Stay Strong!

HIITing IT OUT OF THE PARK

Strength training can help triathletes perform their best throughout the year… And I’m hopeful you do strength training as part of your complete training plan for this year's triathlon season!  That said, as you enter the competitive period of the year, doing full-volume strength training, as you have been during the “off season,” can be daunting.  That’s partly due to the logistics of getting all your workouts into a busy life, but also because there is only so much energy to be had… And if you are doing challenging strength workouts, hitting your tri workouts well can be tough.  On the other hand, if you drop strength training entirely during the “in” season, you will detrain the adaptations you spent the entire off-season building, thereby losing the benefits of that work.  The trick is to view strength training, once you get into your main tri season, as a shift into maintenance mode.  Luckily, you can maintain fitness on MUCH less work than it takes to build it.  As you get into the last 4-8 weeks prior to racing, consider either:

·       Dropping to one strength session a week, which uses challenging loads, but is low on volume.  For example, one workout: 3-4 exercises and 2 sets (a warm-up set and a heavy set) of the exercise being performed.

·       Shift to doing 1 or 2 strength exercises after a couple of your endurance workouts per week.  For example, after a run, do 2 upper-body exercises; after a bike ride, do a lower-body exercise and a core exercise.

The goal with either of these approaches is NOT to build strength “in” season, but to maintain as much of what you built as possible through the year, and to make resuming normal strength training 2-3 days per week next fall/winter/spring EASIER, because you are not effectively starting from zero each year.



Give it a shot this year.  You will be stronger, which helps performance, and next fall, you will find your strength workouts feeling better than ever, too!

Will Kirousis, MS, CSCS, CISSN
Tri-Hard | Director
USA Cycling Certified Coach

USA Triathlon Certified Coach
Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist

Certified Sports Nutritionist

508.633.2708 | will@tri-hard.com | www.tri-hard.com | @willkirousis

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