HOW TO RACE FASTER

THE SEASON’S IN FULL SWING, WHICH MEANS IT’S TIME TO SHARPEN YOUR PERFORMANCE FOR A NEW RACE PB. CUE OUR ESSENTIAL TIPS FOR YOUR PERFECT EVENT DAY…

There are over 150,000 active triathletes in the UK. A good percentage are beginners whose ambition is understandably more completer than competer, the desire to reach the finish line providing enough motivation to train hard and to train consistently. But what about elevating your performance to the next level? And, with many of you firmly embedded in the 2021 triathlon season, what can you do right now to send you firing up the results list?

Simple. Tap into the tips prescribed by our band of coaching experts. What follows are training, nutrition and gear pointers that’ll gain you easy speed without expending a single ounce more energy than you are today. They’re not marginal gains, they’re significant gains based on a huge multisport knowledge base.

It begs the question, of course: what is a good triathlon finishing time? In all honesty, it’s hard to prescribe a onesize-fits-all answer as no matter how fit you are, finishing time is significantly affected by age, gender and, of course, distance. So to focus the answer slightly, let’s commit to Olympic-distance triathlon (1.5km swim, 40km bike, 10km run). When it comes to the elites, Alistair Brownlee and Gwen Jorgensen won Rio Olympic gold in 1:45:01 and 1:56:16, respectively. Both are outstanding, both are out of reach to all but the sharpest point of the performance pyramid.

More relevant to us recreational athletes is a good Olympic-distance age-grouper finishing time. For men this is anything under 2:30hrs; for women, we’re looking at under 2:45hrs. Again, though, this can vary considerably depending on the parcours of your event. Ultimately, whatever your race goal, the tips on these pages will prime you for your

best-ever result.