Maintaining strength/size while triathlon training?

narwog81

is it possible?

i've been training fairly consistently since last august after surgery on my ACL. The knee is all fixed now and im due to return to rugby in september. However its been a long time goal to do a triathlon so im registered for a sprint tri in july and start an 8 week program next week working towards this.

My strength training was going reasonably well, i has made gains and i estimate my current 1RMs are BP 100kg/ SQ 120kg/ DL 160kg/ MP 65kg.

The triathlon program ill be following has me doing cardio 5 times a week and 2 strength sessions. The strength session wasnt specified so i've come up with the following:

Strength workouts
A
Squats 3x8
Bench 3x8
Military Press 3x10
Box Jumps

B
OH Squats 3x10
DB Bench Press 3x15
DB Row 3x10
Deadlift 3x6

How does this look? I tried to split upper and lower evenly and the box jumps and OH squats are in there just because i like them really:D. Is there anything you would change, i dont want to completely start from scratch again in mid-july when its time to focus on the rugby...

or should i just eat like a horse and hope for the best?:D

thanks in advance.

Canis Lupus

There is a tri forum and whilst there are better people supplied to answer you when I was tri training my weights sessions stalled.

You really train for something specific so aiming for a tri won't help your lifts. Once you get far enough into your plan weights get tough specially from a mental point when you have to face going out the following day for a run/cycle/swim on tired muscles.

J-Fit

You can maintain an appreciable level of strength and I would most certainly recommend strength training as part of triathlon preparation but your are essentially pulling your body in two separate directions so really, maintaining max strength is probably out of the question. Without getting too sciency on you, you are subjecting your muscle fibres to highly varying tasks, one which predominantly utilisses type II, the other which utilises type I. Pick your goal and concetrate your efforts fully on it. If that is triathlon, strength training will make you more resistant to injury and will also make you mechanically more efficient. Most triathlon guys avoid weights so it really is giving you an advantage over the competition.

Brian?

I'm interested to see what responses you get.

My 2c would be:

Do 2 full body sessions a week, lower the reps on squat, deadlift and bench to 3x5 or 5x3.

Even if you don't do this, you need to add in more hamstring work i.e. you have squats, OH squats and box jumps which are quad dominant. Swap at least 1 of them, box jumps would be the most obvious, for Straight leg deadlifts or glute ham raises.

I would do something like this

Workout A:

Squats 3x5
Military Press 3x8
Pull ups 3x8
SL Deadlifts 3x8

Workout B

Deadlifts 3x5
Bench 3x5
Lunges 3x8
DB rows 3x8


Balanced enough, with low volume so as not to interfere with your tri training too much.