Richard Allen Tips- May- Training For Total Beginners
First of all not everyone is a seasoned triathlete. What if you have never done a triathlon before or never even done any endurance exercise? Maybe you are getting to the end of you football or rugby playing days and are looking for a new challenge. Or maybe you are just wanting to stay healthy. You don’t have to enter a triathlon and you don’t have to train like a pro! But where do you start?
Triathlon training is a great way just to stay fit and healthy. First of all don’t start with a lot of training. You are far better just doing very small amounts often rather than a few big sessions. Doing small amounts also fits better around a heavy work shedule. If you throw yourself in to big sessions you will loose your motivation fast, get very tired and probably injured. Try to be consistent over a long period and build up the amount very slowly every few weeks.
So what is a good starting point? I would suggest just starting with 1 swim, 1 bike and 1 run each week. A good starting point would be a 400m swim, a 30min bike ride and a 15 min jog. Very small amounts but you will build on this. Don’t do the swim all in one go either- Break it down taking a 10sec rest every 2 lengths. Keep all of this training very easy- You should not be too out of breath.
Having done this small amount for a few weeks increase the swim by 200m, the bike by 10mins and the run by 5mins. Do this for a few weeks until you find the time no problem and then build again. Remember to keep all sessions easy.
A bench mark is 1000m in the swim, 1hr on the bike and 30mins on the run. Once you are comfortable over these length of sessions and if you can fit some more sessions in then it is time to add in another swim, bike and run. You can continue to build on the 3 easy sessions but speed endurance can be introduced to the new sessions and I will discuss these another time..
You will need some basic equipment to get started such as swim suit, goggles and a good pair of run shoes. Browse the website for these products. The biking can initially be done on a gym bike but think about buying an entry level road bike if you are enjoying the training.
