As many of you know, I do an adult fitness bootcamp along with training young athletes. Over the past 6 years of doing this adult camp, I have trained about 12 tri-athletes of which 6 were IronMan level.

I know I always say this about bands but in this population, bands are perfect because they fit how these athletes need to train and want to train.

First of all how they need to train….

Tri-athletes spend 100% of their time training in the sagital (forward-backward) plane. If you have ever looked at their hip flexibility you would often find they have none. Most are very tight through their hamstrings and expecially anterior hip. Interestingly when you talk to them, very few try to maintain their length. A little stretching to warm the muscle up and a way they go. They warm up by doing the first mile or 2 slow.

Assisted band Stretching could really help them out especially done in the frontal and transverse planes.

Secondly most do not like to strength train.   I just recently  to speak to an outstandind Tri-Athlete Coach who believes that preparing for a Tri comes down to strength. Everyone who commits to doing a tri will do the miles but few do the strength and yet Coach Al Lyman has found that his athletes that strength train consistently and intensely are competing and finishing at high levels.

I will take that a step further and say that Tri-athletes that train out of the sagital plane not only get stronger for their event, they keep their body functional and flexible in all 3 planes of motion so they do not breakdown.

 Now the Want…

Bands are portable so Tri athletes can take them on runs and bikes to train with.   Making time to strength train is hard for these athletes.  Convenience is important.

 I am not a tri-athlete and do not claim to be an expert but I treat tri-athletes in the clinic and to rehab them we always need to stretch and strengthen their frontal and Transverse plane. Now do you think if they trained those planes with bands and body weight strengthening they could eliminate those problems.   Bands allow us to train in all planes and force vectors.

I think they could and I think Coach Al (the expert) agrees and bands provide you the convenience factor to get it done.

I know this… every tri-athlete I have work with and has taken part in my camp has PR’ed or finished better than they expect to. Key word here… FINISHED!! You train that much and that often, it would be a shame not to finish.

If you get a moment… Kick on over the Coach Al Lyman’s website.  Coach Al speaks nationally and has had some outstanding results with his clients.

Any Tri-athletes out there… make sure you shoot me your questions or thoughts.

Training Beyond the Contraction

Dave