Triathlon: Base Building for a Better Season

While winter is an ideal time to enjoy a little R'n'R, it is also wise to use the colder months to build a solid base for your upcoming season. Follow our nine easy steps to be fit as a fiddle for next year while enjoying your off season to boot!

By Jason Koop

For most of you, the racing season is winding down and the realities of cold winter months are creeping into your head, but those months are the most important training period you have. The aerobic foundation you lay during this time sets the tone for how high you will peak-and by how much you will PR-during the summer. There are nine simple steps that will help you build the aerobic base to run faster, stronger and injury-free so you have your most successful season next summer.

Step 1: Take two weeks off
That's right, the first step in building a big aerobic base is to do absolutely nothing. Take the time to focus on other things in your life. Whatever you do, stay out of your running shoes (unless you are using them to mow the lawn).
You need a mental and a physical break at this point in the season. When the two weeks are up, you'll be ready to go with a fresh new attitude. The time off can also be a time of reflection. The better you can evaluate your strengths and weaknesses, look at the upcoming season, and put things in perspective, the more focused and directed you will feel with your training.

Step 2: Get a coach
If you don't have a coach already, get one now. All too often, people wait until the last few weeks before an event to hire a coach, as if the coach has some magical workout to improve their fitness in this amount of time. The reality is that at this point, your fitness should be almost completed. That close to your event, you can only make fine-tuning adjustments to your race weaponry. So get a coach early, tell him or her your story and your goals for the season. It will take the pressure off of you, as well as give you some accountability for the upcoming months.

Step 3: Determine your lactate threshold
Most of your winter base-building work should be aerobic running, well below your lactate threshold. One of the best ways to determine your lactate threshold is to do a field test. Running a winter 10k will give you a good approximation of your lactate threshold. (Most people actually run a 10k slightly above, or faster than their lactate threshold.) Your mileage during this base-building phase should be at least 90 seconds per mile slower than your 10k pace (if you use a HR, keep your average HR at least 10 beats below the average HR for the 10k). Repeat the same test you choose to do every eight weeks to account for the improvements in fitness that you gain. After repeating the test, adjust your pace and HR accordingly.

Step 4: Increase the mileage slowly
Now it is time for the nitty-gritty. How much should you run? The answer depends on many factors: How much have you run in the past? How much can you run with your work and life schedule? Do you want to focus more on your cycling and swimming?

All of these questions determine how much you should run during the base-building phase. Whatever mileage you begin with, be sure to build slowly. Increase your long run by no more than one to two miles every other week. Build up for at least eight weeks toallow your body to get used to the mileage before adding in any intensity. When you begin the Tempo runs, start at 20 to 40 seconds slower than your last 10K field test. You can approximate this pace, but it's best to do a test.

Take a recovery week every fourth week. Reduce your mileage and take out one intensity run during this week. The most effective way to make aerobic gains is to allow your body to recover. Without this recovery process, your body will never repair itself from the work you are doing and it will never have the chance to physiologically adapt to the stress you are imposing.

Step 5: Incorporate drills and strides
Since mileage will generally be lower during the early parts of your base-building phase, incorporate some drill work after your runs. Pick three or four simple drills to master, such as power skips, fast high knees, skipping A's, and bounds. Be sure to emphasize technique, not volume.
Incorporate strides into the drill sessions. Strides during your base-building phase serve a few purposes. They maintain your speed so that when you are ready to jump on the track and start running fast-repeats, the turnover is there. Strides are also a good way to improve form. Try to "run pretty," landing on the balls of your feet with good arm motion. Keep your head up and look down the road, or track, in front of you. Stay relaxed and get into a good rhythm. Four to eight strides of 15 to 20 seconds each after a run should do the trick. Start slowly to work out the kinks. By the last few strides of each session, you should be near your maximum speed. By doing drills and strides, not only are you improving your biomechanics so you run more efficiently, you're also training yourself to maintain your leg turnover, so when you head to the track come summertime, you're (literally) one step ahead of the game.

Step 6: Get in the weight room
Some good, well-balanced weight work will help out your triathlon game as well as help keep you injury-free. But remember, you're an endurance athlete, not a power-lifter. Never let your weight room work interfere with your work in the pool, on the bike or on the run. In order to get more bang for your buck in the gym, emphasize multi-jointed exercises as opposed to single-jointed exercises (bench press as opposed to bicep curls). Make sure you start easy, focusing on technique and not how much weight you are lifting. Just like drills and strides, focus on the quality of the lifts, not the quantity. You should be in the weight room three times per week, with at least a day in between sessions. The first and last sessions of the week should be difficult sessions, while the one in the middle should have fewer exercises and a little less intensity (see sample plan below). Just like your running, your weight lifting should include rest weeks. Line up your running rest weeks with your lifting rest weeks and back off the number of reps by 1/3 to 1/2 during these weeks to let your body recover.
Include some abdominal work to improve your core strength on a Swiss Ball (or balance ball) to ensure that you are isolating the muscles in your abdominal region properly. Use slow and controlled motions while on the Swiss Ball. Just like any other type of lifting, technique is just as important as the amount of weight you are lifting.

Below is a sample weight routine with abdominal work:

Week 1-6		Sets/Reps	Focus	Week 4 (recovery)
Session 1&3	Session 2
Bench press	Press behind neck	3x5	Technique	3x3
Lat pull-downs	Incline bench press	3x5	Technique	3x3
Squats	Walking lunges	3x5	Technique	3x3>/TD>
Lower-back hyperextensions		3x5	Technique	3x3
Lunges		3x5	Technique	3x3
Week 7-12				Week 8&12 (recovery)
Session 1&3	Session 2
Dumbell bench press	Press behind neck	3x10	Difficult to get out last rep	3x5
Bent-over row	Incline bench press	3x10	Difficult to get out last rep	3x5
Squats	Step-ups	3x10	Difficult to get out last rep	3x5
Lower-back hyperextensions		3x10	Difficult to get out last rep	3x5
Walking lunges		3x10	Difficult to get out last rep	3x5
Abdominals
Exercise	Apparatus	Week 1-6	Week4 (recovery)	Week 6-12	Week 8&12 (recovery)
Oblique curls	Swiss Ball	3x5	3x3	3x10	3x5
Abdominal crunch	Swill Ball	3x5	3x3	3x10	3x5
Basket hangs	Basket hang machine or pull-up bar	3x5	3x3	3x10	3x5
Forward ball roll	Swiss Ball	3x5	3x3	3x10	3x5
Prone knee roll	Swiss Ball	3x5	3x3	3x10	3x5

Step 7: Cross-training
Get out there and do something adventurous. Take a long hike instead of a long run. Go snowshoeing or rock climbing. Do anything except what you were "supposed" to do that day. Even professional athletes do this sort of thing during their down time. Keep it active and try to keep it aerobic, but most importantly, keep it fun.

Step 8: Take a day off
Don't train, and especially don't run every day. Take at least one day off per week. Relax and enjoy the extra time to nap or catch a movie. You'll be thanking yourself come summertime!

Step 9: Use the knowledge
It's OK to admit that you don't know everything about training. Get ideas from other people and coaches. Keep in mind that you are an individual; your training should reflect that fact. Don't get sucked into doing what everyone else is doing. Take some time and map out a plan for yourself. Get the advice of a professional coach and tell him or her your story. Whatever you do, take the time to think it through. Getting the most out of yourself is all about training smarter, not harder.

Jason Koop is a senior-level multisport coach with Carmichael Training Systems and also serves a CTS' head running coach. He is an Expert Level USA Cycling coach as well as a USA Track and Field Level 1 certified coach. Jason still races today in all types of events in the running, cycling, multisport and adventure-racing world.

Sidebar
The first ingredient in the mix of building a solid run base this winter is consistency. Simply put, you need to put some miles on your running shoes on a regular basis. It is more effective to do this by increasing your frequency rather than your volume. Doing four runs of 30 minutes is better than two runs of one hour. Unless you are coming from a complete non-exercising background, you must make a commitment that you will run at least three days a week in order to run faster, and four to six days a week if you are a long-time competitor. However, remember to build into your run program to remain injury-free; it does not do you any good to have a good long/hard workout and then be laid out for a week trying to recover from it. Most Olympic-distance athletes will build their long run gradually up to 75-90 minutes through the winter.

One of the ways I have helped turn Greg Bennett into one of the fastest-running triathletes on the planet is by increasing his running frequency. We make sure that Greg runs six to seven days of the week, even if it is only for 20-30 minutes on some days. Many days he will start with a 30-minute run when he wakes up before he does his main workouts for the day; a couple of times a week, he runs twice a day. Although I don't suggest this for everyone, increasing frequency is the first step on the path to building a solid run base.