Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition

Are you counting down the days until your first race of the season? Can you believe that April is next month!?! Karel and I will be racing our first race of the season in 2 weeks at the Clermont Olympic Distance triathlon on day 4 of our training camp alongside 20 of our campers and several other Trimarni coaching athletes. Three weeks later, Karel will be racing Haines City 70.3 (which is a key Trimarni race) and then we will both race Challenge Knoxville (half IM) in mid May with Challenge Williamsburg (half IM) 4 weeks later in June.  When an athlete gets to the 8-week or less countdown until a race, this is often the time when an athlete can feel as if she/he isn’t prepared enough and can start deviating from the training plan. For whatever reason, if workouts have been missed, skipped or modified and you may find yourself wanting to devote more energy and time into your training than ever before, in order to feel emotionally, physically and mentally “ready.” You may...

Day 3 of a 3-day training camp is always the hardest. Physically, the body is not as sharp as it was on day one and two and mentally, it is challenging to convince yourself that you still have more energy in your sore/tired body to train hard for one more day. When we write training camps into our training plans (for half and full Ironman distances), the workouts are designed to overload the body respective to the upcoming race distance but to also strengthen the mind to boost confidence. Additionally, there is a heavy emphasis on using the camp to work on race day pacing as well as to practice nutrition. Regardless if it is an Ironman-focused training plan or a Half Ironman training plan, a training camp is designed to prepare you for race day, both mentally and physically.  Although there are many benefits of attending a training camp, our favorite part of a training camp is having our campers motivate each other. It's really special to see campers support each oth...

Back in 2011, I did my very first training camp . I didn't pay any money for the camp and I didn't have to travel very far because the camp was just for me.   Karel designed a strategically placed "overload" training block in my training plan, around 9 weeks out from the Ironman World Championship. Since we, at Trimarni, are not proponents of high volume training within our training plans (specific to endurance training), this new concept of a 3-4 day "training camp" was such a smart and appropriate way to put adequate stress on my healthy body and gain fitness without compromising health. Plus, it was so cool to just mentally and physically dedicate 3-4 days to training and to minimize outside stressors (something that is hard to accomplish on a week to week basis). We still continue to implement "training camps" into our training plans and for our one-on-one athletes.  There are many different types of training camps, from camps...