INCREASE YOUR CADENCE

Biomechanical and run expert Ben Barwick of coaching outfit Full Potential reveals the importance of a swift stride rate

Increasing your cadence – how many times you stride each minute – is a proven way to become a more efficient triathlete, and thanks to training-tool advancements, watches like the Garmin’s Forerunner 630 now automatically measure cadence.

Of course, measuring cadence and actively doing something with that information are two very different things, but one thing’s clear: there’s no optimum cadence at any level; each triathlete is different and has a different cadence range. But ultimately, the shorter the race, the higher the cadence because you’ll be running at a faster pace.

Gwen Jorgensen’s former coach Jamie Turner put it best when he said every triathlete should develop a ‘cadence bandwidth’. If you have a wide cadence range – say 160spm for easy running; 166spm for faster running – it really comes in handy when fatigued. Again, as Turner says, the treadmill is a good place to play around with cadence and stride rate.

Tied in with running when fatigued, to help with jelly legs, when approaching T2 you should shift your bike into a lower gear and increase cadence so you’re spinning your legs more. This will shift bloodflow to more run-specific muscles and prepare you for a faster cadence – and more speed – from the moment you leave T2.

Cadence should be a function of speed – the faster you want to go, the faster cadence needs to be – and you should aim to increase each level’s bandwidth (easy, threshold and 5km/10km pace) by 5-10%. An easy-running 160spm, for instance, would rise to 168-178spm. That’s why during speed sessions, focus on a quicker cadence and pushing off the ground with more force, so you’re developing both stride rate and cadence to go faster.