Simon Ward on How to Train for an Iron Distance Swim

After the popularity of the recent podcast, “How to train for an Iron distance triathlon”, I had several requests to record a follow up, providing more detail on how to train for the various components - swim, bike, run.  There is always lots of debate about what are the right and wrong ways to do this.  To be quite frank, I’m not sure if there is truly a right way for any of it.  Take a random poll of 140.6 finishers and you’ll find an equivalent number of approaches shaped by a whole host of circumstances.  The one true answer is:  Find what works for you.  That said, there are a number of abiding principles for each discipline and over the course of 25 years it’s become apparent that there are some approaches which work best for the majority of athletes, and that’s what I hope to be able to describe today including:

• the importance of a good ‘foundation’ and what it includes
• understanding the requirements of a 3.8k swim in your race and what that means for your training
• training paces, how they relate to your 400m TT swim and your race pace
• why training to swim more efficiently might be a better goal than faster
• how to get the most from your open water swim sessions
• specific guidance on high intensity sessions
• why you must prepare for a non-wetsuit swim at certain events
• the importance of a good warm up on race day
• how to make sure the swim sets you up for a good day

In the podcast I referred to the earlier show 'How to train for an Iron-distance race’ . You can listen to that here.

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For more information please go to www.SimonWardTriathlonCoach.com, or www.TheTriathlonCoach.com, or email Beth@TheTriathlonCoach.com.