Saturday, January 3, 2009

2008 Training Review

I know that intensity matters a bit more than duration in my training, but it is a lot easier to measure duration.  So here is a quick look at how 2008 compared to past years ... and how it went from month to month.

Here are my total training hours for each of the last four years, broken down by sport.  "Other" includes lifting, core strength and miscellaneous cardio (like elliptical when injured, or the occasional pick-up football/basketball game or brisk hike or cross-country ski excursion).

 

Year Swim Bike Run Other Total
2005 105.6 457.8 82.3 53.7 699.3
2006 152.2 401.0 140.7 54.4 748.3
2007 184.6 327.4 158.9 94.5 765.4
2008 211.9 362.6 173.9 51.5 799.9

A few observations:

  • Clearly I didn't look at these numbers before 12/31/08 or I would have done an extra 6 minutes of *something* and gotten over 800 hours.
  • I had a lot more "other" in 2007 than in other years, mainly because of two running injuries that gave me a lot of rehab to do.
  • I'm glad to see that Swim, Bike and Run volume all increased from '07 to '08.  The Boulder trip probably helped a lot.  More on this later.
  • The total hours haven't gone up very much as I went from Age Grouper in '05 to rookie elite in '06 to mid-level elite in '08.
  • 800 hours in 366 days averages out to a touch over 2hrs 11min each day.  By comparison, 700 hours in 365 days in 2005 meant 1hr 55min each day.
  • Weekly volume: Swim - 4:03, Bike - 6:56, Run - 3:19, Other - 0:59, Total - 15:18.  So that's a really rough ballpark figure for "what it takes" to be an almost-competitive pro triathlete.

Now let's look month-by-month:

Month Swim Bike Run Other Total
Jan 25.5 34.4 14.0 9.8 83.7
Feb 18.5 40.8 14.2 6.8 80.2
Mar 13.2 29.4 14.6 4.1 61.3
Apr 20.0 24.2 14.9 2.7 61.7
May 16.2 32.0 9.4 4.4 62.0
June 15.8 31.2 11.1 5.9 64.1
July 25.2 45.5 25.4 0.6 96.6
Aug 22.3 33.2 20.0 4.0 79.5
Sep 19.3 18.3 14.0 0.8 52.4
Oct 11.6 26.7 10.0 0.8 49.1
Nov 5.3 19.8 10.2 1.8 37.2
Dec 19.0 27.1 16.1 9.8 72.1

Observations:

  • My best run split of the year was probably my 1:18:30 at Lake Stevens in early July.  Note that it came after two of my lowest-volume running months.  Odd.  (I'd hurt my IT band in late May.)
  • Most of November was my "off-season" 3-week break.
  • July was freakin' huge b/c I got to Boulder on the 22nd.  I trained for 46.5 hours during my first ten days in Boulder.
  • My September volume was pretty low b/c I raced at Pac Grove and Portland, plus Tinley's in early October.

Okay, that seems like enough number crunching.  I'll try to make my next post a bit less geeky.

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