FEATURES
To Beard. Or Not to Beard....
-
Saturday, 28 March 2015 01:10
By Eric Turner (eturnertri.com)
Race day is coming next week and it will be my first shot at 70.3 distance. With all the press lately about the power savings just from shaving your legs I am now torn on shaving my beard or not. Here’s some of the back story/pro’s and con’s.
I have had a beard for almost 5 years, shaving with a razor only once when my beloved Blackhawks won the cup. Other than that it has just been some trimming here and there (mostly there). My girlfriend has only seen me without a beard that one time, and she almost broke up with me for shaving (she loves the beard, she’s cool like that). Now I have been trying to get races to add a bearded division for those of us brave enough to race bearded, but have not had much luck, so here I am debating.
Now the benefits are pretty obvious. There’s the aero data that came out about shaving your legs, so I am going to guess shaving the beard would only increase my aerodynamics. There’s also the heat factor, it’s looking like temps around 85 or 90 for race day? I did a track workout this morning and the beard was hot…real hot....
Fitness Misinformation Stuff...
-
Wednesday, 25 March 2015 01:10
Every social media outlet is seemingly flooded with “fitspiration”, “thinspiration” and everything in between lately. You can’t go on Facebook or Pinterest now without noticing a text war revolving around thigh gaps and images of “real women”. But how many of these arguments are rooted in real fact and not just hurt feelings? Are these images and sayings really motivational or simply bulls**t? Are they inspiring people to push past their reasonable physical limits, or are people’s self-image just so delicate that they can’t take a bit of “tough love”? Kevin Moore had a lot to say on this topic and wanted to share it with our community. Kevin is an experienced Pilates instructor, movement therapist and martial artist – and someone we hope to see more of on the HiitBlog in the days to come.
By Kevin Moore (hiit-blog.dailyhiit.com)
The 6 Most Shockingly Irresponsible “Fitspiration” Photos
I have been planning a blog post for a while on fitness misinformation, and it was originally going to be the same kind of thoughtful deconstruction found in my other installments. But then I read this and it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever found in my newsfeed: so beautiful, in fact, that the rest of the health and fitness propaganda floating around Facebook like turds in a pool started to really, really piss me off....
Is Fitness More Important Than Technique?
-
Sunday, 22 March 2015 01:10
By Lance Watson (home.trainingpeaks.com)
Is fitness more important than technique for the new triathlon swimmer? The definitive answer to this question is, of course, it depends! In fact, many swim coaches will prescribe both within their swim sets.
As a triathlon swim coach I have the opportunity to see many types of swimmers as they join our group. Some are adults who swam a lot in their youth, either at the local pool, competitively on a high school swim team, or even in college. They may have been out of the water for 15 to 20 years and put on a few extra pounds, but as a coach, right away you know they can swim. Their technique may be a little rusty, and they may be out of breath after 50 yards but in a month or so they will be back making waves with their lane mates....
Cadence Debate Stuff...
-
Saturday, 21 March 2015 01:10
Since we’ve started selling training plans on trisutto.com I have been asked frequently about bike cadence and why I’m such a proponent for age-group and pro triathletes from non-cycling backgrounds using low cadence training:
By Trisutto.com
My view is that if an athlete has not had the advantage of a competitive cycling background then the ability to learn how to ‘feel’ the pedal stroke, which enables a rider to spin effectively, is lost to all but an exceptional few.
Indeed, many professional cyclists who train between 750km to 1200 km a week never acquire the ability to use the high-cadence technique effectively. So if professional riders spending 6-days a week training a minimum of 4-5 hours a day are not able to find it, then what hope does someone with no cycling background putting in a maximum of 200km have of mastering the ‘Lance Armstrong high cadence’ model? In my experience very little....
80/20 Stuff...
-
Friday, 20 March 2015 01:10
YndeCam Photo - A great pic that has little or nothing to do with the story.
By Mackenzie Lobby Havey (triathlon.competitor.com)
Follow the 80/20 rule for new performance gains.
To get to the finish line the fastest you have to power through at your hardest effort, but when it comes to training, a growing body of research confirms that endurance athletes should be doing 80 percent of their training at a low intensity and the other 20 percent at a moderate or high intensity. Simply put, hammering your way through every workout is ill advised.
The latest of these studies, published in the Journal of Sports Physiology and Performance, demonstrated this by rounding up a group of recreational runners who ran between 30 and 43 miles per week. Half of the participants followed the 80/20 rule, ...
