So How Does One Get Started In Triathlons?

The swim is by far my biggest concern.  Everything about it is completely foreign to me.  The talk about workouts, how far the distances are in relation to anything I know, OWS, etc.  Running I understand.  Cycling I understand for the most part, though the tech is a lot different now than it was 20 years ago. 

My wife and I are talking about joining a gym soon, and my neighbor is a swim instructor at one of the gyms here.  Maybe I can catch her outside sometime in the next week or two.

As for clubs, there's two near here that I've found online.  One uses Ning for their site and it's completely disorganized, and the organizer of the club has posted some stuff that leads me to believe we won't be a good fit personality wise.  The other's Facebook page looks like an infomercial for some nutritional supplement and all their pics look like expert level folks.  I can't get a feel for how newbie friendly they are.

-sign up for the sprint. that will make it real.

-figure out how to swim decently, and start doing so

-dust off the bike skills

-don't go nuts buying stuff, get what you need

-re-assess the HIM later, or if you have to sign up, do so, but realize it could be an unrealistic expectation (so you have plan B, bail).

-buy a book on tri's, and read, ask questions here, figure out what you need to know

I still have my first HIM ahead, but that should be just 3 months from now

It's a good idea to set some milestones with shorter distance triathlons on the way and get some race experience. With one year+ to go, it's way too soon to fix yourself on a particular race anyway. 

For the swim, get a coach, in particular in the beginning. The sooner the better, or you might just teach yourself some bad habits that you then have to unlearn. You need to master at least free style and breast stroke and be able to tread water a few minutes to be safe in OWS.

How much time you need to dedicate really depends on your goal, and your current base fitness. I think the running is by far the hardest on your body, so having done half mary you should be good. If you can dedicate about 1hr 4 weekdays and then 2-4hour sat+sunday then you have a good schedule. Have you considered riding your bike to or from work? 40miles will do a nice workout, drive to work, ride home, next day ride to work drive home. If that is feasible you should get some extra time there.

I was recommended a road bike and don't regret it, I expect to ride my road bike on my first HIM. A road bike is legal in any race, tribikes are legal only in non-drafting races. But, I understand that in US most races are non-drafting. The benefit of a tribike depends as much on the route, a very hilly route with lots of turns, steep climbs, hairpin down etc and you'll be better off with an ordinary road bike which has better handling and is more stable. The tribike excels on long flat and straight routes, but is unstable if there is a lot of gust winds. 

Tracking my workouts really keeps me committed, without I think I'd easily fall back. I use a Garmin 910xt which works for all three sports, I use it mostly as a datalogger really. Otherwise I don't use gadgets, and I think it might be a good idea sometimes just to go by feel.

So, your last question: What is a "decent" target? 

That is very individual: A decent target is something that makes you proud! It doesn't matter if you do 6:00 or 6:30, if you feel you earned it and it makes you proud.

But if you want to gauge your result I suggest you do a few OLYs. Se how you do in each discipline. Then you can either scale up your times and add 10% or compare with race results from last year:

If you get in as, say, number 80 of 100 in the swim in the OLY, then you'll likely fare as well on the HIM, if that had 200 athletes, you should expect to be 160. Look at the race results and see what time number 160 did.

BR

Excellent advice. Sign up for that sprint and get in the pool. Swimming is harder than you think, especially as an adult. Take lessons or get a coach. Do some open water swims before the race, that too is a different experience. Do the sprint, get used to bodies hitting you in the water, and see how you feel afterwards.

All you really need for a sprint is tri shorts and top. And I am assuming you own a bike helmet.

Thanks for the tips, everyone.

I'd love to ride to work, but it's not possible because of the 24 mile bridge I drive every day.

Any race down here is going to be flat and straight.  After I do the du and the sprint in August I'll probably look for a deal on a bike, but I won't go buy something new and crazy expensive.

We're going to check out a health club today with a pool.  I'll also ask about coaching.  That swimsmooth.com link was helpful.  I'll read it some more later.

I still can't believe how dead my legs still are from a marathon 2 weeks ago.  Geez.

At some point you're going to have to go open water to be comfortable doing so in a race setting.  I would recommend signing up for a sprint with open water option a couple months out, then get in some passable speed in the pool and then go out to OWS in protected, non surf waters with a friend, or FIVE, or a triathlon club to get used to staring at the abyss while swimming, and practice swimming in a straight line. I would say due to the weakest chain swim ability you will have to set the HIM at least a season out to not crap out on the swim. (Then again, plenty of swimmers never touch open water until race day, doing plenty of pool training, show up in a backwards wetsuit and all, and still survive OR do really well, so if you're really gung ho or making good progress, maybe a fall HIM?)

Tri club is really the most efficient way to get all the knowledge you need, access to an Olympic sized pool, and peer pressure/support to get through the training.  I'm about to go stalk one right now to try to join XD

swimming is the best for this!

Welcome to BT and triathlons!

It seems to me that finding the time to train will be quite problematic.  You mentioned a wife and five year old.  I looked up an 80/9 schedule, so it looks like you have an extra day off every other week, but you trade a 9 hour day for it.  Add on that a 40 mile commute.  Wow.

Over the years on BT there have been many long threads on how to balance work / family / training.  Everyone's situation is different.  Yours is a typical challenge.  Your five year old will need to go to school, drop-offs and pick-ups and weekend T-ball games etc Your job fills a big part of your day.  So you won't have a lot of time.

Triathlon training is not marathon training.  Marathon training is simple by comparison. What you have to do to maximize your training time is minimize transition time and cut the overhead. 

You can't afford 30 minute drives to the pool to go for a swim.  You need to find on the way to work or the way home so getting to the pool is at most say 5 minutes out of your way.  Most of your swims will be in the morning on the way to work so you can get dressed for work at the gym.  

I'll suggest what is probably difficult, but I'll still suggest it: move closer to work so you can bicycle to work.  Bike commuting is not necessarily great training by itself, but the time in the saddle really adds up.  I do a lot of my training in the summer to/from work.  My normal route is 7 miles to work , so that's a bit short. but I can easily add time and get an hour or 90 minute real workout.  But nobody can do an 80 mile round trip bike commute. You're just too far.

The problem with triathlon teams and clubs is meshing your schedule with theirs, both in terms of the training you need to do and when to do it.  When they're planning a 40 mile ride on Saturday at 8am, and you need to take your kid to T-ball that morning, ouch.  When you need to do a 60 mile Z2 endurance ride, and they're planning 2 hours of hill repeats, ouch.  I've been a member of a club for years, but our schedules often don't match so I rarely actually train with the whole group.  Hopefully maybe this summer my IMAZ training will match with their IMC training so we can do some long rides together.  Maybe.

Other time saving tips:

• I don't bother to log details.  I don't have 20 minutes a day to futz with writing things down Sure I have a Garmin 910xt and upload the data out of it every Sunday evening.  I also have a spreadsheet where I log my training time (time, not distances).  
• I suggest a no-fuss haircut that doesn't need blowdrying or product or whatever.  No time to fool around with that, especially when you have to shower twice a day.
• Get a bike trainer ($250), put it in a spare room or the garage.  Put a TV in front of it, connect a laptop, get TrainerRoad, watch Netflix etc.  Do a lot of training on it. 
• Get a treadmill ($700 to $1000, like a used Sole F80 or new F70).  I do a lot of treadmill runs at home, most everything less than 45 minutes is a treadmill run. 
• Take swimming lessons from the get-go.  You do not have time to learn by yourself, get it wrong, need to unlearn bad habits, etc.  
• Buy your time back as much as you can.  Hire someone to mow your grass.  Get a house cleaning service. 

My last thought is that this is not a cheap sport.  You don't need to go broke, but getting started in triathlons means equipment, gym memberships, swim lessons, clothes, race entry fees, travel expenses to the races, even gardeners and housecleaners.   You don't need to buy a tri bike from the get go, nor do you need fancy equipment.  But you might want it later.  And this all adds up.  It would be wise to plan for that and not surprise yourself or your wife with how much you'll spend.

I agree it's a pricey sport, but if you know what to spend your money on, and are thrifty, it's not so bad.

Marketing pressure, and not being satisfied with the "lower end" is what makes it expensive...and that goes for races too. Going for off-brand races, instead of Ironman (for example), will save a lot...but as many of us do, we go for the fancy stuff.

..and there is nothing wrong with either idea, or a mix of cheap/expensive. whatever works to get you out to do what you want with the budget you have.

Baby steps...

I ran 4 miles Saturday.  Legs are feeling better, but still not "good", if that makes sense.  I'll probably start running steadily again next week.

Sunday I rode 20 miles.  That felt great.  I wish someone had told me 20 miles on a bike was easier than on foot. 

My Dad had a magnetic trainer, so I grabbed that out of storage and set it up in my garage. 

And lastly, the gym that's about a 2 minute detour on my way home has:

• Corporate discount with my employer
• Reasonable family rates
• 2 Olympic pools
• Swim coaching program and a swim coach who's worked with triathletes
• Classes my wife will like

So it looks like we'll probably join that gym. 

The wife is completely on board with this.  I think she's just looking forward to a beach trip at the end of August though. 

I'd just like to say that you were right on with this. Usually when people warn of a long post it really isn't long at all. Yours is. Well done.

I'm an admin on a small off-topic board.  I know the rules.