Carrying Your Training Load

by Sue Aquila

If you have followed along all these years, you have watched my journey from a back of the pack triathlete to a Kona qualifier and finisher. How did I get from there to here?

I had to learn to carry my load in training. Training load or work is a combination of intensity and volume. The safest way to learn to carry your load is to manipulate the amount (volume) of training you are completing. The off season is a great time to experiment with your training load.

Try the following (not all at the same time!) this winter:

November Swim Camp: 14 day swim camp of 14 different workouts at your race distance (if you are an IM athlete target 4000 meters per day).
December Run Camp: 30 days of running 30 minutes a day. Just roll easy to steady efforts.

Learning to carry your load is about more than just knocking out your workouts. Learning to carry your load requires you to develop the following skills:

Discipline to get the work done
Focus to complete the workouts as required
Support system to help you reach your goal

Your first step in succeeding in carrying your load is to make a commitment to the load. Tell your family, tell your friends, tell your coworkers and post it on social media. Social guilt is a very effective way to achieve your goals.

The second step is to recruit your training partners near and far to join you. Set up a Google Doc that everyone can use to post their completion of each workout. One year, I signed up 100+ people near and far to join me! It was great fun and highly motivating (a few lives were changed too!).

The final step in learning to carry your load requires you to develop the life skills necessary to train big. This is the the most important part! You will soon find out if you get enough sleep, eat properly and recover well. Big focused training turns poor choices into glaring errors that can’t be ignored.

Carrying a big load in one sport does not mean you neglect your other sports. This is part of learning the balance of training. You can do 30 days of running while continuing to swim and cycle. The key is to keep touching all the sports while focusing on one.

To get my dreams, I had to choose to carry my load. Is it time to pick up your load today?

Endurance Corner is kicking off a two week virtual swim camp next week via Facebook. All are welcome to participate. Daily workouts for both IM and 70.3 distances will be provided. You can join here.

Sue started her triathlon journey with a 50lb weight loss and continues as a Kona qualifier. As a successful entrepreneur, she believes that, “You can run your business like your training and your training like your business!” As a coach (USAT Certified), she helps athletes to develop success in all areas of their lives: family, health and work. She blogs regularly at fewoman.com. You can find her on Twitter @fewoman.