Piecing Together The Training Jigsaw Puzzle

Following on from a previous blog post (The Intelligent Athlete – aka Captain Sensible) I’ve been hugely impressed with the way some of you have started to go about your business – it has been noted!

I think there has been a real positive shift to better decision-making and an improved attitude to training and racing. What I found most amusing was being asked by several people if I had written that article with them in mind! In truth the answer was no it’s just written on my general observations of the people I work with as a whole.

I think the message was pretty clear in that I’m trying to get you to think more intelligently about what you do athletes. Its not just all about the training, its about making smarter decisions to get you to where you want to be, there are so many wrong turns you can take in this sport which only leads to frustration and disappointment. You should also realise that if I’m telling you to do something a certain way its because I’ve probably made that same mistake several times so I’m trying to keep you on the right path.

The reason I’m going on so much about this at the moment is because if you can start thinking more sensibly about you approach your training both physically and mentally you will be inline for a far more successful summer. Your psychological training starts here and now, it wont be perfect and you will still make mistakes…that’s fine, nobody is perfect. But you can certainly start to make less poor decisions moving forwards, if you do you will flourish and grow as athletes. To get to where you want to get to be is like putting together a big jigsaw puzzle, don’t keep putting the same incorrect pieces down in the same place. Try to think more laterally and find the right piece to take you to the next stage.

With this in mind I’m forwarding a great article written by Brett Sutton, without question the most successful coaches in the world. It’s a simple blog post but the message is a powerful one and I like the fact he’s aimed it at age groupers and pros alike. Its about what happens when an athlete gets injured and the toys get thrown out of the pram, I see this same thing on a daily basis. The beauty in the article is the way he encouraged his athlete to think “outside” of the box, which is exactly what I want all of you to do when things go wrong. The message is simple and clear, injuries, illness and all sorts of things can go wrong but you don’t panic and you shift your focus to what you can do. You cant rush things when things go wrong, if you get injured you have to suck it up and make the smart choices. The magic bullet is what Brett calls “TIME”, if you can be patient and sensible you will be back where you want to be when your body is ready and not before.

Enjoy.

Looking for Clues: Hurry Slowly

By Brett Sutton

We get the season underway with our early training. On the tweets, we see people a little sick or injured already thinking season is over. This is a huge misconception among pros and age-groupers alike. The pros too worry about their preparations have been hindered so I can’t get my “base work” in. Oh my, Oh my what a disaster! Well I’m here to tell you its not, not by a long shot.

I just had one of my champs having a melt down over a stress fracture that was not her fault. So, oh my god, my kona is gone. Not so, I had her go home and answer 2 questions and then do a little task .
Question 1: Do you ride well enough to fulfill your goal? Answer no!
Question 2: Do you swim well enough to put yourself in the position to access your bike which is not good enough anyway to get your goal? Answer no!

The little task was send me an email and put on it how many days to the major goal. That was done to put things in their true perspective.

People, we all tend to get so subjective when dealing with a problem that impacts what we want to do. Rather than looking at does it impact on what I need to do?

Yes it takes great personal self-discipline to think like that but isn’t our sport of ironman built on self-discipline? I think very much so.

Our training regimes even for age-groupers build up a bank of aerobic condition. It also builds up a back-log of muscle memory and add to this the reason why our sport is unique. We have others sports that we can train while injured in one the three disciplines. So, for certain injuries, we can lose with smart planning absolutely no earobic function. We just need to take the time to fix the problem, and then let muscle memory will have us back on track in about 2 weeks of restarting when the injury is better.

Now, if you are sick. It is a little different, but one can accomplish much at very low heart rates. I still remember vividly times when my athletes have been down for 2 weeks flat on their back and upon rising to do very little training before a big race. They have come out and done fantastic after this rest while sick.

The morale of this story is you have time. Or the morale could also be “this too shall pass ” if you give it the magic “pill”. What is that pill you say?

The magic is “TIME”. It fixs most things and a whole lot quicker than one anticipates. If left alone to do its magic work and we dont poke our needy greedy head in too early that is.

Hurry slowly to all those with the above problems. At this stage of season, I say to you the season is not over. In fact, the season has yet to begin. Accept your situation. Don’t fight it. HURRY SLOWLY, and you will be back and in no real time at all!

Cheers,

The Doc

Trainer of champions

Piecing Together The Training Jigsaw Puzzle

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