and all my splits, going back to that race. That's always been a reason for me. I really am an advocate for trying new races and seeing new places, but I still, every couple of years I go back to that first course. It's right down the road and I like to just kind of kind of get a barometer of "Hey, where am I now compared to where I was two years ago, five years ago, 2015, the first time I did it?" It's just really fun to clock that every couple of years.
Jeff: I find that a lot of athletes have to have a race out there on the horizon. They've got to have something that they've signed up for, it's there, they know it's coming up, or maybe they just won't train. But if that race is too far out, and you're that type of person, throw in a remote race, throw in a local sprint tri in six, seven weeks. That's just a safe go-to. It's only going to increase your threshold. It's a great fitness-builder day, hone in on transition and all those other things. They're great to mix in if you're doing it correctly and in a right way.
Andrew: So let's talk about the vibe that is at a short-course event. Because there's a completely different vibe from a locally produced race and a major brand like Ironman, Challenge, Family Clash, Endurance, etc. Most short-course races are produced by local, small- to mid-sized production companies. What is the difference in the vibe between local events and major events, and does this impact an athlete's experience with short-course racing at all?
John: I think so. It kind of goes back to what I was saying earlier is that they're both swim, bike and run events, but they're very different. And I think for me, as we've talked about before, one of my favorite things about triathlon is the community. It's the people. It's getting to experience this with like-minded people. And I would say it's even a little bit of a different experience when you're when you're going more the long-course versus the short-course race, for the reasons that you mentioned. Oftentimes there's a certain amount of travel involved for those long-course races, you have to go to a destination to race an Ironman race. I mean, they're not everywhere. Whereas most major metropolitan areas, you can find several options for short-course races there. You don't necessarily have to travel to another state or another country to get in a sprint or Olympic-distance race. So what I found is, is even the community is different. One thing I love about Ironman is showing up several days earlier, and it's super easy to spot your fellow athletes. They either got a wristband on, they've got compression socks, they've got their Ironman gear. Super easy to spot. So you have that camaraderie.
Andrew: And if they don't want to have that, and if they don't have any tri gear on, a triathlete will always let you know that they're a triathlete.
John: You will never have to wonder. I mean, even in the airport and on the airplane –
Andrew: I'm in town for the Ironman!
John: Exactly, yeah. The 14 Ironman backpacks, and stickers on the luggage. Yeah, you don't generally have to wonder. So yeah, I mean you can very easily spark up a conversation with a complete stranger, kill a couple hours on an airplane or, you know, wherever you may be. So there's that really cool sense of camaraderie, even at those venues for the 70.3 and Ironman races. Whereas I feel like, at least in my experience it's been different in the short-course races, is again those are usually in my local community. I live outside of Houston, so the vast majority of my short-course racing has been in the Greater Houston area. I'm very well connected with lots and lots of athletes in the Greater Houston area. Now, Houston is huge. You know, Ironman Texas is in Houston, but it takes me more than an hour to drive, without traffic, to the Ironman Texas venue, which is only kind of polar opposite side of town from where I am. So Houston is very big, so I don't get to see all these people on a regular basis. It's not like we have the opportunity to get together and train every weekend because we all live in Houston. So really, these races are those unique opportunities for us to get together. We'll connect on social media and that sort of thing, but I would say the vibe of that community is almost like a reunion kind of thing. Whereas, especially that first race of the year, I probably haven't even seen those people since the fall of the year before when we were at our last race. So I would say that it's a little bit more familiar as people, or kind of like friends of friends. There's just less degrees of separation between you and those other people that you're there with. A lot of times you're racing you have rivalries, which was always something great that I always really enjoyed when I was racing short-course, racing more consistently. There were those same folks that were showing up to every race. And for better or for worse, they were there and you knew what you had to do. Kind of admit just from the beginning is like, "Oh crap, I just got bumped one spot off the podium because so-and-so is here." But, there were some great rivalries that came out of that. And I think too, because the short-course races are shorter, everyone finishes in a closer proximity. You know, like at Ironman there's, gosh, half a day between the winner of the race and that last finisher, whereas at a sprint race it may be an hour between the first finisher and the last finisher. So the after-parties are very well attended, just because everyone finishes in the same proximity to time, and you're not dead because you've been racing for a quarter a day, half a day, a full day. You've been out there for an hour or 2 hours, 3 hours, depending on the race. So you're still up for partying and hanging out and having a good time. So always a great vibe around those local races.
Andrew: I kind of compare the local race scene to the big-brand races in this way. It's almost like going and racing Ironman or Clash Endurance is like going to an NFL football game, and doing your local sprint or Olympic is like going to a high school football game up the road. They're both football games. They both have the same players in the field playing the same sport. But the atmosphere at one is way different than the atmosphere of the other, and both are equally valid, equally fun football spectating experiences, but the money you've paid to be there is different at either, the production value at each is different, but they're both fun for just very different reasons. That's kind of a parallel I've used before in talking about that.
So let's move to talking about training for these events, for a long course event. You know TriDot takes you through a development phase to build your power, and then slides you into the race prep phase to build up the stamina you will need to go long on a longer race. So without the need to build that same stamina, what should we expect to see in our training for a sprint or Olympic?
Jeff: That's a good question, and we see that a lot. You largely will not need a lot of stamina for a sprint or an Olympic, but you will still need that aerobic base. So you will still have aerobic sessions to do. Those don't need to be neglected by any means. But what you'll probably see is maybe slightly more quality sessions. But actually, I should probably say the threshold inside of your workouts might be a little bit longer. So whether you're training for an Ironman coming up or a sprint tri coming up, you'll probably have, depending on who you are in your optimization, somewhere around an hour for that weekly, let's just call it a normal Tuesday quality bike ride. So if we're all doing a 60-minute ride, if you are a sprint or Olympic triathlete and you're really focusing on that developmental work, you might have 35 or 40 minutes of Zone 4 inside of that workout, whereas a long-course athlete might have 25 minutes in there. The focus is a little bit different. So if you're in that stamina phase, that build volume, that race prep phase, the idea is to maintain that threshold that you had have built during the developmental. Whereas if you're still in developmental or you're that Sprint Olympic focus, the idea there is to continue to significantly build upon that threshold, so that is why you'll see different amounts of rest intervals or different amounts of total quality work inside of those sessions. But your Zone 4 range, let's just use the bike, for example. Zone 4 is your threshold range, and your bike threshold, FTP, your bike functional threshold power, that means one-hour power. Bike FTP could or should be what you could hold all-out for one-hour power if you pace perfectly. What is your what human body capable of holding all-out for one-hour power. But sprint tris, especially, are largely well under 60 minutes for the bike portion. Even an Olympic, most of them are around 24.8 miles, and most athletes are kind of falling in that 55 minute to 1:20 range. So you're really pushing a high percentage of your FTP if not even over 100%. So if you're FTP is one hour, but your sprint tri bike is going to take you 30 minutes, you're pushing well over 100% of your FTP. So the focus is just a little bit different there, but you're not going to see a ton of extra junk miles being long-course, but that quality over quantity is really what is monitored, and that training stress design in goal is different for everybody.
Andrew: All of that, Jeff, was very insightful. I do want to point out, though, that halfway through I got lost in what you were saying. Because at one point you went to say "long-course athlete" and it sounded like you started to say a "long-course ASS-lete" and then corrected yourself, and I couldn't get that out of my head. I just went down this rabbit hole tangent of thinking in my head, like we talk about how on race day when you're out there on course, be a good citizen of the sport, be friendly to your competitors. Be a good triathlete out there on course representing the sport. And we could say, when you're racing, when you're representing triathlon, when you're representing TriDot, "Don't be an ASS-lete, be an ATHLETE." And really put that emphasis. Anyway, I rabbit-trailed. John, please bring us back to what we're talking about here.
John: Oh, I'm completely derailed as well.
Jeff: Work your editing magic there, Andrew!
John: So yeah, I mean, there certainly is going to be an emphasis on those higher intensities. And in fact, Jeff talked a lot about Zone 4, but you're even going to have a propensity to see more Zone 5, Zone 6, even those super-threshold intensities for a couple of reasons. But that doesn't mean we neglect the Zone 2 as well. There certainly will be plenty of Zone 2 that is still going to be included in there. Things like aerobic efficiency and recovery that are done at Zone 2 are still important when training those, so that that'll still be in there. It'll be more so by default largely, even with the reduced training hours for sprint and Olympic distance, you still have a relatively small capacity for that Zone 4, Zone 5, Zone 6 intensity. So the rest of that time by default can be made up with Zone 2 training. So you're going to get a great mix of it. And too you have higher capacity for training, because you're not doing three, four, five, six-hour rides on the weekends. You're not doing those long runs. So when you have sessions that are limited to 60 to 90 minutes, you have higher capacity to do more intensity in there. Whereas when you get into the long-course racing where you have to do those longer sessions, just because we have a finite capacity training stress, for training, for the amount of training that we can make adaptations from, it has to be done at a lower intensity. So there's that opportunity to really do it. And again, it goes back into that power/stamina, "fast before far" and all that. It's really a great opportunity to focus on that and really mature as an athlete to focus on getting fast, getting strong, and then either using that out there on the short-course racecourse, or adding stamina to it and being a fantastic long-course athlete. Or ass-lete. But hopefully an athlete.
Andrew: But especially while you're out there racing short-course, don't be an ass-lete, be an athlete. Working towards Ironman, I always held back a little bit on the workouts that had intensity. I would hit my zones, I would shoot for my zones. But on the Zone 4, the Zone 5 stuff, I would try to stay on the weaker end of the range, just knowing I would have long stamina sessions just around the corner. When we know that the next A race is a short event, how should we approach our intervals in our day-to-day training? Should we try to be more aggressive with each interval in session, or what should our approach be as we're doing each individual session?
Jeff: That's a great question, Andrew, and I think it's even kind of the million-dollar question. I've had athletes say, "Hey, we're in the middle of developmental phase. I'm here for six months before my stamina starts. So I really want to focus on getting fast, getting strong," and they want to maybe push up upward of Zone 4. Or, "Hey, can I do more Zone 5 and Zone 6? Because that's how I get my Zone 4 threshold higher, right?" And that's largely "no" is the answer. We've talked about it before, but that has to do with training stress. The answer to improving your threshold is not just doing a bunch of Zone 5 and Zone 6. There are zones there for you for a reason. We all know that Zone 2 is looking for an aerobic stressor, a training response. Zone 4 is our anaerobic threshold. Zone 5 is not there to push harder than your anaerobic zone, because it takes you out of that zone to increase it over time. The goal of Zone 5 is largely a muscular stressor, maybe a physical stressor using bigger muscle groups. Maybe it's lower-cadence work on the bike. You'll see hill repeats, big gear workout where we get off and do the squats. Then that Zone 6 is designed for a neural hormonal stressor. It's getting your body, in that training stress, used to certain hormones being dumped. So the answer to improving your Zone 4 is not just doing a bunch of Zone 6. Think of it this way: if we're testing in TriDot every four weeks, people are like, "Well, I want more Zone 5, Zone 6." Why? Well, if you think about it, if we test every four weeks and whether you go up two watts or 25 watts, your zones shift harder for the next four weeks, if you bump the dot and improve that bite dot score. Think of it this way: for the next four weeks, all of your new Zone 4 is actually what your old Zone 5 was for the whole month prior. So if you think of it that way, you're getting so much more, upper anaerobic workouts than you are. So that's another reason to test more regularly. But it's okay if you're halfway through a session and you're like, "Okay, I've got this 30-watt Zone 4 range." And if you're automating your workouts and you're dumping the middle of Zone 4, if you're feeling good, yeah, it's okay to bump up the watts and do some workouts in upper Zone 4. But I wouldn't go rogue and go off the training design and go outside of your zones. Because more is not always better as it pertains to quality and especially volume and duration.
John: I think especially when focusing on sprint races or even short-course events, if I know I've got a week or so before I'm going to do a 5k and I'm going to really be pushing the pace on that, or a 20 minute power test, I begin to visualize and really try to develop tenacity in those hard sessions. Especially within even a macro cycle, where as we approach the end of that macro cycle, the efforts get longer. Sometimes the recovery gets shorter in between. They get harder, they get closer to a race-day scenario. So something I do that really helps me even get through those sessions, get through those hard parts is really begin to visualize race day. I specifically do this, it's kind of goofy. I do a whole lot of running on a track, and what I'll do is every time I come around the bend of the track and I approach that straightaway, I visualize my competitor at the end of that straightaway. So basically what I'm doing for the next 100 yards or so is thinking about running that that guy down. Then I'll go around the curve, and there I am again. Now he's at that opposite end of the track. So that's kind of my visualization. I'm thinking about being there and pushing my body. Then you're not necessarily thinking about, "Oh, this hurts." I'm thinking about, "I got to catch this guy." Then specifically, when I know the course, I try to even put myself there. This is mile one. This is what mile one is like. Mile one is flat, so this is going to be my opportunity to go fast. Mile two gets a little hillier, so I'm going to be experiencing some of that. And just even thinking about things like temperature and all that that, you know, it's going to be hot on race day, so I'm going to be experiencing this in the heat. So that is one of the things that helps me push through those harder sessions, and really developing the tenacity that it takes. Something I've said for a long time is that whoever hurts the most and hurts the longest is going to win. Oftentimes it's not so much a question of who's the fittest, who's the fastest. Especially in the short-course racing, you can make up for a whole lot of lack of fitness if you are able and willing to hurt more and hurt longer than that person who's maybe a little bit fitter than you, maybe a lot fitter that you, depending on what their race execution is like. Because if they've got all this fitness, but they're not willing to put it out there, conceivably you can overcome that by just being able to go out there and push your body, be comfortable being uncomfortable, and having that grit factor to go and push. This is something that we talk about with assessments. We get that question a lot. "Why do I have to do a 5k at the end of every macro cycle? Why do I have to do these 20-minute power tests? They hurt, they're uncomfortable. I don't enjoy it. They suck." But they serve a whole bunch of purposes, including keeping you sharp. Yeah, they suck. But it's the same sensation you're going to experience on race day.
Andrew: It's absolutely true.
John: So getting comfortable being uncomfortable, knowing what it feels like. And when I say hurt, "hurt" is a word that we use. Again, that's kind of an air-quote thing. It's not true pain. We're not saying "no pain, no gain" or that kind of thing. It's just that hurt being that uncomfortable place that is going to go away as soon as you stop. It's not the kind of pain that persists after you stop, but it's just having that grit and that ability to push and that's really key, especially in short-course racing.
Andrew: I'm confident, John, just hearing you talk about visualization there. We just had Episode 128 of the podcast come out where Coach Bobby McGee gave us all sorts of different mental skills to help us dig deeper in our training, dig deeper in our racing, to execute better when we're out there, and visualization was a big part of that conversation. And I'm confident, John, that if Coach McGee heard you talking about how you do that visualization right there, he would be very proud. Ten out of ten impressed and pleased with that.
John: In his very eloquent South African accent. I would be proud of that too.
Andrew: So short-course races are high-intensity efforts for a short amount of time. So it hurts in the moment for sure. But our bodies can bounce back from short-course efforts much quicker than a long-course endeavor. So just in terms of scheduling these races into our season, what is the best practice for timing sprints and Olympics around each other, and around longer course events?
John: So it's going to come down to what is the priority of the race? As we've talked about, oftentimes short-course races can be your objective for the year. Maybe it's a race like Age Group Nationals, maybe it's something like Escape from Alcatraz or one of those, and that is your A race for the year, and you want to make sure that everything else leading into that race is supporting that and not detracting from it. So that's a consideration. We've also talked about using short-course races leading up into longer events, or maybe having a higher-priority short-course race and working in lower-priority short-course races in preparation for that. So all of that needs to be taken into consideration. This is largely agreed-upon and is something I've experienced myself, is we as athletes can maintain peak fitness somewhere in the neighborhood of two to three weeks. So this used to work well for me, when I was doing a lot of short-course racing. For me, every July, I did three races in a span of four weeks, and I knew that those first two races that were one week apart, I could race those at a very high level. And then I had a week off, and then there was another race on week four that, even having that week off, I knew my performance was not going to quite be there, having raced the two previous races. That needs to be factored in, and then that can be taken advantage of. That's something, if you have that opportunity like I used to. For me, that was two races in the Houston area and one in Waco, so I had to put some races together to make that work. But I always love doing that. I did that for several years in a row, did those same three races, and they always fell on the same weeks. So that is that generally agreed-upon principle, is that you can maintain that peak fitness for a neighborhood of two to three weeks, and then you're going to need to take some recovery time. You're going to need to build back up, taper again, and then you'll be good to go for another two to three weeks. It's kind of working within those confines. Then my rule of thumb, especially for working in a short-course race when you're training for a long-course race, is putting that race in where you're naturally at that duration of training. That's also a good rule of thumb for like a 70.3 in the leadup to an Ironman race, is don't put that 70.3 three or four weeks out from Ironman, where you're doing considerably higher training volume than the 70.3. Put it back at the beginning of that phase, maybe four weeks into a 16-week. You're going to be doing a volume similar to that 70.3 distance. Or if you're training for a 70.3, that that first four to six weeks, that is where your training volume is going to be in the neighborhood of that Olympic-distance race or even that sprint race. So it's not going to take away from the training. You're not going to lose the valuable training days close to race. You can actually benefit from that race and actually use it as valuable training whereas, especially if you're racing an Ironman race, that sprint race you do six weeks out, that's not going to do you any good on race day. It's just going to take away the training opportunities that you would have on those days. It just is all about planning it out, being strategic and intentional with when and how you schedule your races.
Andrew: If a short-course event is a C race, I know our training will be unaffected the week of race. We just keep training hard all the way up until the event. But say we have a sprint or Olympic marked as an A race, and we really want to be primed and ready to kill that race. What will the taper and the race week itself workouts look like for a short-course A race?
Jeff: Good question. It is largely different, but at the same time it's largely the same. But I just want to throw this out there that if you train seven days a week, you should work out seven days a week of a sprint tri race week, or even a full-distance, Iron-distance race. You will still train, or should train, seven days per week. So the taper is kind of largely misconceptionalized, if that's the word. Then also inside of that, there is still quality work to do during the taper week or the taper period. For half and full distance, the duration and quality of those workouts are toned down about 20 to 30-ish percent on each workout day of the taper period. So you still have some quality work in there. They just won't be quite as hard or quite as long, but the percentages may be a little less for a sprint and Olympic. What really changes is how many days out that that taper structure is implemented. So if an A race half or full distance, the taper may start ten to 14 days out. But for a sprint or an Olympic, it might be four or five days out, or the second half of the race week. For a full Iron taper, you may not see a lot of Zone 5 or Zone 6. There's still a little bit of quality work during the taper, but you may not see a lot of that high-end training stress goal or response inside the workouts. For a sprint or an Olympic, you may still see a little bit of that, maybe very little, but there might still be some there. And a lot of that has to do with maintaining range of motion, muscle elasticity. In that sprint or Olympic tri, you're pushing your body harder, maybe a slightly lower cadence, bigger stride length, stuff like that, because you can get away with that more anaerobic type of racing.
John: So I described that July that I used to race three times in four weeks, and generally what I would do in that kind of special macro cycle where I had three races in four weeks is I would follow my normal training really through Tuesday or Wednesday. So following our traditional typical TriDot where we're having a quality bike session on Tuesday, a quality run session on Wednesday, and then Thursday is usually a little lighter or more of a recovery day, Friday is a swim day. So because I wasn't coming in with a very high accumulated fatigue from large hours of training, I was able to still do those quality sessions, those higher intensity sessions earlier in the week. I could still keep my body primed and keep doing enough, incurring enough training stress, that I could continue to make adaptations that continue to keep my body in a state of recovery. Where if I if I did that harder session Tuesday, maybe Wednesday, by Saturday I was I was still able to recover from those and show up to the race course fresh. And that was really key in being able to maintain that peak fitness for a little bit longer. You can't just taper and then be in that top form for those several weeks. You have to be intentional about it and keep it topped off. That was kind of my rule of thumb, and again, I was racing sprint races, which I was able to recover from relatively quickly. So I could race a sprint on Saturday or Sunday, and still be able to be recovered by Tuesday to get in at least some intensity, and then maybe some intensity for a run on Wednesday, and then recover Thursday and Friday and race again that weekend.
Andrew: Next week on the podcast, we are talking all about short-course race day. So everyone hold on your butts, and count down the days until you can fire up that episode next Monday. For our final main set question of this short-course conversation, what advice do you have for choosing a good race? Some folks live in a location with plenty of options like myself, others maybe not so much. Now there are remote racing short-course events out there as an enticing option. As we scan the possibilities, what are some ways to pick a good race?
John: So obviously proximity is a big one, especially on short-course events. But I would say one thing just to consider is make sure you're comfortable with the swim. Sprint races probably have the widest availability of different swim venues, so some of those are true open water swims out in the ocean. That can be very intimidating, very difficult for new athletes or less experienced swimmers. Then all the way on the opposite end, I've seen them not only in swimming pools, but even things like lazy rivers and resorts where you've got a current that's pushing you at a 0:90/100 pace for even start your stroke. Make sure you're comfortable with that. Think about things like, "Am I comfortable in this body of water?" Whether it be a river, a lake, an ocean, a pool, make sure you're comfortable there, and then make sure you're comfortable with the water temperature. Is it going to be a wetsuit swim? Is it going to be a cold-water swim? Is it is it going to be nice and warm and not an issue? So I think that especially for those lesser experienced athletes, make sure that that is comfortable for you. My first was in basically a retention pond in a neighborhood, so it was kind of like a lake. It was pretty open water. It was murky, but it was cool, not cold enough for wetsuits. Yeah, I remember that feeling. I didn't panic at the beginning, but I definitely went out too hard, and probably 50 yards in I'm out of breath and I'm hyperventilating and had to bob up and had to kind of give myself under control. So yeah, I would say make sure that you're comfortable with that. And then, you know, I think a lot of sprints and short-course races are known for their swag. It's kind of funny to think that way, but I know that is definitely a consideration that people will consider, is cool swag. And then the venue: is it something unique, is it something fun? Is it something you want to experience? And the race director management is huge as well. Do they put on first a safe race, and is it well run? Do things start on time? Is the course well marked, are there good volunteers and that sort of thing? That make a huge difference on your race day experience
Cool down theme: Great set everyone! Let’s cool down.
Andrew: One of the best ways to find a good short-course race is word of mouth from other athletes, and all three of us have completed in sprints and Olympics all around the United States and Texas since we live there. So guys, from your short-course race experience, what are maybe two, three, or four events that really stood out to you as just being extra fun that you would recommend our listeners check out?
John: So I mentioned a couple of times my old July race schedule, and one of the races that was part of that was Tri Waco. Great race, sprint and Olympic opportunity. One that, as I mentioned, is known for swag is the River Cities Triathlon in Louisiana. They've late thrown up some crazy stuff, and it's a reasonable price. It's your typical $100 give or take entry fee, and they've given away like jackets and luggage, and the swag is worth the entry price alone. Super cool race there. Then one that I did back in 2020, it was actually a whole festival, is called Tri Fest for MS. It raised money for MS, and a super-cool, unique format where there was a super-sprint on Saturday morning, there was a sprint on Saturday afternoon, and then an Olympic distance on Sunday morning. But the Olympic distance was basically two times through the sprint. So you would swim, bike run and then swim bike run again that combined for a Olympic distance total. So super cool races there, lots of fun.
Andrew: The ones I'm going to give a shout out to, I've done quite a bit of racing in the state of Florida. My family's there, and so it's easy to travel to Florida and see family and knock out a race at the same time. Tri Key West is a really cool event down in Key West, Florida. I've done several times the races over in the Fort DeSoto Tri series. They shut down Fort DeSoto Beach just for triathlons. It's a very safe, contained race. Clash Daytona has a sprint option. I did the sprint last year, so if you want the Clash, NASCAR track race experience but you don't want to go long, there is the sprint option. And actually, if you do the sprint there instead of the middle distance, you get to ride more laps of the track anyway. I have to say Alcatraz. I mean, we can't talk short-course racing and talk about the best ones they do without mentioning Alcatraz. All three of us did it this past year. Then I got to give a shout-out to our local tri down the road, the Monster Tri, or the St. Patty's Tri in Keller, Texas for both Coach Jeff Raines and myself. It was our first one. I love going back there and checking it out. So if you want to if you want to go race where it all started for Andrew Harley and Jeff Raines, go check out the St. Patty's Day Tri or the Monster Tri in Keller, Texas. Jeff Raines.
Jeff: I have to mention Alcatraz. I have to throw it out there. I know you already talked about it. It is such an iconic unique, bucket list for sure. The CapTex Tri in the capital of Texas, Austin, Texas, that was my hometown for nine years, and I was out there every single year. There's another one called the Enchanted Rock Race, and it's a triathlon, they've got duathlon options. But it is really, really cool. It's at Enchanted Rock State Park in the hill country of Texas. Just beautiful, and Shannon Rock is a famous landmark, you can Google it. But the finish line is at the top of Enchanted Rock. And you're doing this race, you bike on all the roads, you go in T2, hang up your bike, put on your run shoes, and you go run. But then the last mile, with one mile to go, there is no course marked anymore. And all you got to do is get to the top of Enchanted Rock. And way up at the top you see the finish line flag. So you can take any route you want that last mile, you just get to the top.
Andrew: Wow.
Jeff: So it's just really cool, and you finish up at the top, and you're exhausted. You're kind of like climbing on all fours for some of it. And then you get to the top and you're like, "Great! This is amazing race. Now, I got to go all the way back down." So it's just really cool.
Andrew: That's it for today, folks! I want to thank coaches John Mayfield and Jeff Raines for talking us through training for our short-course races. Shout out to TRITATS for partnering with us on today's episode. Remember to visit TRITATS.com and use promo code TRIDOT for 10% off your race number tattoos. Enjoying the podcast? Have any triathlon questions or topics you want to hear us talk about, head to TriDot.com/podcast and let us know what you're thinking. We'll do it all again soon. Until then, happy training.
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