An Age Grouper's Worst Enemy: TIME

Triathlon is a very demanding sport. It requires an athlete to spend countless hours of training specially if he is aiming for a competitive finish time, or win his age-group. With an 8 to 5 job and a family to look after, how does one get to train and balance family, work and triathlon time?

It has been said that to be able to finish a half-ironman, one must train at least 10 hours a week at least 18 weeks prior to the race. These 10 hours is a mix of run, bike and swim trainings so you cannot just bunch a 5-hour training session in one day and the other 5 hours in another day just to complete the 10 hours in two days. These need to be evened out in a week.

Modesty aside, I was able to do this but not without sacrifices. You want to know how? Read on.

What are the things you need to source out before starting your training?

First and foremost, you need to find a public pool which opens and closes during your free times. And by free times, I’m talking about either early mornings ( before you go to work ) or evenings ( after office until around 8 p.m. ). Keep in mind that your family requires you to earn money from 8am to 5pm.

Next, try to look for a safe bike route which is easily accessible from where you live. A place which will only take you 10-15 minutes to travel by car.

Lastly, and probably the easiest to find, look for a run route with minimal dogs ( yes, dogs are a big problem especially in the mornings ).

Once you find these places, you should be well on your way to start training.

Study the sleeping and studying habits of your wife and kids.

Do not steal quality time from home if you’re training for a race. If your kids leave for school by 6 a.m., try your best to finish your training around that time to wave them off. If they get home around five and do their homework until 9 p.m., make sure you check on them before they go to sleep. You don’t want them missing you or growing up without you noticing it.

Leave some energy for your spouse especially at nights before going to sleep. Women wants to know what happened to their spouses’ day and they will feel important and not neglected if we have a good conversation with them before going to dreamland.

Train to wake up early to train. This is the only way your wife and kids won’t be affected with your triathlon training. Though in some days, you may need to leave the house very early to go to the public pool, doing this only a couple of days in a week won’t dent your relationship with them too much. Doing this more than twice a week though, will be disastrous. Keep this in mind: You want them to be supporting you on your sport so best to keep them feeling first priority, not a hindrance to your sporting goals.

Now, the hard part.

Waking up very early is hard. You need to command your body to be at training mode at 4 a.m. when everyone else are still glued to their beds and won’t be opening their eyes in at least 1.5 hours. Unfair? Dude, its supposed to be unfair, its triathlon! Its a sport where having a good bike split doesn’t guarantee a podium finish, or where the slowest of swimmers runs past the whole pack enroute to an age-group win. Live with it.

The training program.

You got your training grounds covered, your family’s body clocks dialed in, and your waking and sleeping hours locked. So what do you do?

I have a training schedule which fits my work hours and family hours nicely. You may find this a good fit to your schedule as well.

Monday – REST

Tuesday – Swim. Wake up at 4:30 a.m. for a quick breakfast, leave the house at 5:30 a.m. to be at the pool at 6 a.m. Swim for 1 to 1.5 hours then head to the office.

Wednesday – Wake up at 4:30 a.m. Mount my bike trainer at 4:45 a.m. and spin until 5:50 a.m. Wave the kids off to their school bus and mount the trainer again at 6 a.m. until 6:30 a.m.

Thursday – Swim ( same as Tuesdays )

Friday – Wake up at 4:00 a.m., mount my bike trainer at 4:15 a.m. until 5:15 am, then run immediately from 5:20 to 5:55 a.m. around the village. Get home and wave the kids off to their bus.

Saturday – Wake up at 5:00 a.m. Drive off to Camp Aguinaldo and start running at 6:00 a.m. Finish at 7:30 a.m. then a quick dip in the pool. Home by around 8:30 a.m. just when the kids are waking up. Join them at breakfast…OR…wake up at 5:00 a.m. and bike to Sierra Madre. Home around 11:00 a.m. for lunch with the family.

Sunday – Wake up at 5:00 a.m. and start biking at Aguinaldo at 6:00 a.m. to 8:30 a.m., then run until 10:00 a.m. Home around 11:00 a.m. for lunch…OR…wake up at 5:30 a.m. and start running at Camp Aguinaldo around 6:30 a.m. until 8:30 a.m.

Notice that two of my weekdays are near or in the house trainings. This is to make sure that I’m at home before the kids leave for school and have a good breakfast with my wife.

On weekends, the kids don’t wake up early so I have more time to train in the mornings. I make sure I get home by lunch though, except for days when I’m doing century rides somewhere in the mountains of Sierra Madre. But on those days, I make sure my wife knows and understand.

With the aforementioned sked, I am able to do 10 hours of training a week, sometimes even more. I make sure also that when I promise to my family that we will go out on a particular weekend, I fulfill my promise no matter how tired or exhausted I may be from my training. I don’t even let them feel that I’m tired!

All the sleep debts I incur during each morning I try to pay back at noontime in the office. Fortunately, the lights are turned off from 12:00 noon to 1:00 p.m. in my office enabling me to take 30-45mins naps.

Triathlon is an addicting sport for people like us who have the “I can do it” attitude. But triathlon addiction isn’t a good excuse to make your family feel left out or neglected. Once you retire from the sport, its your family you’re going back to and not your teammates or sponsors. It just makes sense keeping them in the thick of all the things you do.

In races held in good locations, bring your family. You may not bring all of them but at least be accompanied by your wife. Make sure she is or they are the ones you will be looking for after you crossed the finish line.

When people tell me how I can afford to train given my busy sked, I just tell them “If you really want it, nothing’s stopping you.” Having a family and an 8-5 job is one of the lamest excuses I hear people saying when they say they want to do triathlons but don’t have the time to train. Its all in the attitude, and how much you want to be in an exclusive group called the “Ironmen”.