strength training for a triathlete

Good afternoon, all. I'm training for an Ironman-distance triathlon in October (will be my second one). I've been participating in triathlon for about 6 years, been running for close to 20 (I am 33). I've never been a big lifter at all, as my enthusiasm ebbs and flows. With swim, bike, run training taking primary importance, I'm going to place an "in home gym" in the garage, consisting of the following:

- pull up bar

- gym rings from here (will be purchasing by month's end)

- swiss/stability ball

- perfect pushups accessory

With the gym rings, as it would relate to triathlon training, I'm at a loss for where to start. I am highly INFLEXIBLE (part genetics, part laziness). Keys for my training are:

- core focus

- shoulder/lat strength (2.4 mile swim)

- general increase in body strength

I'm thinking my routing will center around pull ups and presses (dips and push ups). 90% will be done on the rings, except some pull up reps.

If anyone can offer a place to start, it is appreciated. And if I'm missing anything, please offer some advice. Lastly, I don't know what any of the acronyms mean, so if you use them, just let me know what they stand for, I'll research what to do.

Looking forward to starting my new training regime!!! THANKS!!!

Hi mpalios,

I don't have that much experience with long distance swimming, let alone ultra-distance endurance events ...but I'll try and get the ball rolling.

Firstly, you probably want to get stronger without bulking up, as that's going to hurt you in the run, and use more fuel in the swim. That means no more than 1-5 reps and 3-5 sets with a couple of minutes rest between. I would also suggest trying to include some straight arm work, since it would be closer to the mechanics of swimming?

Initial thoughts are:

1) You need to include some strength above your head, if for no other reason than to protect your shoulders. It will also give you strength gains through the shoulders and core. This could be handstands against a wall or barbell/dumbell/kettlebell work. Even working up to HSPU (handstand push-ups).

2) I would also consider working up to muscle-ups, because you pull from all the way above your head, ending with a push down to your hips. I would also think that front-levers would be great - and if you were to do back-levers as well, you would be getting both anterior and posterior core work thrown in.

3) I'm not sure what a perfect pushups accessory is (would guess some kind of handles) but can't imagine it would be as effective as doing pushups on rings, which have multi-planar instability to contend with.

4) If you still feel you need additional core work, add some hollow holds, arched holds (supermans) and side planks. You could also do ab-wheel rollouts on the rings, which is both a great core workout, and some good shoulder stability/lat strength thrown in too.

Another thing, if you're not already doing it, would be to throw in some interval/sprint training in all three events. This will give you specific strength carry-over to the events, and in my experience improve fluidity and technique. Keep it short and sweet though, work at a level you can barely maintain for 10-30 second work intervals, with 2-3 minutes of rest. In the pool, make it a length or two - but don't go so hard you drown.

Make sure you start off easy, with a good warm-up and only a couple of sets to start with, as you don't want to be straining/tearing anything. Build up the speed/power over a number of sessions to allow you to get a feel for it, and your body to get used to the idea.

Don't know if this helps, but someone might find it interesting.

Regards,

George.

George said:

Hi mpalios,

I don't have that much experience with long distance swimming, let alone ultra-distance endurance events ...but I'll try and get the ball rolling.

Firstly, you probably want to get stronger without bulking up, as that's going to hurt you in the run, and use more fuel in the swim. That means no more than 1-5 reps and 3-5 sets with a couple of minutes rest between. I would also suggest trying to include some straight arm work, since it would be closer to the mechanics of swimming?

Initial thoughts are:

1) You need to include some strength above your head, if for no other reason than to protect your shoulders. It will also give you strength gains through the shoulders and core. This could be handstands against a wall or barbell/dumbell/kettlebell work. Even working up to HSPU (handstand push-ups).

2) I would also consider working up to muscle-ups, because you pull from all the way above your head, ending with a push down to your hips. I would also think that front-levers would be great - and if you were to do back-levers as well, you would be getting both anterior and posterior core work thrown in.

3) I'm not sure what a perfect pushups accessory is (would guess some kind of handles) but can't imagine it would be as effective as doing pushups on rings, which have multi-planar instability to contend with.

4) If you still feel you need additional core work, add some hollow holds, arched holds (supermans) and side planks. You could also do ab-wheel rollouts on the rings, which is both a great core workout, and some good shoulder stability/lat strength thrown in too.

Another thing, if you're not already doing it, would be to throw in some interval/sprint training in all three events. This will give you specific strength carry-over to the events, and in my experience improve fluidity and technique. Keep it short and sweet though, work at a level you can barely maintain for 10-30 second work intervals, with 2-3 minutes of rest. In the pool, make it a length or two - but don't go so hard you drown.

Make sure you start off easy, with a good warm-up and only a couple of sets to start with, as you don't want to be straining/tearing anything. Build up the speed/power over a number of sessions to allow you to get a feel for it, and your body to get used to the idea.

Don't know if this helps, but someone might find it interesting.

Regards,

George.

>>>

Thanks, George.

Muscle ups = two big thumbs up. That's an exercise I forgot about.

Intervals are already a part of the training routine, and have been for a LOOONG time; they're my favorite workout of the week for each respective sport. For triathlon, intervals vary...some are 1', some have to be 10' (on the bike especially).

Perfect Pushup = http://www.perfectpushup.com/. I was thinking the rings would be much better, but wasn't sure.

front levers and HSPU just sound hard...but high quality. Will get started on those soon.

Also, I was thinking since it was with body weight, I needed to jack up the reps. The more the better. Since there's no traditional weight resistance. I was thinking MUCH more than 5 reps/set. I'm not concerned about bulking up...I'm 33 and have never ever bulked up. It's not in my genetic make-up. Am I off target here?

Again, many thanks.

Hi again,

Perfect Pushup = use the rings

N.B. A short re-read of this message prompts me to clarify that it's definitely not a rant ...just me blurting out stuff before I dive out for a much-needed lunch break...

Regards jacking up the reps, that is mostly going to increase endurance, not strength. At a basic level, the following rep ranges will produce mainly:

> 1-5 reps ...strength

> 8-15 reps ...strength-endurance/hypertrophy* (more reps = less strength)

> 20+ reps ...mainly endurance

I guess ultimately it depends on whether you want to get stronger, or have better endurance!? I would say that the events themselves would be best for increasing endurance, and the supplemental training would be best for adding strength. Bodyweight exercises can always be made harder by adjusting the variations/leverage involved. Pull-ups getting easy? ...you can start work on one-arm variations!

That said, strength is strength, and exercise schemes that require you to get stronger will help you get stronger, and exercise schemes that require increased endurance will increase endurance. Getting stronger will carry over to a percieved increase in endurance (as you will be working at a lower percentage of your maximum output, which I imagine is what you're after ultimately) but I believe there is no (or very little) carry-over from endurance training to strength. There is no place for the burn in strength training.

An example of this might be that someone who can do one-arm pull-ups might be able to do 15 pull-ups simply because they are 'easy', whereas someone who can do 20 pull-ups will not get anywhere near a one-arm pullup. Does that make sense?

Bear in mind that intervals you can sustain for a minute or more won't primarily be increasing strength/power, in the same way that sets of 20 pullups won't build strength as sets of 3 one-arm pullups will. What is often termed a short session for endurance sports is only short in relation to the long sessions. Running for a minute is not sprinting ...it is just running.

Cheers,

George.

* Regards bulking up, some people have a hard time adding muscle anyway, but endurance training/events, and the usually associated high-carb/post-workout nutrition, will make it a great deal harder.

While I don't have any suggestions, welcome to the forum! I too am a triathlete... Thought not training for IM distance. I'm curious if you got a hold of this site from trifuel? I posted a message on there and recommended this site. I don't know maybe you just found it on your own.

Anyways Welcome to the forum!

Chiflado said:

While I don't have any suggestions, welcome to the forum! I too am a triathlete... Thought not training for IM distance. I'm curious if you got a hold of this site from trifuel? I posted a message on there and recommended this site. I don't know maybe you just found it on your own.

Anyways Welcome to the forum!

Chif, I found it by searching on ebay for gym rings. I found two brands that I Was going to buy, this on and the elite ring II (xtreme ring, don't recall the exact name).

Safe to say that I'll be going with these rings.

How have you incorporated ring training? Once this IM is done, I'll be focusing on easier/shorter distances.

And George, my thinking is that at mile 85 of the bike, or 21 of the run, I want to feel strong (or as strong as could be expected). My thinking is that I'll want to focus on endurance (20+ reps). I'm no where near that...at all, so it will take a long time and a lot of work on my end.

But with this stuff set up in my garage, I kind of have no excuse!!!

Cool. One way to approach that might be to play around with cycling your rest times in order to increase reps/endurance?

1) Work out your current max (maybe 6)

2) Do 5 sets of 50% max (therefore 5x3)

3) Start with 2 minutes rest between sets

4) Reduce rest by 15 seconds each session (it will be easy to start with)

5) At the end of the cycle*, have a few sessions off** and...

6) Go back to step 1 (which should be higher) and repeat.

* Once you get to a point where you can't manage the workout because the rests are too short, that is your signal to end the cycle, have a rest, and start again. You don't want to overtrain!

** The rest before re-testing is important to give a fair repesentation.

If you find that the 15 seconds jumps are too large, and you need to progress a little more slowly at first, just reduce it down by 10 seconds (or whatever you like) per session. Should you decide to go with something similar to this, I'd really like to hear how it works out for you.

Cheers,

George.

Well I actually don't have any rings (yet) but I've got a couple of pull up bars. Right now I don't have a super structured workout but I do dips (both on bar and on these parallel type things... not exactly P bars... I think they're a little wider spaced than p bars. Hand stand pushups (partials right now) front lever progression frog stand and the core stuff. Pull ups are my strongest (my current PR is 13... which isn't all that impressive...) I might do an IM someday but for now no... I'm kinda trying to get decent strength as well as good endurance... I enjoy both forms of training... both strength and endurance.

EDIT: Oh yeah and it seems to me that you'd want to train for endurance since you're doing a full IM.

Oh yeah and pushups too. If you want a program to help increase your pull up number check out Pavel's fighter pull up program... http://strongerman.com/guests/the_fighter_pullup.pdf

A few questions as I approach pulling the trigger on the rings:

1) how far apart should the rings hang? They will be in my garage, which is about 10 feet high. (I'll adjust the height when I switch from pull ups to dips to push ups.)

2) a possible routine to get a foundation...

- Push ups (on rings)

- Pull ups (on rings)

- Dips (on rings)

- Pull up (on straight bar)

- Core work (Stability Ball)

- Leg work (Body weight)

I know with weights, you should only go 2-3 x/week. Does that stay the same with ring work for someone like me?

Thanks.