Dear Athletes,
Do you often find yourself checking out what the WTS athletes are doing for training on social media and wonder if you should be doing the same?
The short answer to this question is ‘you probably should not..…’
This week we will look at why simply copying others’ training sessions – even if they are the best in the world - is not such a good thing.
The performance factors required in triathlon can be described as strength, speed, endurance, flexibility, balance and coordination. In addition to this, you need to have developed the ability to master the tactical, technical and psychological demands that triathlon racing and training requires. The object to becoming a world class athlete is to master each performance factor to ensure you are maximising your capabilities. This sounds pretty simple, but once you get into things, mastering these factors requires a progression of development that cannot be rushed, and must carefully consider your actual age along with your training age. Let’s look at this in more detail.
If you look at the performance factor of strength. This can be broken down into general strength, specific strength, muscular strength, speed strength and maximum strength. On reading this list, it should be clear to you that a younger athlete will simply not have the capacity to master all areas of strength because they are young, not because they are not a great athlete.
Endurance is another performance factor that can be broken down into aerobic and anaerobic endurance. To further complicate things, there is the anaerobic threshold that a world class triathlete needs to be capable of pushing themselves to and recovering quickly from. The development of this level of fitness again cannot be rushed.
Speed is an interesting performance factor. Speed encompasses the ability of an athlete to react and perform quickly and efficiently. Speed requires technique and skill mastery. Speed is something that a young athlete can work on, because skill and technique are the foundation of the fundamental movement skills required in the 3 disciplines of triathlon. Or to put this in another way, until you have the technique and skill to perform an action you cannot work on speed, strength or endurance because you cannot hold the skill. It is for this reason, speed, technique and skill development should be your focus as a young athlete because this will set you up for the development of your endurance and strength as you mature as an athlete.
Let’s look at some examples –
-
You may see a WTS Triathlete swimming with large paddles, calling it their ‘favourite strength swim set’. If you were to adopt this training tool of large paddles, you would most likely not have the strength to hold form, and the result would be to pull wide, exit the stroke too short and/or slow your cadence too much. In effect you would be doing more damage to your stroke than good.
-
You may see WTS athletes riding 100km+ rides. If you were to do this you will most likely lose form, lose speed and be training in the area of endurance when speed should be your focus. Too much volume in the training program of a young athlete is one of the most damaging training errors you can do. Avoid it at all costs.
-
You see a WTS athlete running a 10,000m track event and decide you should too. If you do not have a running background, and have not raced in the track consistently in the last 3 years you should not attempt a 10,000m event. Instead you should run 800m, 1500m and 3000m track events along with various cross country races. Learn to run fast, learn the skills of racing hard. You don’t need to run 10km to prove you can run 10km. Your endurance will develop naturally given the nature of triathlon training and your maturity as an athlete. Refer to email 14 & 15 for more details on this.
I hope the above makes sense. While it is very interesting and educational to watch what the best triathletes in the world do, it is also very dangerous for your own progression as an athlete to simply copy a session that are claimed to be ‘the best’.
Your coach should be setting out your development in a clear plan which is designed around your development needs.
Speed, skill and technique are the priority for young athletes, and strong foundations in these areas will hold you in good stead for your development going forward.
Train well.
Emma
