Being stuck in a plateau with your triathlon training can be very frustrating. Here are 4 common mistakes triathletes often make in there training that cause them to stop seeing positive gains.
1. No Strength Training
Sure, most of the pro triathletes you see may *look* like lean, skinny guys and girls who have never touched a weight in their life, but the reality is that strength training goes far beyond football style deadlifts, squats and benchpress, Do you do fire hydrants? How about elastic band walks? Rotator cuff rotations? Planks? All this requires no weights, but is still considered resistance training, and is incredibly beneficial for your triathlon training program. Don't get fooled into thinking that strength training is bad for you - most of those studies were done with heavy dumbbells and barbells, not the more precise body weight and elastic type resistances you should be using.
2. Ignoring Data
Do you know the power from your last bike session? OK, so maybe you haven't invested in a power meter, but what about your speed and distance? Heart rate? Do you know your average 100m pace in the pool for your priority race distance? Do you know your per mile pace in your long run, or do you ever take a GPS out with you? You're living in an age where data is fairly inexpensive, easy to get, easy to interpret, and highly beneficial. Take advantage of this and at least give yourself some baseline pace and heart rate measurements so you can track your triathlon training progress.
3. Obsessing Over Data
Of course, you may also be the person who needs to cut every workout short by forty-five minutes because you know that's how long it's going to take to download all the data onto your computer and sit there analyzing it. There is no rule that you need to know the precise measurements for every, single workout. As a matter of fact, "unplugging" yourself and just going for a long run in nothing but your shorts and t-shirt can be incredibly gratifying. Especially when there's no beeps, whistles, or alarms sounding. Choose the most important triathlon training workouts of the week, and simply focus on getting the data out of those sessions.
4. Not Racing Enough
This especially holds true for longer distances. Literally hundreds of rookie Ironman or Half Ironman athletes stand on the starting line of their big, prioritized race having done absolutely no racing leading up to that point. This is often due to fear of injury, not wanting to lose a "training week", or simply not knowing how to schedule a race in. But racing is one of the most valuable triathlon training tools you have! It teaches you mental toughness, proper transitions, race day fueling, and perhaps most importantly, how to get all those butterflies in your stomach to fly in order. Try to race at least two or three times before your "big" race.
The best way to avoid these mistakes is to never make them in the first place. That is why the Rock Star Triathlete Academy was started. It assists triathletes in reaching their triathlon training goals.
