Iron Man schedules

[Brit]

Would any of the Iron Girls or Iron Girls to be come in and talk about your schedules? chw57, I am especially curious about you since I know that you work, have a baby, and that your H is pretty active too. How do you fit it all in? If you have a child how do they fit into the mix?

[trigal]

I'm a teacher and our union president, so my training schedule needs to be very flexible. But, right now (at less than two months out), my schedule looks like this:

Tuesday - swim in the morning (1 hour); long run in the afternoon (2 hours)
Wednesday - group ride in the afternoon/evening(2 hours)
Thursday - run in the morning (hills)(1 hour); Pilates (1 hour) and open water swim in the afternoon/evening (1 hour)
Friday - swim in the morning (1 hour); run (1 hour) or ride(2 hours)
Saturday/Sunday - long ride (4-7 hours) + short run; shorter ride (2-3 hours) (the longer ride is generally on Saturday unless there is something else going on that makes it tough to get it done, then I move it to Sunday)
Monday - rest day

DH is also training for IM (in fact, he is coaching me). We swim together, but that's about it. Sometimes he'll join me for a ride or run if it's an easy day for him. Basically, we see each other in the morning and when we are going to bed. We are up at 4:30 on the morning we are training and we are in bed at around 9:00 each night (no later than 10). We don't get to do a whole lot of extra fun stuff. We turn down a lot of offers to go out and we don't see our families very much. But...we make up for that at other times during the year.

We don't have kids, but for a few years we were trying. We went through a mess of fertility treatments and that was difficult. Not only emotionally, but also with training. If we had been successful in conceiving and having a baby, that would change things a lot. We would both stay involved in the sport, but it is highly unlikely we would both be doing an Ironman at the same time. Friends of ours have two kids and they decided to trade of who would do the long races each year. In the end, though, she hasn't really been interested in doing another Ironman yet. He does them every year and she runs marathons. Their kids are 1 and 5.

It's not easy, with our without kids, to train. Especially if your spouse is not into it. It's not just the time spent swimming, cycling, and running. It's the fact that you are tired all the time and that almost everything in your life revolves around it. It becomes a lifestyle versus just a hobby.

When DH decided to sign up for his first IM, we had only been dating for about 4 months. But, he asked me if it was going to be okay with me for him to make that kind of commitment. I was surprised he was asking (since we didn't really have any commitment between the two of us at that time), but it was great that he did. I know two guys who have signed up for IM and never told their wives. They just expected their wives to live around Ironman and that is completely unfair. So, if you are considering it, just make sure that everyone knows what this means and that everyone is on board. AND, do your best to make time for other things. IM athletes with families/kids will get up super early on weekends to get their training done by noon, so that they have the rest of the day to spend with their families. It's a lot of sacrifice, but it's totally worth it!

[joenali]

I'm a little less than 3 months out. I'm a second grade teacher and I do also have a stepson. He isn't with us a lot of the time which makes it hard on the weekend when I barely see him. My schedule looks different than trigals, as this is my first IM. We did sit down as a family to talk about training schedules. I write my workouts in a calendar and share them with DH. Sometimes he joins me on workouts, but not on the long ones. I also do a lot of workouts with team members.

Monday: rest
Tuesday: hour + am swim, 1 hour track workout
Wednesday: 45 minute zone 2 bike , 30 minute run.
Thursday: 60+ am swim, pm group ride 60+ with 30 minute run brick
Friday: 60 minute am run, 60 minute OWS
Saturday: 4-7 hour bike
Sunday: 60 minute bike 90+ minute run

[katandkevin]

I am still in the speed building phase, but I can answer since I already have my training schedule. I stay home with our kids but I have to work my workout schedule around them or when I can get a babysitter. I do the majority of workouts before DH leaves for work. I spin 2-3 mornings a week and long rides on saturday, run 2 mornings and do long runs on Wednesday. The only thing I do during the day is swim so I can do a masters swim class. My fil watches the kids for me so that I can so that twice a week. My workouts are all an hour with the exception of the long days. I double up on workouts 2 day a week.

It is hard to do even staying home. Just training for my half ironman was hard a d my kids were in school 3 days a week. They will be home for a month and a half this summer while I am training before kindergarten starts. I try to impact my family time as little as possible if I can.

[chw57]

For my last half, I used this general schedule and will probably keep it the same for when I start training for IMTX:
Mon - rest
Tues - up early to ride on the trainer before work; masters swim at night
Wed - 8ish mile run before work
Thurs - same as Tues
Fri - 5 or 6 mile run before work
Sat - long bike an transition run. After I get home, DH works out
Sun - long run, sometimes part of it with DH pushing DD in the stroller.

When I spin in the morning, DH goes to the gym or runs. He takes evening workouts on m/w/f

[Brit]

Thank you all for talking me through your training schedules. I am so in awe of you all putting in so much hard work and I think it is super awesome that your families support that type of time commitment. I love to follow your stories, keep them coming!

[reginaphalange72]

I'm probably not really helpful since I'm alone with no family, kids, etc. (do dogs count??). However, most of my training is done at night. I always attempt to get at least one workout in before work, but I'm not so good about that, and I seem to get my workout buzz at night anyway. That makes my weeknights go until 10pm or so - often with a brick. On the weekends, I do my long swim, bike, and run workouts, occasionally with a short brick attached.

I'm fortunate in that my work schedule is pretty flexible, so I can come and go as I please (college teacher). If I need to squeeze in a workout in the middle of the day, I can do that pretty easily. Also, I have summers open, which is when I end up doing my longest workouts.

One hugely important thing is making sure your partner/family is on board. My BF is also an endurance athlete (marathoner and ultramarathoner, and eventually wants to do an IM too), and I absolutely love that we can go out and run 18 miles together (XH was NOT like that and it drove me nuts). It's a huge time commitment. Even if they aren't going to train with you, they definitely need to know what's in store for everyone beforehand.

Good luck! Go for it!!!