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Back in August last year, I posted about my Journey to Triathlete, where I vowed that I would become a triathlete this year. I'd been super inspired from watching the Olympics and watching Phillip complete his first Triathlon and I wanted in on a bit of the action!

Before making that initial post, I'd been running for 3 years and had been making slow steady progress with swim lessons for 2 years(but still hadn't cracked front crawl). I'd never been open water swimming, didn't even own a wetsuit and didn't own a bike either, so I had those big initial purchases to make and felt very much like I'd maybe jumped in too deep.

Fast forward to now and things have really turned tables for me. Running has actually become my least strongest sport of the three and I absolutely adore open water swimming and cycling.

You may or may not have been keeping upto date with my weekly training updates, but I've been pretty much training for a triathlon the last couple of months without really training for one. I've been running, swimming and cycling just like a triathlete in training would.

What Triathlon Am I Doing?
If you haven't seen from the title, I'll be doing the Human Race Woburn Abbey Triathlon on the 10th September and I'm doing the Sprint distance which is 800m Swim, 20km Bike and 5km Run.

I've done Human Race Race's in the past, so I know how good their races are and I'm definitely looking forward to this. The race is located in Bedfordshire which is just over an hour away from me, so it wont be too bad to travel to in the morning. The race has become famed for it's iconic venue, with views of The Abbey(which looks stunning!) and Deer park.

PHOTO CREDIT: Human Race

The race is in it's 9th year and tri for life have raised over £2m for it's charity sponsors Great Ormond Street and Melanoma Focus Cancer Research which is amazing! Whilst I'm not fundraising for the event, I am making a donation to the charities.

Phillip and his mum are also doing the Triathlon too, so I wont be there alone. Phillips Mum is doing the sprint like me and Phillip is doing the Olympic distance.

What Are My Goals/Aims?
First and foremost, my goal will be to finish the race strong. I have no doubt that I will be able to finish the race, even if I'd have done it today on the training I've already done, however, I'd like to build on each of the sports so it's not as tough and I have a strong finish.

I do have some very rough time goals in mind but they're not massively important and as long as I have a good time, thats totally fine with me but here are my time goals anyway:

SWIM - With my current pace in OWS, I'm looking at about 2 mins per 100 yards, so I can currently do an 800m swim in 18 mins, but would like to get closer to 16 in the tri.

BIKE - This one is a little tougher to judge as I live in a very flat area.. currently looking at around 45 minutes for the cycle.. but I don't know how the hills will affect me on the race.. I've got to get in some turbo time!

RUN - I'd ideally like to get sub 30 for the run portion. I've been a little slower with my running lately and haven't been so consistent with hitting sub30 on a 5k run. That being said, I'm weirdly faster at running when I've been on the bike straight before.. Either way, some interval/hill sessions definitely wouldn't go amiss here and I'd like to be comfortably under 30mins if possible.

Whats My Plan Training?
I'm subscribed to the 220 Triathlon mag, so I've been basing my training on their training plans in the magazines and have come up with a rough plan of attack for the next 7 weeks leading up to Race Day.

Alot of the plans suggest that training contains  at least two times of each sport, mostly 3. I'm pretty much doing that already, so I'm happy with that, I just need to be a bit more consistent with my structure as I seem to be in structure of leaving most things to the end of the week and the beginning of the week is rather easy going.
The training plans in the magazine also don't have any strength training or extra activities included and ideally I'd like to include some strength training into the week, so my training days will be fairly busy.

The training plan schedule I have in my bullet journal is the sports I can do realistically in the morning or evening based on my what I've been doing recently and has been working for me thus far. The only thing I may change is days where I run and cycle on the same day. The training plans I've seen dont have these training days unless it's a brick session - Double sport days are usually swim and run and not cycle and run. If you know why it's like this, let me know!

So, my plan is this:
- 1 rest day per week, this will either be a tuesday or a thursday, these are the days I am more likely to have a rest day based on experience.

- Swim days cannot be changed, OWS and Pool sessions are specifically on these days.

- My aim is to have 3 of each sport in my training plan and then I have the option to drop one if needed and will have still done 2.

Monday - Strength Training - OWS and/or Swimming Lesson
Tuesday - Rest OR Brick OR Run and Cycle split into Morn and Eve
Wednesday - Strength Training and Pool Swim
Thursday - Rest OR Brick OR Run and Cycle split into Morn and Eve
Friday - Yoga - OWS
Saturday - OWS + Run - Optional: Strength Training
Sunday - Turbo Session and Run

I've always been pretty flexible with my training, so whilst I have activities on specific days, I'll just re-jig things if I miss one or if I want to take a rest day.

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I think 7 weeks is still plenty of time to get in some solid training and see if I can lower some of my times. Currently, I'm super excited to actually do the race which is really weird as I definitely thought I'd be nervous about it. Maybe it's too early to get nervous, we will see what happens as it gets closer

If you've got any tips for triathlon training, words of wisdom, transition tips.. give me a shout, I'm all ears! Until then, I'll be continuing with my weekly training diaries and will be sharing some posts leading up to race day with any tips I have for swimming, running and cycling from a newbie triathlete in training perspective ;)

Question: Have you ever done a Triathlon or thought about doing one?