Well everyone, the week is almost here and you are probably wondering if you have done enough and whether that niggling blister on the toe is going to get better in time to have a hassle free run and ride (or should I say run, ride, run, ride, run, ride…….). Either way you look at it, there is little you can do about it, and it is important psychologically to enter the final week of preparations with a positive head, knowing that you are about to embark on an extraordinary adventure of challenge, adrenalin, and pain.

Your final preparations for the event are extremely important. All endurance athletes of all abilities have differing methods which work for each as an individual. However, there are a number of underlying procedures which form the basis of all good final preparations regardless of the level of athletic performance. These include final training procedures, nutrition, hydration, transitional training sessions & pre race preparation of equipment.

Final Training Procedures & Transitional Training Sessions

By this point in the training program there is little point in suddenly increasing the training volume and intensity with the thought you have not done enough to get you through the event. It is more important to ensure the remainder of the time is a continuation of valuable training without the feeling of panic.  It is found with endurance athletes that prior to an event there is benefit to maintaining high intensity sessions through to a few days before an event, while volume is kept consistent. For endurance events your last long session should be completed about 6-7 days prior to the event itself, this would equate to Saturday or Sunday this weekend.

There should be a number of aims to this session. One, it is a final big long hit out to fatigue and stress the muscles prior to the target date. It allows sufficient time for an athletes muscles to over adapt prior to the actual event. When we exercise or train, our muscles are required to perform above what they would usually, and they therefore fatigue. With training they continue to fatigue until they are provided with an opportunity to adapt by increasing in size and strength to over compensate in the event they are fatigued again in the near future. This is actually the basis for all training and where a coaches role lies, to take an athlete to the point of fatigue without tipping them over the edge, and then let them recover allowing the muscles to overadapt before taking them to the point of fatigue again. The trick as a coach is to monitor and analyse exercise information to ensure the athlete does not go to far into the fatigue state and end up in the over training zone.

The other aim of the session is to deplete the body of its energy stores in the form of carbohydrates. It should be pointed out here that for effective carbohydrate loading, retention, and conversion of this stored energy source, you should all be eating multiple small meals of carbohydrate rich foods this week from this point on. When the final long session is completed on the weekend, the aim should be to burn as much of the stored carbohydrates already in the body as possible. This does not mean you should not eat and drink during the session, but just means that by doing the long session you will use what you store between now and the last long training session. By depleting the bodies store of these carbohydrates, it will then absorb the carbohydrates consumed in the final week leading into the event more efficiently and in greater volume, providing the body with a little extra on the day. This is actually the basis of what is often termed carbo loading.

During the week, it is important to then maintain many small high carbohydrate meals during each day, and immediately after all exercise consume high carbohydrate foods and drinks within a half an hour of the session.

In relation to the TRANSITION TRAINING, some things work for some athletes and other things work for others. However on the whole it is important to not fall into the old trap of what was once called tapering.  Tapering used to be utilised to the point of an athlete doing very little during the week leading into an event. Studies have shown, and results have proven (even with athletes coached by myself) that if an athlete ceases exercise a day or two prior to an event there is a loss of performance as the body moves into recovery mode. For this reason, without telling you all specific training sessions you should or should not be doing, it is recommended that you maintain volume and intensity until about Tuesday next week, this includes high intensity intervals if you have been using them as part of your training sessions. Following Tuesday, it is important to maintain voluime in your training, but the intensity should be reduced. It is extremely important here to understand the difference between volume training and intensity training when utilising this information. Likewise, it is also important not to fall into the trap of increasing the volume because the intensity has dropped. For example, if you have been completing 350km's of cycling on the bike over the entire week, and two sessions have been high intensity lactate tolerance interval sessions of 60km's on Wednesday and Friday, then for next week you would drop the intensity of all your cycling sessions, but also and importantly you would convert the two interval sessions to two more E1 sessions of 60km's (E1 zone is around 75-80% max heart rate and cadence of 100-110rpm). This is only meant as an example of how intensity is dropped and is not meant to be indicative of the training volumes at this stage of event preparation.

The day prior to the event you should go for a run and a ride. It is most important to ensure you are not sedentary on this day as the body needs to do some form of training. I usually send my cyclists out for about a 1 hour session which usually includes a stop at the coffee shop at the end of the ride for some relaxation and socialisation.

Hydration

Hydration should have already commenced. Continuous consumption of fluids is vital, and it is important to be soaked in hydration. Studies under the AIS and other sporting institutions have shown that a 1% loss in hydration results in a 5% loss of power. This is a huge amount of power. I have experienced this personally in both triathlon races and also during road races. It is a hard way to learn as it is too late when it starts to happen out on the course. Yes you will continue on, but to what degree depends on how well you counteract the loss in hydration and to what extent it occurs.

An eye opener for many when discussing these losses is when we consider the power output of an athlete on a bike. Where an endurance athlete weighing in at 70kg can produce 400w of power,they are producing 5.7w/kg of body weight. However if they then drop 1% due to dehydration, they would then lose 1% of body weight making them 69.3kg however they would lose 5% power, thereofore producing 380watts of power. This would therefore make there power to weight ratio drop to 5.4w/kg of body weight. Continuous losses throughout the day will result in an athlete without power for Jacobs Ladder!

I cannot stress the importance of being very stringent with your hydration from a long way out from the event. When sleeping at night ensure there is water beside the bed. Drink throughout the day at work and at play, trying to consume 750ml per hour. This can also include the consumption of sports drinks with electrolytes and should be continued through to a half an hour before the commencement of the event. About a half hour before the start of the event cease consumption, and excrete excess water not retained during the multiple nervous trips you are bound to have to the toilet before starting the event.

As soon as the event commences the hydration commences again. Ideally for an endurance event of such length and demand, a minimum of a water bottle should be consumed within 1/2 to 3/4 of an hour incorporating electrolytes and carbohydrate fluids.

At the end of the event to aid in your recovery, hydration should continue for as long as required. This is important to aid in muscle recovery, and should be continued for the days following the event.

Pre Race Preparation

This can be very personal, however there are a number of tips from my experiences as an athlete and as a coach. Don't laugh at some of them, you would be amazed at some of the things I have seen from high level elite athletes who have done all of this in the past. A good example of how things can go wrong is one of my elite cyclists who, after just returning from the national championships as a dual medalist, arrived as favourite for a gold medal at a state points race in Collie having left her shoes at home in Perth. In preparing to strap her running shoes to her pedals with packing tape found in the rear of a van, she was fortunate enough to find a rider with a spare pair of shoes which happened to be her size. This athlete should have been better prepared and usually is. But it goes to show if you unprepared it can really bite on the day you have been training for, regardless of how good you are feeling.

All of my athletes have a set procedure to follow the day before an event, to help prevent such occurences (the above athlete follows it to a tee now). I will share it with you all:

• Two/three days before the event place race wheels on the bike, any new tyres to be used for the event, etc so that the bike is how it will be on the day of the event. This gives sufficient time to trial all equipment and still get in to be fixed of there is a problem.
• On completion of the final training session, clean the bike, check the tyres for knicks and pieces of glass or other debris, oil the chain.
• Pump up the tyres to full race pressure, if they go down over night you can replace the tube before you start the event.
• Pack all your gear in your event bag including your cycling shoes, running shoes, clothing food and all else required for the day. Make a check list and tick things off as you pack them. Place the bag in the car along with your bike and anything else you need. The last thing you want to be doing in the morning is packing the car and making sure you have everything.  Having packed and prepared, sit and relax for the remainder of the day, listen to music or watch your favourite movie to ensure you are relaxed and in the right frame of mind for the day to come.

Other race preparation some athletes of multi sport events like to do is actually go through the process of transitions. Riding their bike around the block and then getting off and getting their running gear on and having a short run and then repeating the process to ensure that everything is there before packing the bags.

The Event

Well what can be said. Yes you are about to experience PAIN. It is not called the PAINathlon for nothing! I cannot speak from experience of doing the event, however having participated in multi stage and multi day events including cycling over 100 km's in two days, I can certainly say we are all of the same insane goal seeking junkies! The pain is always worth the results and the triumph. There are too many suggestions to list for how to tackle the ride and run. Most importantly do what works for you. There will be athletes flying past you on the bike legs, while you may wave them goodbye on the runs.

Stick to your own game plan and hope it works for you as you know your body the best (I can guarantee you will know it even better after the Painathlon!).

A couple of pointers however which I discovered through competing in State Long Course Triathlons, and through coaching knowledge. Firstly head the warnings of hydration and nutrition I have pointed out. Secondly, to help ease the pain of your transitions during the event from run to ride and vice versa, remember that the average runner has a cadence (the number of times the same foot strikes the ground in a minute) of about 90rpm. For this reason, when coming into, and out of, a run try to decrease your cadence on the bike to the same cadence you run ie 90rpm. Likewise start back on the bike, after running, in an easy gear at about 90rpm, and allow the oxygenated blood in the legs to move to the required muscles for each activity before trying to go to hard.

On the point of cadence, don't fall into the trap of pushing a great big gear in the bike. By this don't push a hard gear.  You are far better off using a slightly easier gear and having a cadence of around 100rpm then using a gear that leaves you with a cadence of 80-90rpm (unless pushing into a head wind or up a hill). The harder gears will sap your legs of their power very rapidly leaving you depleted and wanting of strength.

Finally I must say well done to you all. It is a great thing to see athletes rise to a challenge and set goals to test even the best and strongest. Regardless of where you finish or how much of the Painathlon you finish this year, you have all succeeded the minute you begin the event. Truly the only way one fails is if they fail to have a go!

Enjoy the pain and I look forward to seeing you all with smiles on your faces at the top of Jacobs Ladder.

Bryce Mitchell-D'Raine (B.A.Ed) (NCAS Level 2 Road Track MTB;  NCAS Level 2 BMX Coach)

Cara Mitchell-D'Raine (B.Psych; Dip.Ed) (NCAS Level 0  Cycle Skills Coach)

The Mitchell-D’Raine Trust trading as:

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