Triathlon Training

Triathlon: to swim, bike and run.

I've resisted it for so long, about 20 years, but no longer. I have been closet training for triathlons for about two years now. Two years! It has taken this long to actually learn how to swim and to get into some reasonable shape. You see, triathlons have their own degree of difficulty. You have to be accomplished in all three disciplines. And for me, a non-swimmer, it has taken me a long time to commit to becoming a triathlete.

Blame it on Team Stampede.

This is the team of cyclists and triathletes that I've hung around for the past several years. I've trained and raced bikes with these guys, done some tough workouts and even helped with our local races. I've raced multisports like Peaks to Prairie and The Glacier Challenge, winning P2P in 2006. But I haven't raced a triathlon since I was right out of high school...back in the late 80's, Gulp!

My intro to Triathlons began during my senior year in high school. I ran track and our local paper guy would come out to cover our meets. He was a triathlete , would hang out with us and began talking to me about triathlons. I had begun riding bikes and was, of course, running. He showed me some basics on swimming. That was enough to get me through several sprints, but I realized that this was a skill that would limit my abilities, so I dropped tri's and just kept pedaling.

Fast forward a dozen years or so and I traded swimming for kayaking. And I have been happy with not swimming...until the infectious enthusiasm of our team started me thinking of triathlons. Hell, I was routinely running and riding 1/2 Ironman to Ironman distances, so if I could only learn to swim...

So here we go. I'm training for my first triathlon on March 7th, the Desert International Triathlon. I decided on an Olympic Distance Tri to break away from the shorter swim Sprint distance, and to take advantage of my endurance base.

So my training is still a little unorthodoxed for triathlons. I have basically been training for a Century (100 mile) ride and the Palm Springs 1/2 Marathon, both of which I completed two weekends ago. I swim two days per week and have built my base to 2400 yds per workout. So I'm feeling good about this first race, and am now looking forward to racing up to an Ironman. So my goal is to race a 1/2 Ironman in 2010....and a full Ironman in 2011???

Wish me luck in two weekends and stay tuned for my race report and Susan's pictures. It should be a great race!

E