Trimarni Clermont Camp - Day 2

While our scheduled Olympic distance race for Saturday was not yet cancelled, we proceeded with our planned workout for the day. A 2.5 hour ride followed by a 20-30 minute run off the bike. 

The morning started as usual - the coaches were working hard while the athletes were eating, laughing and anticipating the training day ahead. With such a large house/resort, the coaches (and our camp support Alvaro) were tucked away on the far side of the house (with our own kitchen - one of four kitchens in the house!).

After eating our pre-workout meal, it was time to pack up and drive to Waterfront Park to start our brick workout. 

It was a beautiful sunny and warm day which was a pleasant change from our cooler temps and a big shock to our midwest and northern campers. I love the heat so I said bring it! 

For this ride, we broke into three groups based on fitness levels and each of the coaches (Karel, Me and Joe) had a small handful of campers to follow each of us. This also allowed us to be less cluttered on the road and to provide individual feedback to each camper as needed. Alvaro drove the SAG vehicle to our meeting spot and then joined us for some of our ride as we covered one stretch of road for the "main set" of our workout. 

After our campers covered the first part of the bike race course, we turned off the race course onto Sugarload Moutain road and started our main set which included a series of rollers to work on terrain management. After a short time on that road (out and back), it was time to descend down Sugarload Mountain for a time trial up to the top. Surprise - Clermont has lots of hills! 

Karel's group had so much "fun" the first time that they got to ride up it twice. My group and Joe's group only did one TT. And we were so proud of everyone for working so hard all the way to the top. 

Appropriately, the end of the TT course was by the donkeys (which I had to say hello to). 

It was great to see all of our campers supporting and cheering for one another. A few of our campers had never accomplished such a feat so it was great to see comfort zones being stretched. That is what camp is all about - doing things that you won't do or don't know how to do alone. 

After we all regrouped at Waterfront park, it was time for the brick run. We encouraged our campers to focus on good form running and to not think about the upcoming race on Saturday. 

We finished our 3-hour brick workout around 1pm which left us about an hour before registration opened at 2pm (a few blocks away). So our campers recovered with their recovery drinks and we all gathered under a pavillion for a course talk. 

Sadly, just 30-minutes after picking up our packet for the race, the city told Sommer Sports that they could not hold the race due to the current health situation. While a dissapointment, Karel and I had already planned option B in the case of a cancelled race. 

Vegan Baked Blueberry Oatmeal from my book Essential Sports Nutrition.

When we arrived back to the camp house, we had an absolutely amazingly delicious meal prepared by our camp cook Kathleen. What a treat to have her in the house preparing all of our meals. We truly believe that this made such a positive impact on the recovery and energy levels of our campers throughout their 4.5 day camp. 

Kathleen prepared sweet potato cookies, oatmeal bake and had a spread of fresh fruit, veggie burgers, deli meat and cheese, along with an assortment of breads. 

While there are plenty of places to sit and gather in the camp house, somehow I ended up in a kids rocking chair. As the saying goes "If it fits, you sit." 

Since we were unable to do our afternoon open water swim (oh - forgot to mention that on Thursday, the swim for the race was cancelled due to the water conditions so we had two cancellations - the swim and the race!) our campers had a lot of free time to relax and recover from 3pm until bedtime. They took full advantage of it! 

While some of our campers stayed inside, a few of us ventured outside and had some fun on the swan in the lake. 

That was a workout pedaling around this huge swan!!

After a bit of fun in the lake, we walked on the somewhat-sketchy boardwalk to Lake Louisa...which was incredibly beautiful and peaceful. 

Around 6pm, it was time for dinner. We had an assortmet of chilled pastas, chicken (for the meat eaters) and sweet potatoes. 

With happy bellies, it was time for our evening talk with our campers - which occurred every evening of camp around 7pm. 

Each night we went over the day, answered questions, highlighted the accomplishments and feats of some of our campers and turned over the white board (oh the anticipation by our campers) to reveal the workout plan for the next day. Although the original plan was the Olympic distance race followed by a 2-hour endurance ride, we loaded up the morning with a 5 hour brick workout. Catering to the needs of all of our campers, we were excited for each of them to put in some solid training and enjoy the outdoors for most of Saturday. 

After the talk, our campers mingled for a little and then started to make their way to bed around 8-9pm. As for me, let's just say that I was ready for bed soon after our evening talk. 

2019 Clermont Train-Cation Recap

For the past few years, Karel and I have dedicated a few days in the month of February to a personal "training camp." We ran this idea by our coaches and they supplied us with our workouts for 3.5 days of training in warm and sunny Clermont, Florida. We are very familiar with Clermont as it was the first place where we held a training camp back in 2013. Since then, we have held five camps in Clermont, Florida. Also, when we lived in Clearwater and then Jacksonville, Karel and I would annually participate in the Clermont Horrible Hundred bike event in November.

Clermont is a great place for triathletes. The NTC (National Training Center) has an incredible facility with a huge outdoor pool that would make even the most anti-swimmer triathlete want to swim. The one-day rate is a little pricey ($15/person) but it's worth it when you get to swim outdoors and be surrounded by other like-minded individuals (there's no shortage of triathletes in the area, no matter when you go to Clermont).

There are countless routes for cycling. Since we were last in Clermont (in 2017), there have been so many new developments, roads and cycling trails. Although we consider Greenville, SC super bike friendly, it's incredible how many cycling-friendly paths there are in the area. We also feel safe on the road, mostly because the drivers are accustomed to sharing the roads with cyclists/triathletes. We have been fairly lucky with this trip as the weather was perfectly HOT when we arrived on Sunday evening. Although Wed was rainy and chilly, we were lucky to get two warm days to start our train-cation. It's been a nice change from our weather in Greenville (which is not that bad compared to way up north!). And in case you were wondering, Clermont is hilly!! Although we are searching out more "flat" terrain while we are here, we are getting plenty of ups and downs to remind us of home. 

As for running, there's the notorious Clay Trail that is a rolling hill trail covered in orangish clay. It's very popular among visitors and locals. We were planning to run on it on Thurs but due to weather, we had to swap Wed/Thurs workouts. While there are plenty of paved trails for running, we enjoy running by the Waterfront Lake - which is home to a series of triathlon events from March until October.

Tomorrow we will conclude our training camp with one last big workout. Here's the run down so far...

Monday AM:
4300 yard swim
2:46 ride

Monday PM:
50 minute run

Tuesday AM:
3:49 ride
(Karel had a 25 min run off the bike)

Tuesday PM:
4000 yard swim (with a 40 min break before the main set due to lightening)

Wednesday AM:
5000 yard swim
1 hour run for me, 50 min run for Karel

Wednesday PM:
30 minute run

Thursday AM (still to come!)
5 hour ride
20 min brick run

With a lot of training to pack into 3.5 days, nutrition plays a huge role in our training - all year long.  Consistency is key for us as we love the process of training, but we also care greatly about our health. In my opinion, nothing says "healthy" when you think about the stress that we put our body under when we are training for 3-5 hours a day so it's very important for us (and for all athletes) to consider the role of the daily diet and sport nutrition to help the body perform well and adapt to this intentional overload of training stress.

While I always put a lot of thought and effort into how we eat and fuel, it never feels too overwhelming for me. With a background in exercise science (Bachelor degree) and exercise physiology (Master degree), I find that sport nutrition comes quite simple for me. Because I know what's going on on a physiological level, it's much easier for me to know how to eat, fuel and hydrate on a daily basis. 

I prepped a lot of food before we traveled to Clermont so that we could easily put together a balanced meal in a hurry, without needing to think about meal planning (or waiting for food). Rather than making complete meals, I made a bunch of different foods such as rice, quinoa, boiled potatoes, sauteed veggies, tempeh, tofu and chicken. I also brought along some staples like honey, syrup, PB and oatmeal, as well as some "fun" foods like Oreas and pita chips (however, the later two haven't been consumed very much). Karel and I are all about real food to make up the majority of our diet but as endurance athletes, there is room for the "fun" foods. We never worry about eating "too much" and we also don't focus on body image when we train (or throughout the day). Food is our fuel and nourishment and we don't ever restrict ourselves (that includes fueling before and during workouts). 

Although I am all about real food, there's a time and a place for sport nutrition - specifically powders and bars. I'm grateful for the sport nutrition companies out there who have well-formulated products with safe and effective ingredients. When I search for a quality sport nutrition product, I look for the carbohydrates, electrolytes and formulation to ensure that it's well made and also that it can be easily digested and absorbed. I am not a fan of "boosters" and additives in sport nutrition products so to me, sport nutrition needs to be simple - give the body what it needs and nothing more. If the body needs something more (ex. BCAAs, protein, fat, etc.), get it from an extra source and not from your primary sport drink. By supplying the body with what it needs during a workout (with the right type of product and amount), the body can perform at its best and the stress response decreases (with less risk for injury, burnout and sickness). This is how the body can best stay "healthy" through intense and high volume training. In my opinion, sport nutrition products are not unhealthy - they keep the body in good health! That is - if you use them properly.

Throughout this camp, I've not consumed any energy drinks or caffeinated products outside of my one cup of coffee in the morning. The energy that I need comes from my daily diet and from the fuel and hydration that I consume during training (and after training). 

Karel and I don't get to train like this very often. Even with the Ironman World Championship as our priority race this season (in October), this will likely be our only personal training camp of the year. The rest of the season will include a lot of private and group training camps for athletes and we will squeeze in our own training when it makes sense. As part of this mini train-cation, I wanted to use social media to show you how we train, fuel and eat. It's not extreme, sexy or complicated. Yes, it does require a lot of planning, understanding and effort, but I feel it's an obligation to my body to take care of it. 

It's not uncommon for endurance athletes to want to change how they look and to experience strong feelings before, during and after workouts to be lighter, leaner or stronger. This often leads to overexercising and underfueling. However, there is also a large group of athletes who don't think this way but just lack an understanding of how to fuel and eat to support the training load. Regardless of the group that you fit into, haphazard fueling and eating can result in health issues and a performance decline.

As it relates to the former group, rather than fueling for consistent training, great health and a stronger body, athletes sabotage great workouts by not eating properly. The body becomes weaker and more fragile as the goal switches from being strong, fit and healthy to train more and to eat less.

There are far too many nutrition "experts" who are encouraging athletes to avoid carbs and sport nutrition and even to fast for 8-24 hours at a time. Because of this, athletes are scared and confused about food. This thinking is absolutely wrong!!!

The outcomes of an underfueled/undernourished body are not advantageous. I could not image training in an underfueled, undernourished state. Workouts are hard enough as they are, even when I'm well fueled! 

If you have been told to not fuel before, during or after a workout OR you feel you are chronically undernourished OR you are occasionally severely restricting your food/sport nutrition intake, you may be putting your body at an increased risk for injury, burnout and illness. 

Please be kind to your body. Take care of it and give your body the fuel and nourishment that it deserves. In return you'll be rewarded with great health, consistent training and an improved quality of life. 

Off to Clermont, Florida for our training camp!

It's crazy to think that in 2014, we held our first ever training camp in Clermont, Florida. 

Now, 4 years later, we are heading back to Clermont for our 4th consecutive Trimarni Clermont training camp.

Every year, we try to make our camp experience better than the last. This year, our campers are in for an amazing 4.5 day training camp experience filled with education, lots of sponsor swag, challenging workouts, learning and stretching the comfort zone. And to make the camp experience even better, we will once again conclude our training camp with a USAT sanctioned Olympic distance event on the last day of camp!

For us as coaches, seeing athletes in action is extremely beneficial as it gives us an opportunity to provide immediate feedback to improve skills and execution. Repetitive feedback to our campers offers the chance to correct previously learned habits and to enforce good habits.

For our campers, training in a group environment provides a fantastic opportunity to do more with the body than what can be done solo as training with other athletes keeps the mind from giving up and forces you to not give up when tired. We believe that a camp training environment shows athletes that they are physically and mentally capable of achieving so much more than what they think they can do alone in their home environment. 

Above all, every athlete, no matter how young, old or busy, deserves the opportunity to check out of life to do something incredible with the body. Certainly, a sport is a hobby and we do this hobby because it is fun, it makes us happy and it provides great life enrichment. Good health should never be taken for granted and a training camp gives the body a unique opportunity to place intentional stress on it for several days, with other like-minded individuals. 

You can follow us along on our Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition Facebook page where we will be posting videos and pictures throughout camp.

Wednesday evening is the official start of the 2017 Trimarni Clermont Training camp so between now and then, we will be getting together the final touches for a smooth and safe camp environment, packing the swag bags, fine-tuning the workouts and getting excited to welcome our 19 campers to Clermont, Florida. 

Our email will be checked throughout camp but we will not be quick to respond as we will be chasing around our athletes all over Clermont for the rest of the week. 

2016 Trimarni Clermont camp - day 1

After a busy day on Wednesday, it was finally time to start our training camp... not-so-bright, but humid and early in the morning.

I was so lucky this year to find the perfect house for our campers - a Duplex just 1/2 mile from Waterfront Park (the race venue).
We love the idea of having all of our campers stay together as it promotes teamwork and it gives everyone an opportunity to really get to know their teammates. Although we do not force staying in the team house, this year, all of our campers wanted to stay in the team house which just showed me how much our athletes love the friendships and memories that are built during camp.

For the duplex rooming, the girls are upstairs and the boys are downstairs. We also have 3 athletes staying at the "coaches house".

We tend to have two themes at our training camps - a lot of training (the obvious) and a lot of education. We try to not let one overpower the other as it's so beneficial for every Trimarni athlete/camper to leave training camp with new tools, skills and knowledge but also a mindset that allows our campers to be more present in training. I find that during a training camp, our athletes recognize that the are capable of doing so much more with their body and mind due to the constant positive energy and support from one another. It's our hope that our campers can bring back the tools and focus for smarter training to assist in reaching performance goals.

For our first workout of the day (Thursday) we had a shake-out run on the schedule. We met our campers at the Duplex at 7am and by 7:15 we were down at Waterfront Park for our dynamic warm-up. We always stress the importance of a dynamic warm-up before training so we demonstrated a few of our favorite exercises. At camp, we make sure that our athletes are doing what we prescribe in their training as it's easy for our athletes (and any athlete) to be more focused on how much is accomplished in a workout rather than proper execution.

For the run workout, we had our campers run on the race course to get familiar with the route.
The workout was as followed:
1/2 mile jog warm-up
Dynamic stretching
10 min EZ jog
MS:
6 x 30 sec build to fast w/ 60 sec EZ

Cool down to house

We left our campers with enough time to refuel after the run workout and to get ready for our  9:30am Long Course Swim at the NTC. 

For many of our campers, this was their first long course swim in a long time (or ever) and first outdoor swim in a long time. We just love this pool. 

We try not to overwhelm our athletes with skill improvements when swimming but since swimming is so skill specific, having the opportunity to see our athletes swim is extremely valuable as it's easy to learn bad (inefficient) habits when you are a new swimmer. 

We did not take it easy on our campers for the swim and include a few very strong efforts in this workout.

MS: 4-6 x (100 STRONG, then 10 sec rest (grab buoy), then 200 active recovery swim. Rest 1 minute and repeat.)

After the 90-minute swim, our campers had a "long" break from 11am - 2:45pm to eat, rest, relax and think about their third workout  of the day. 

At 2:45pm, we met outside the team house (this is the team Duplex in the above pic) and Karel talked about the purpose of the workout and provided the team with the main set.

MS: 4-5 x (2 min build, 4 min strong) w/ 90 sec EZ

Our amazing photographer Taylor! 

We biked to the Oly race course and provided the team with one last talk before we sent each athlete off in TT order for the main set. We then regrouped and we all biked home together and covered the entire race course. 2 hours later, we were back home. 

Later in the evening we gathered the team for our nightly team talk/recap and I lectured about long run sport nutrition to ensure that our campers would know how to fuel and hydrate for the Friday long run and for future training and on race day.



Our campers enjoyed their team dinner (thank you Taylor for feeding our athletes!) and then it was lights out early for me and Karel.
I'm sure it was all laughs and chats for a while before their bedtime. 

2016 Trimarni Clermont camp - pre-camp

Every year, Karel and I feel overwhelmed with all that goes into planning a training camp.
But as soon as we see our campers, we get excited to have the opportunity to spend several days of one-on-one coaching with our campers.

This year in Clermont, every camper is a Trimarni coaching athlete - either a one-on-one athlete or a performance team member (after purchasing a training plan, for only $50 a month extra they receive all team/sponsor discounts and benefits, access to our private Trimarni Team Facebook page and they receive detailed check-in educational emails every Monday).

Every camper knows our philosophy for coaching and understands our training methodologies. However, as the sport of triathlon continues to evolve, the athletes who have been coached by us for more than a year (alongside the new athletes) are learning new skills, tips and information at our camps.

Although we put a lot of attention and focus into our training plans, nothing can replace the immediate improvements in skills and fitness that can be accomplished in just a few days at a training camp.

Although our training camps are a lot of fun (there's a lot of laughing and smiling), there's no shortage of challenging workouts and education to ensure that every athlete leaves camp with the ability to train smarter to train harder.

After I shook out my legs with a short brick on Wed morning, it was time to get all the swag together for our campers. 

I feel so lucky to have Clif Bar providing sport nutrition food and drinks for our campers to ensure that they put quality ingredients into their body while training.
This year I am doing something that I have never done before and that is spending at least 45 minutes every evening of camp educating our campers on how to use sport nutrition properly and then how to best fuel for the next day of training. This educational opportunity provides our campers with information that is not overwhelming but also applicable to each workout. 

I also want to send a big thank you to Oobe for producing our team and camp shirts, Veronica's Health Crunch for providing our campers with all types of crunch flavors (be sure to try her newest flavor - cinnamon apple cranberry, it's so heavenly delicious!), Oakley and Oakley Women for providing bags, Justine (Trimarni athlete) for creating awesome Trimarni swimsuits (for guys and girls) and all of the other Trimarni team sponsors for supporting our team all season. 

After I was finished setting up the swag in the Team Duplex, Karel and I headed to the NTC to check out our camp and then we moved all our stuff to our rental Townhome to finally get settled for camp. 

Karel is always in high demand at our camps for bike mechanic work and RETUL fits so a few campers get to take advantage of his expertise at our camps (he would do more but there isn't enough time with all the training!)

After a long day, it was finally time to eat.
I was excited to finally cook in a kitchen so I made chicken for Karel (I had cottage cheese), roasted potatoes w/ melted cheddar cheese and a salad w/ oranges, strawberries and cashews. 

Stay tuned for my recap of our first official day of camp!
(or you can just follow the camp on my Trimarni Facebook page).

Clermont, FL....here we come!

 It seems like it was just December and I was in the initial process of preparing for our 2016 Trimarni Clermont Training camp.

I know our campers are just as excited as we are to start 4-days of intentional training overload.

Our campers will be training over 4 hours every day with 3 workouts each day. There's just enough time between workouts to eat and rest.

Our campers know what they are in for at a Trimarni training camp - it's the perfect mix of fun, education and challenging workouts.
We will be stretching some comfort zones over the next 3 days.

And to conclude the training camp, every Trimarni camper will be racing (yes, racing) the Great Clermont Triathlon (Olympic distance) on Sunday. We included the race into our training camp last year and it was a perfect opportunity for our athletes to incorporate the many skills that they learned at camp and to execute without the pressure to finish with a specific time or place goal.

I will be updating the Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition Facebook page with pictures throughout our  camp and hopefully, my blog as well. You can stay up to date with our camp on social media by searching for the hashtags #Trimarni #Trimarni camp or follow on Facebook. 

Here are a few pics from our trip to Jacksonville, FL and then to Clermont, FL

Sweet snack on the road before lunch on Monday in route to Jacksonville, FL.

Late afternoon snack at Native Sun Jax.

Karel doing a pre-race tune up on our friend's bike at Open Road Bicycles. Karel is always in high demand with his expert bike mechanic and bike fit skills, even when we travel. 

Palm trees - it's been a while (I still love my mountains more than the beach)

But I really love outdoor swimming - anywhere!
Thanks Trimarni athlete and friend Adam for taking us to the perfect pool for our 4700 yard morning swim on Tuesday - and for joining us for some fun in the water!

Mix and match lunch from Publix grocery store as we made last leg of our trip from Jax to Clermont.
Karel got a Publix sub. 

After unloading our packed car, Karel and I needed to relax our tight legs from all the traveling. We enjoyed a 1:45 ride around the lake and on the Olympic race course. After two years of riding in Greenville, SC, the Clermont hills are getting flatter and flatter. :) 

After we cleaned up from our ride, we made a quick grocery store shop at Publix and then it was finally time to eat and call it a day.
I had a stuffed pita w/ mixed greens and arugula w/ chopped Cabot cheese and hummus, and a side of baby carrots and cottage cheese. 

Karel had "brinner" (Breakfast for Dinner) which consisted of oats, strawberries and almond butter (mixed with milk) and a side of eggs and ham with fresh bread (from Native Sun) w/ butter. 

Trimarni Clermont camp - Day 2 recap

                           

Good morning campers!!
March 20th, 7:30am - meet at the NTC track!

We reserved the track from 7:30-9am but the first 30 minutes were spent warming up. We find this extremely valuable for our athletes and we feel this is often a missing link in the average age-groupers training plan. With rushed schedules and never enough time for anything, strength training and a proper warm-up are typically put to the side in order to squeeze in every extra minute to add more mileage/distance to the workout.
We did our mobility warm-up, followed by 1 mile EZ jog and then 10 more minutes of dynamic warm-ups. All in an effort to help our campers warm-up the body to enable the body to perform better and to reduce risk for injury. 

While we were doing our workout, an elite runner to the side of us did not go unnoticed. She spent around 15 minutes jogging super slowly on the track and then another 30 minutes doing her warm-up exercises. This is proof that top athletes do spend time warming up because it makes for better quality workouts. Lesson to age groupers - use your time wisely and stop counting miles and focus on what you get out of your available training time.  

                           

photo by Elizabeth

What a picture! We felt like we were running in a sauna but a run is better than no run and track workouts are so much fun with company!

Since 19 of our 20 athletes are Trimarni coaching athletes, this would be the very first "speed" workout for all of our athletes. Although our athletes have been training with us since November, they have been diligently working on building their foundation and getting stronger before they go faster. Not to our surprise, everyone ran FAST and did just great on the track! We absolutely LOVE track workouts but it can be a recipe for injury, burnout and a suppressed immune system if the body is not healthy and strong to run fast.

Ready, set .....GO!

A fun main set for our athletes to work on pacing and mental focus.

Thank you Clif Bar for keeping our athletes well-fueled throughout our camp!!
And thank you Run In, our local running store, for all your support for the Trimarni Team!

Do you always run with a sport drink? I highly recommend you do so in order to train your gut, to stay hydrated, to meet your electrolyte needs, to keep your immune system healthy and to help postpone fatigue and boost recovery.

The Trimarni team fuels smart!

Photo by Elizabeth (far right, looking happy to be running!)

Love my Trimarni girls!

Photo by Elizabeth
My athletes make me work hard! Here I am pacing Trimarni athlete Kevin D who just turned 57! Super strong and FAST!

Photo by Elizabeth
Time to cool down! Yay for keeping the easy stuff easy and the hard stuff hard.

Wrapping up our track session with some key pointers for our athletes.

9am - time for a long course swim session!!

Although an active recovery swim would be a great idea, we didn't take it easy on our campers!

Deck-ups were on tap and although our athletes were tired, everyone gave their 100%!

 

MS: (Long course)

5 x 150's as: 50 smooth, 50 build. Then get out of the water, run around the block and then 50 build to fast.

Rest as needed and then 50 EZ swim to home base. Rest 30 sec and repeat 4 more times.

                                          Yay - all done for the morning workout sessions!

Trimarni camp is never complete without an underwater pic! Love my age-group swimmers!

After the swim we did 15 minutes of dryland (yep - more core work!) and then we called it a morning. 

We gave our athletes some free time to refuel and rest from 10:30am until 2:30pm.
This was well-needed by everyone for although we want to overload our athletes with solid training stress, we never train at the expense of poor nutritional habits or inadequate sleep. 

At 3pm, we all meet at the NTC for a 2 hour social spin OR a 2 hour tempo ride (Karel's group). 

As coaches and athletes, we do not believe in junk miles. As age group athletes we have a lot on our plates and going through the motions just to tick away miles is rarely beneficial. We want quality sessions and to use our time, when we aren't training, wisely in order to make our training sessions count. Junk miles only break down an athlete and take up precious time for sleeping, eating and relaxing (and spending time with family/friends).
However, in the case of  a training camp, we used this social spin as an active recovery ride for most of our campers. Knowing this was the 6th workout in 48 hours for our campers, this is new training stress for many of them and a social spin got our athletes on their bikes, outside and made them use their body even when they were tired and exhausted. 

The best part about the ride was having our athletes work together. If one athlete was tired and the other athlete felt good, that good energy spread throughout the group. 

Photo by Elizabeth
Plus - the views were not hard to enjoy either. 

Photo by Elizabeth
It's hard not to want to be outside, on two wheels, with views like this and GREAT company!

After the two groups regrouped back at the NTC, our campers cleaned up at the NTC and Karel and I headed back to our condo to get ready for our team Pizza dinner!

The vegetarian pizza selection.

Pizza was provided by us for our campers from Lil Anthony's Pizza (which was GREAT!) and based on the number of empty pizza boxes (we ordered 6 XL pizzas, 3 vegetarian options and 3 meat-lover options), I'm pretty sure our campers were extra hungry. 

Campy was on his best behavior....especially around the meat eaters for any "accidental" topping droppings. 

Beer, pizza, friends, Campy and.......

DESSERTS!!!
Thank you Sara with Sara Ran Away With The Spoon for sending us your delicious treats!

Gluten Free Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

Lemon Patty Cake

Chocolate Chip Brownies 

Blackberry/Granola bars

And Happy Birthday Taryn!!!

Slow down Elizabeth - save some cookies for the rest of us! 

Karel and Colleen - sharing is caring when it comes to desserts!

A HUGE thank you to the Trimarni sponsors for providing some AWESOME prizes for our campers. We resorted to the draw-names-out-of-a-hat option.

Thank you Oakley and Oakley Women for providing a pair of Half Jacket 2.0 shades for the male prize and the Commit SQ Breast Cancer edition shades (my fav!) for the female prize.

Thank you Veronica's Health Crunch for providing your NEW banana walnut cacao crunch, Xterra Wetsuits for the wetsuits and to Run In for the Body Glide, 2 Fuel Belts and 2 handheld flasks. 

Looking good Maggie and Jim! Congrats on winning your new Oakley shades!

Rob, Wlad, Colleen and Tricia will be running well-hydrated with their new Fuel Belt hydration gear. 

Stay tuned for day 3. Yep, we are only half way through camp! 

Trimarni Clermont Camp - Day 1 recap

It's Thursday 3/19 at 5:30am - time for us to wake-up for the first day of the 2015 Trimarni Clermont camp!!!

After Karel and I had our pre-workout snack, we drove a few miles down to the road to meet our campers at the NTC. 

Our 20 campers were wide awake and excited for our first workout of a jammed-packed day. 

2.5 hour bike + 20 min run

To ensure my campers were properly fueled and hydrated, I encouraged everyone to start the morning with a satisfying carb-rich pre-workout meal before the workout (around 300-350 calories) and to bring 3 bottles of sport drink (200-250 calories) for the ride and to have at least 50-100 calories of sport drink for the run. Clif Bar graciously sponsored our camp with sport nutrition products for our campers but everyone was able to bring their own nutrition as well.
I strongly advised my campers to have a hydration system for the run (fuel belt or hand held) as that is something that we highly recommend for all of our triathletes to get comfortable carrying their own nutrition/fluids while running. Our local run store RUN IN wanted to help out with the camp and we were incredibly grateful for letting us borrow some coolers for ice cold water and NUUN tablets for post workouts. 

We started our ride from the NTC and headed on the trail toward the Great Clermont Olympic Distance triathlon race course. This is a great course because you get a hint of flat roads to start and finish but there are two punchy climbs which take you to rolling hills for the middle stretch of the bike course. If you are interested, Karel mapped out 2 loops of the bike course for our campers on MapMyRide.  It doesn't have my mountains that I love but it is a beautiful course. 

We broke into two groups with Karel's group working on pacing, rotating and legal drafting whereas my group worked on climbing, descending and gearing skills. All important components to being a faster and smarter cyclist. 

We spent around 90 minutes on the "top" of the course before heading back to the lake to head home as a group. 

Karel's group working hard!

Another part of Karel's group.

Karel giving a wrap-up talk to our workout before heading back home.
Yes, we like to take up all of the road :) 

Just riding along.

Just looking for my furry friends. 

After our ride, we instructed our athletes to do 20 minutes total running but they had to include 4 x 30 sec hill strides/sprints at the end of their run. It was fun to have our athletes push each other - there was a lot of "racing" going on between athletes for 30 seconds. After each sprint the athlete walked down the hill before repeating. 

After the brick, our athletes had around 90 minutes to get cleaned up in the NTC lockers rooms, grab a recovery drink/smoothie and get some lunch and then meet back at the NTC at 12:45pm for our lectures from 1-4pm. 

Karel had a quick hour to clean-up, change, eat and pack-up our car (and give Campy some kisses) before we headed back to the NTC for our afternoon of lectures. Thankfully, my mom served as my other hands while we were training and she washed fruit for our athletes. Thanks mom!

We had plenty of electrolyte-rich foods for our campers, pretzels, Blue Chips and Veronica's Health Crunch. All good stuff for every type of post workout craving. 

The BEST crunch ever!! Once you try this trail mix you will never want another trail mix ever again. 

A highlight of our camp was having Chris Johnson, PT  speak to our group. Although he lives in Seattle, we were able to use the power of technology to have Chris Skype with us, use JoinMe for his presentation and have an interactive, informative session with our campers. If you don't know, Chris has played an integral role in my training since October and he is keeping me injury free by helping me properly design strength training and the correct running mechanics for my training. Check out his YouTube videos - he is one awesome PT and athlete!!

Although we didn't have a lot of time, Karel and I find it extremely important to talk to our athletes and give them the "why's" to their training. If our athletes do not understand why they are doing what they are doing, we don't feel they will get the most out of workouts by just following a plan.

Although Karel is not comfortable public speaking, he did an exceptional job talking about what he knows best and that is bikes. Bike fits, bike gear, bike training, bike racing.....he talked a little about Solestar Insoles which we are using (and many of our athletes), he talked about training with power (ex. Normalized Power vs Average power), the best race wheels for athletes and how to sit on a bike.

I spent a little time discussing the developing athlete and finished by talking about sport nutrition. I could spend hours talking about sport nutrition but I had 20 minutes to fill my campers heads with valuable information on how to fuel for endurance sports and eat for  health. 

After 3 hours of sitting in a classroom, our campers were exited to jump into the long course pool for their last workout of the day.

Inviting, right? 

The main set was as follows for our speedy swimmers (we had 3 lanes divided-up into different swim abilities and modified the workout for each lane)
3xs:
4x (30 sec vertical kicking followed by 50 build to fast with 10 sec rest in between).
After 4 rounds, 30 sec extra rest and then repeat MS 2 more times. 

Thank goodness for the Clif Hydration drink to keep us properly fueled and hydrated. I love the Cranberry Razz, Karel likes the Lemon Lime-Aid.  

After our swimmers finished their 1 hour swim workout, it was time for 15 minutes of dry land. Oh yes, the good old days of doing dry land exercises before and after swim practice. 

I made sure all of our campers left with sore abs!

Never too many modified v-ups!

After we released our exhausted campers at 5:30pm, Karel and I changed and got in the water so that we could do a short swim workout before we called it a day.

We were so proud of our campers. Not one complaint, a lot of determination and focus and eagerness to learn.

And of course, it is just so awesome to see our athletes interact with one another - something you just don't get when you train alone. 

At 6:45pm, Karel and I were officially pooped and ready for a good meal, snuggle time with Campy and to get things ready for day 2 of camp. 

Stay tuned for day 2 of the Trimarni Clermont Camp which included a track workout, swim and bike!

Trimarni Clermont Camp - Pre-camp recap

I absolutely LOVE our training camps. 

How can you not love the idea of checking out of life for a few days just to train, eat and sleep with your fellow teammates?

 I love the positive energy of our campers on the first day, eager to train, sleep and eat. I also love the looks I get around day 3 of the camp when our campers are tired, exhausted and sore. But above all, I love the friendships that are made between our athletes. There is so much hard work going on that it's hard to not give 100% when everyone is supporting one another. In a group environment, you have no choice but to soften the excuses and give your best effort even when you think you can't. It's simply incredible to see our athletes discover new limits, embrace new challenges and to support one another. 

I always have a few goals for our training camps and safety is on the top of that list. But another big goal is fun. I want my athletes to have a lot of fun while training because for many of our athletes, they train alone most of the time and balance a lot in life. I feel an easy way to accomplish this is to take care of my athletes as much as possible so that all they have to do is show up and train with their teammates. 

The behind the scene moments of putting together a training camp are not pretty.  Although I enjoy wearing multiple caps as a coach, sport RD and party planner (aka "camp organizer"), I have to say that I really appreciate all the work that race directors do so that us athletes, can just show up on race day and do what we love to do and that is to race.

When planning our camps, there are a lot of moving parts, a lot of logistics to contend with and a big lesson that I've learned is... never make an itinerary final - something will always come up. 
To say that I am excited for First Bourn to build their first facility in Asheville, NC is an understatement. I can not wait to have our camps in an all-inclusive facility that caters to athletes!! 

Thankfully, we hold our Clermont training camp at the NTC and my contact is super easy to work with in terms of reserving pool time, the track and conference rooms. For this camp, I also reserved two houses around 12 miles away from the NTC for our campers and organized roomates and sleeping arrangements. The houses (instead of hotels) were something that our campers requested last year after we sent out our camp feedback form so...they ask and they shall receive. 

Lastly, a huge highlight of our camps is the swag. We absolutely LOVE the Trimarni sponsors this season and we were so excited to see the Trimarni love from our sponsors with awesome swag for our campers. And we were also so thrilled that the Trimarni kits came in on time (thanks CANARI!!) so that our campers could sport their new gear at camp.
Thank you Trimarni sponsors for supporting the Trimarni team!
Clif Bar
Canari Cyclewear
Oakley and Oakley Women 
Veronica's Health Crunch
Run In 
First Bourn
TrainingPeaks
SOLESTAR
Challenge Family
TriBike Transport
Salem Professional Anesthesia Services
XTERRA Wetsuits

So, enough details...

After Karel and I did our morning workout on Tues (3800 yard swim) we packed up our car and my mom's car (who was joining us and serving the role as Campy babysitter and my second pair of hands) and off we went to Clermont, FL around 11am. 

9 hours later...palm trees and warmth!!! Campy was so pumped about his first training camp!

Campy loves road trips and although he spends half the time napping, he also loves looking out the windows, stopping at new pee-stops and being with his mommy and daddy. He is the best travel partner even though he doesn't say a word. 

Karel, my mom, Campy and I were staying at a condo near Waterfront Park thanks to my athlete Colleen who connected me with one of her friends who rents out his condo. After arriving to the condo shortly after 8:30pm, Karel and I headed a few miles down the road for a quick grocery shop at Publix. I don't think I've ever shopped for groceries at 9:30pm but we made it in and out in 15 minutes and had enough food to last us a few days. We were off to bed around 10:30pm.

The day before our camp is always a hectic day but since Karel and I give our total energy to our campers during camp, we made sure to spend a little energy on ourselves with a morning run...in the heat!! 

Campy watched for gecko's while I headed out for a 9 mile flat run along the water.  I was so happy to work on my triathlete tan-lines. Since this is my first triathlon season in Greenville, the past ten years in FL have left me with conversation-starting tan lines all over my body. 

Thank goodness I just got my new Nathan Fuel belt from my fav local run store Run In, which holds 20 ounces total of fluids! And it's pink - yay! My Oakley Women shades came in handy with the beautiful sun.

After I refueled and organized myself at the condo, I spent a few hours working for my nutrition athletes and around 2pm, my mom and I headed to the rental homes (2 blocks from one another) to place swag bags on the beds of my athletes.

Again - Thank you Sponsors!!!
(And a special thank you to Salt Stick for sending samples to our campers! We really appreciate you thinking of us and our electrolyte needs in the FL heat!) 

Xterra gave us wet suit hangers - so cool!
Clif Bar was our title nutrition sponsor and provided sport nutrition for our campers throughout the camp.
Oakley and Oakley Women provided hair ties and lanyards for the ladies and socks for the guys.
Veronica's Health Crunch provided her yummy crunch in individual bags
And Training Peaks gave our athletes awesome mesh bags.


Our campers also received their kits. Great job Karel and Canari - they look awesome this year!

While my mom and I were out for a few hours decorating the team homes and doing a little more grocery shopping for our first day of camp, Karel stayed busy back at the condo by assembling a few bikes for our campers who flew into town. It's an added bonus for our campers to have an in-house bike mechanic and sport RD throughout their entire camp.
Thank you Trimarni athlete Elizabeth for making our tummies happy with your homemade banana walnut bread!! I love being fueled by bread!

Stay tuned for the recap of the first day of Trimarni Clermont camp! 

If you are interested in a private camp for up to 8 of your training buddies in Greenville, SC, send me an email so we get things set-up for a fun, challenging, educational, skill-focused and nature-filled camp!

Tri-race road-trip! What’s in my cooler?

Welcome to our life….. we are on the road again! 

But this time it’s triple the fun because I get to train on the hills, I get to watch Karel and 6 of our Trimarni athletes race in the Clermont Olympic Distance Triathlon AND Campy gets to make memories with us!

After a quick stop at the Jacksonville Running Company on Friday late afternoon (when Karel got finished with a RETUL fit and I got finished with my Oakley Women Facebook chat), we hit the road around 5pm, hoping to miss some Friday traffic in route to Clermont, Florida (just outside of Orlando). We arrived around 7:30pm and missed the traffic. YAY!

I packed a cooler and bag full of yummy goodies for us to enjoy so once we arrived to our hotel (Clermont Days Inn and Suites – pet friendly) all we had to do was prep, eat and relax.

When it comes to traveling for races, I prefer to bring as much Trimarni-friendly options as possible for it makes our trip a lot easier to have our food options within our control (when we want to fuel our body). It  isn’t that we don’t ever eat out when we travel for races but there are a few pre-race foods that work well for Karel and me and traveling with food takes the guessing/stressing away as to where and when we will eat. Not to mention, bringing our own food from the grocery store reduces costs on eating out for traveling is not cheap, especially when you throw in the cost of race fees. 

When it comes to traveling to a new place for a vacation or event (non-sport related), Karel and I LOVE supporting the local food business as well as enjoying local eats. You will not find us eating in our room (or eating similar foods that we eat at home) when we go to new places for we love to explore new places and eat like the locals. I also get really inspired by new meals which gives me great excitement for when I get home to the Trimarni kitchen.  Since we don’t have rules with our diet, we both believe if you eat well most of the time you don’t have to worry about the rest of the time.

Here is my list of what I brought with us for our Fri – Sun trip to Clermont, Florida
(Not everything is/will be consumed but always good to have options. Most of the foods are in our daily diet.)

Cooler:
2 flavored Chobani Greek yogurt
2 Fage 0% plain Greek yogurt
Large bag of mixed sliced fruit (grapes, apples, strawberries)
Deli meat (for Karel)
Sliced cheese
4 hardboiled eggs
Hummus
Bag of baby carrots
Large bag of mixed greens
1 small carton skim milk
1 Kefir strawberry drink
1 Bolthouse chocolate protein drink (for Karel)
6 slices Ezekiel cinnamon raisin bread
Irish butter (for Karel)
Local Blackberry Jam (from our trip to Waycross, GA)

Food bag:
4 small bananas
1 fresh baguette

1 bag WASA crackers
3  pitas
Honey
2 sandwich-size baggies of peanuts and golden raisins
Large bag of mixed cereal (Cheerios, granola, Kashi cinnamon cereal)
1 bag triscuits
4 packets oatmeal
Smuckers Natural Peanut butter
Dark chocolate
1 can soup (for Karel)
1 bag 90 second rice (it has chicken stock in it so only Karel ate it)
1 large Tuna packet (in water)
Dog food
Instant coffee

Sport Nutrition bag:
INFINIT customized formula (for me)
INFINIT Speed (for Karel)
Napalm (for me and Karel)
2 gel flasks
4 water bottles (for me)
3 water bottles (for Karel)
4 KIND bars
2 Power bar performance energy blends (for Karel)
Optygen
Hammer Endurance Aminos
Hammer Tissue Rejuvinator

Extra:
Plastic plates
Tupperware bowl
Plastic bowls
Silverware
Napkins
2 jugs water

We woke up around 6am on Saturday and the weather was perfect for a beautiful day of riding. I couldn’t wait to get on my bike in the hills of Clermont, Florida. 

Karel and I drove to the NTC  with our bikes attached and we each went our separate ways. Karel did his race warm-up on the race bike course and a short run off the bike, each with a few pick-ups to get the blood flowing.

As for me, Karel gave me a great workout to test my current level of fitness after a few months of consistent (injury free) "train smarter to train harder" training (YAY - thank you body!) . 

3:15 ride in the hills of Clermont (59 miles)
(I enjoyed seeing a few athletes on the course during the Half Ironman event that was happening in the morning)

8 mile run off the bike:
(I ended up running around our hotel which was around 1/3 mile but provided me with unlimited ice from the ice machine (which made my intervals amazing in the hot Florida sun) but also a change to pace myself on terrain that was not flat but also not super hilly. I could also focus and settle into a pace without worrying about cars if I were to run on the road outside of our hotel. Also I could keep me bottle of sport drink and gel flask of Napalm on Karel’s car for easy sipping between intervals)

2 mile warm-up (7:43, 7:39)
Walk 1 minute
MS 3xs:
5 min @ 6:45 min/mile, 5 min @ 7:30 min/mile
(over/under intervals to help the aerobic threshold while minimizing fatigue in a long run)
1 min walk/rest in between
10 min cool down

After the workout, it was time to enjoy some Campy time outside and then clean-up (while refueling with a glass of milk mixed with whey protein powder and a handful of cereal, also 1 Hammer FIZZ tablet in a bottle of water) before heading to Chiptole with Karel for a meal. 

We both got our meal to go (I got a veggie salad on greens with rice, beans, cheese, corn, veggies and salsa) and Karel ate in the car (with Campy watching carefully for any accidental chicken droppings)  while I drove to the race venue (my tummy wasn’t quite ready for a meal so I snacked on some fruit).

After Karel picked up his packet we made one quick trip to Publix so Karel could get a few last minute foods for his pre-race meal in our hotel room.

This afternoon I talked race-strategy with a few of our 6 Trimarni athletes that are racing tomorrow and Karel did a final tune-up on his bike to get it officially race ready.  Tonight it is early to bed for an exciting day tomorrow of watching trained bodies and minds in action! 

Triathletes are so inspiring! 

Trimarni camp day 4 - putting it all together with the Trimarni Mock Tri!

Day 1: 1 hour swim, 1:15 hour interval run, 30 min strength
Day 2:  3-4 hour bike + 30 min run
Day 3: 3 hour bike + 60-80 min run

After our team dinner on Saturday evening, Karel and I relaxed in bed at our hotel and we couldn't stop talking about our campers.Over three days of quality and tough training, we heard no complaints and saw a lot of effort and heard no excuses. When discussing the plan for the mock tri on Sunday for the last day of camp, we could tell our campers were tired but smiles that we saw on Thursday, still remained on their faces. The camp was going so well, beyond our expectations and although we knew everyone was tired, we didn't want the camp to end. And what what we could not expect was how well everyone was getting along. There were no competition as to who's the best, fastest or strongest athlete but instead, each athlete pushed each other as comfort zones were stretched. Since Karel and I are all about teamwork, it was a beautiful sight to see friendships being made while bodies were in action. 

There was so much positive energy throughout the camp and we knew Sunday's workout would be a big confidence builder for all our campers. Not only were our campers able to apply everything they learned throughout camp and test clothing/gear that may be used on race day but our athletes were forced to be body/mind aware and everyone was in a positive environment to "race" their own race. Although we treated the mock tri as training, it was the last chance for our campers to push their bodies to have the best performance possible on the last day of camp. 

Since we are firm believers in getting adequate sleep to help the body rejuvinate and repair, our meeting time on Sunday was 7:15am with an 8am swim time for our mock tri. 

The athletes gathered in the parking lot of the NTC and after bottles were filled and tires were pumped, we did our normal pre-race routine and spent about 10 minutes with our campers, leading them through dynamic warm-ups. The weather was just perfect for our mock tri and it was already a great start to the day with everyone laughing and continuing to make memories with each other. 

We racked our bikes by the pool at the NTC and all the campers set up their transition area as if it was a race. 

Once everyone was ready, we went to our two reserved long course lanes to warm-up for 5 minutes. 

Mock tri:
30 min time trial swim (non-stop) - however many meters you can complete in 30 minutes.
26 mile bike ride (similar route to our Saturday workout so that the athletes were familiar with the route and could practice changing gears and pacing themselves on rolling terrain)
40-50 min run (or 10K) - on trail, which includes rolling terrain

Karel and I swam with everyone and it was great to just zone out and swim long course with everyone.
After our swim, we all got our gear ready for the bike and headed out to the trail together as a group. 

Over the next 20 min or so to get to our "course", the campers stayed in groups of similar fitness levels on the trail and once they were on the road, it was time to get into the zone.

Just like in a race, there was pacing and passing but we instructed to our athletes "safety first!" Karel rode out ahead of the campers so that he could help the athletes with any traffic on the road and I rode with athletes here and there during the ride - although Karel and I were not racing or training on the bike. We were out there to support our athletes, take pics and cheer them out. 

Karel made sure every camper got back on the trail safely and I made sure the athletes had cold water and coconut water in a marked box on the trail to hydrate as it was getting rather warm up. 

While our campers were out on the run, looking super strong, Karel and I made a last minute decision to run with our campers. Originally we were not going to run and just stay on our bikes to cheer for our athletes but when we saw our athletes running and really giving a solid effort out there we were so inspired that we put on our run shoes and headed out for a run. Karel ended up running a 10K in around 40 minutes on the trail and I ran intervals so that I could stop here and there to take pictures of the athletes running. 

Although so many highlights on Sunday, running the last 1/2 mile or so with my athlete Gary (65 years old) was a moment I will never forget. It was if the entire Clermont area was filled with positive energy from all the Trimarni campers. 

After the run (I ended up running 3.1 miles) I joined all the campers with Gary and we all celebrated the end of camp by soaking in the pool....and the smiles and laughs continued.

Words can't describe how much fun we (Karel and I) had a camp. It was all because of our amazing group of athletes that made our first camp experience the best experience ever. 

17 athletes now have new friends who can share a similar passion for an active and healthy lifestyle through triathlon training and racing. 

Karel and I look forward to putting on more camps in the near future so if you or your tri club/tri buddies have any interest in us putting on a camp in your area, just let us know.

Also, with much request, we will be placing another Trimarni kit order soon so stay tuned. 

Thank you again to the sponsors of the Trimarni camp! We had lots of happy tummies and well-fueled, strong bodies throughout the camp.

The oldest and youngest at camp. Colleen and Gary. 

My friend, web designer and the creator of the Trimarni logo - love you Doris!!

What an inspiring, motivating and amazing group!!
Until next time........

Trimarni camp recap - day 1

Wow – I can’t believe that our first endurance triathlon training camp is over! Karel and I could not be happier with how things went and it was all because of the positive energy that was shared throughout the camp from our inspiring campers.

Karel and I both knew that a Trimarni camp was in our near future but as we started to plan this camp in early January, we felt as if we didn't have enough time to get it all done. When it comes to getting things done, Karel and I are both "no excuses" type of people so if you ask us to do something, we will find a way to get it done. However, with that comes doing things right. Although there may be not be a perfect way to get something done, we always give our best effort.

We put a lot of time, money and effort into our camp so that it could be "right". Down to every detail, we knew that we couldn't make mistakes with this being our first camp but instead, everything would be a learning lesson.

After four days of swimming, biking and running in Clermont Florida, we are sad to see everyone go.

With 13 athletes (plus 2 for Sat afternoon swim + mock tri on Sun) from all over – California, Maine, Washington DC, Pennsylvania, Texas, Georgia and Florida –  new friendships were formed and there was non-stop happiness for four days. As to be expected, body's are tired and muscles are sore but each athlete has improved confidence when it comes to training and racing smart.

Several athletes stepped out of their comfort zone but now feel more confident with their skills. Every athlete had his/her comfort zone stretched with quality training, in hilly terrain, throughout the 4-day training camp.

It’s hard to summarize all that was accomplished during our camp but I would love to share some of the highlights from the camp.

Day 1: Thursday Feb 28^th 2014
6:30am – 1 hour swim
10 min warm-up
Pre set: 8 x 25’s – 10 strokes fast, rest of the pool EZ w/ 10 sec rest
Drill set w/ fins: 4 x 125’s – 25 right arm, 25 left arm, 25 6 beat kick w/ 1 stroke, 50 perfect stroke. W/ 20 sec rest
Main set:
4 x 100’s @ 80% w/ 10 sec rest (w/ fins)
4 x 100’s @ 90% w/ 20 sec rest (w/ fins)
4 x 100’s @ 90% w/ 30 sec rest (no fins)
200 cool down

8-8:20am – tour of the National Training Center.
(all Trimarni camp athletes had full access to the NTC facility throughout the entire camp)

8:30am-9:45am – interval run (hilly paved trail)
10 min warm-up
10 min dynamic stretching and discussion of the purpose of the workout/main set as well as key pointers to remember)
Main set 3x’s:
(athletes were to focus on their lap pace, time and perceived effort)
4 min @ half marathon pace
1 min EZ walk
3 min @ slightly faster than half marathon pace
1 min EZ walk
2 min @ 10K pace
1 min walk
1 min all out
1 min walk, then repeat the main set 2 more times.
Then cool down

After the run, we took the athletes inside for a 20 min hip/core/glute circuit. Each athlete was able to perform some of our favorite exercises and we also discussed the importance of hip/glute/core work on a daily basis in order to build a strong foundation.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

After a quick shower, it was time to clean up for an afternoon of presentations.
(Originally, we had planned for our athletes to have a nice and EZ 2 hour leg opener ride after the swim, but because it was slightly raining and rather chilly that morning, we went to plan B on Wed evening before our camp started. Actually plan B was created around 9pm at night when we checked the weather all day and finally decided that riding in the cold rain after a swim on the first day wasn't the best idea for our campers. As a triathlon coach and athlete, I love a routine and schedule but there are many times when you have to be flexible and creative).

1pm – time to eat!
I provided lunch for all 13 athletes while Karel set-up the RETUL fit system for two athletes to receive fits during our camp (an extra service at our camp).
On the lunch menu:
Whole wheat pitas or Gluten-free rice wraps
Organic ground beef (for those who are not vegetarians)
Quinoa
Veggies
Homemade hummus (chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice and garlic)
Salsa
Beans
Chopped romaine
Corn
Onions
Gluten free tortilla chips
Pita chips
Coffee
Veronica’s health crunch mix
Water

After food was served, athletes received their awesome swag bags, thanks to some amazing sponsors at the camp. Karel and I wanted the athletes to also take home a little something from us, so every athlete receive a customized Trimarni canvas tote filled with delicious snacks to keep their tummy’s happy at the camp.

From 1-5pm I gave a presentation on “Train smarter to train harder” but first we reflected on the morning workout as well as tips to help with training smarter on the run for triathlon training.

1)      Understanding training tools and gadgets.
Why’s sport nutrition so confusing?

2)      Avoiding haphazard training.

3)      Being proactive – acting instead of reacting.

4)      Performance focused not time-obsessed.

5)      Having a healthy relationship with food and your body.

After my presentations, Karel finished the afternoon by talking about all-thing bike related (saddles, chain rings/cassettes, positions on the bike, wheels, helmets, etc.) and also discussed the importance of getting a professional fit whenever you buy a bike OR whenever you buy something new for your bike (ex. saddle, handlebars) that may affect your position.
I was so happy that every athlete could have the opportunity to pick Karel's brain. Karel knows so much about biking with his experience in retail, bike and tri racing and also being a cyclist all his life.

When the campers left the NTC, Karel and I went back to our hotel to make some food for dinner and then we went back out again to drop off our 5-gallon jug of water for the campers on Day 2 of the camp (on the bike route). I had a bit more prep to do for lunch on Friday and by 10:30pm we called it a night.

Every evening I sent out an email of plan for the workout the next day, as well as the map for the ride (which Karel created on mapmyride so athletes could have access from their smart phones via the mapmyride app) and other details such as what to bring, sport nutrition fueling suggestions and what time to meet at the NTC.

Day 1 was a great success and our immediate reaction was “WOW – everyone gets along so well!” Considering that this was our first camp, we weren’t sure what to expect but we did have expectations for our campers. We wanted the athletes to have fun, enjoy being around other like-minded individuals, we wanted to stretch their comfort zones and we most of all, wanted the athletes to leave camp with a better understanding of our philosophy of how to train smarter in order to train harder and reach success faster.

Here are a few pictures from our camp from day 1:

                                     

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our fridge is packed - hello from Clermont!

 

 

 

Hello from Clermont!

Because our camp is all about our campers, it was nice to have a little time to myself this morning to work my lungs and muscles with a great swim/run brick workout.

 

                                  

4000 yrd swim:
1000 warm-up

Drill set w/ fins:

8 x 125’s (25 right arm, 25 left arm, 25 6 beat kick, 50 swim perfect stroke) w/ 15-20 sec rest

MS 4x’s:
200 steady on 3 minutes
2 x 100’s fast on 1:30
50 EZ float, then repeat

200 cool down swim (free/back) w/ fins

40 min run:
20 min warm-up
MS 4x’s:
4 min @ 8.6mph (6:58 min/mile) w/ 30 sec rest
Walk cool down

 

After packing up the car one last time at my parent’s house, it was that time. I had to say good bye to Campy. 6 loooong days apart. Oh I hate saying good bye to him L

 

 

After an easy 2-hour drive to Clermont, Florida (which included a quick stop on 310 at a local farmers stand to pick up fresh strawberries and oranges for my campers), I checked into the Value Inn (like an Extended Stay) and started to unpack my packed vehicle.

                                    

Karel arrived to Clermont a few hours before me and he tested out our day #1 bike courses (34 miles). Karel put together all of our rides for the camp and uploaded them to Mapmyride app for our campers. I am just so thankful for Karel and how he always goes above and beyond everything I could ever imagine and this has been a lot of fun to work together on this new adventure with our business.

                                           

After we unloaded both of our cars, I had a bit of organizing to do in our room/kitchen and then we headed out to drive the course that Karel biked today so that I could get familiar with the route.

We then headed to Publix grocery store so that we could fill our large refrigerator in our room (which includes a microwave, stove and sink) with some delicious happy tummy food.

A few of our staple refrigerator foods when we travel:
Milk
Eggs
Cheese
Deli meat (for Karel)
Tempeh or tofu (for Me)
Veggies
Leafy greens
Fruit
Dark chocolate
Trail mix
Kefir
Greek yogurt
Water
Butter (Karel uses Irish butter)
Ginger
Potatoes
Sweet potato
Seltzer water

A few other must-haves:
Peanut butter
Oatmeal
Pita bread
Wasa crackers
Granola/Cheerios
Fresh local bread/baguette
Rice
Quinoa
Olive oil
KIND bars
Coffee

We will be test riding part of our day #2 camp course tomorrow morning (which includes Sugarloaf mountain) and then swimming later in the day at the NTC. We are so excited that some of our campers will be flying in tomorrow and then the rest of the gang will meet up on Thursday morning……with an early wake-up call for our 6:30am swim at the National Training Center.

If you are interested in following along throughout the camp – check out #trimarni #trimarni camp on Instagram/Twitter as well as following Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition on Facebook. Thanks for your support!

Wait a minute, Karel....something doesn't belong here?

Happy triathlete marriage...it's all about compromise. I make the plant strong meals, Karel enjoys his IPA beer.

Trimarni Endurance Triathlon Training Camp!!!

TRIMARNI CAMP

Who didn't love camp growing up? 

Hanging out, meeting new people, changing up the normal routine (no parents!), enjoying food with friends and making a lot of memories to share with others when you returned home. 

When Karel and I discussed having a training camp, we both had two different ideas for our camp but with the same philosophy. 

TRAIN SMART

We repeatedly stress the importance of training smart in our training philosophy and we also abide by this thought as well.

Not only do we focus on quality training and removing the junk miles but we also do a lot of research, learn from great coaches and we believe in placing the least amount of stress on the body with the most physiological performance gains. 

There are so many ways that an athlete can train smart and we focus on those other areas to help take structured training to the next level. 

-Stress management
-Good sleep
-Mental skills/confidence
-Good form/drills/skills
-Immune system health
-Sport nutrition
-Daily nutrition
-Recovery
-Flexibility in a structured schedule
-Get stronger before getting faster before going longer
-Season planning (annual training plan)
-Strength training
-Massage/yoga/flexibility
-Teamwork
-Proper use of gadgets
-Quality equipment

-Periodized training 

Those are just a few of the many ways an athlete can train smart alongside following a balanced training plan that is focused on individual goals. 

So when I brainstormed about having a camp, I was really excited about helping others learn how to train smart and to discuss in detail, the many ways an athlete can train smart to train hard and then to recover harder. 

I was also excited about the hands on opportunity to be with athletes and to watch them use their body for swim, bike, run. Beyond analyzing every movement, I also wanted to talk about skills, form and drills. I also wanted to focus heavily on education (of course, my favorite - sport and daily nutrition). I wanted my campers to leave the camp with a new toolset of knowledge that allows for smarter training (and a more balanced lifestyle all together). If anything, clear up any confusion on how to train for endurance races because there is a lot of confusion when it comes to the smartest  and healthiest way. 

Lastly, I wanted my athletes to enjoy camp. To have as much fun as I do when I balance training with my everyday life (like so many others do) but without the responsibilities of "life". Just four days to train like a pro and be surrounded with like-minded individuals, great food and positive energy. 

Karel was on board with all my ideas but he also wanted to make sure athletes left the camp with four days of quality workouts that would boost fitness, motivation and confidence with swim, bike, run in the endurance triathlon distance. 

And together - we created our ideal itinerary for our training camp. 

Our camp is not for us. Our camp is for our campers. 

Karel and I are lucky that we both live the same lifestyle, we each have knowledge when it comes to specific areas  and can pick up and go and train wherever and whenever anytime (so long as Campy gives us the day off from work, which rarely happens). We both agreed that this camp was not about us training for 4 days with 15 athletes but instead, our 15 campers training for 4 days with us to give guidance, support, education and enthusiasm.  

So, after much planning, discussion, communication......

I proudly announce the first ever (but not last) Trimarni Coaching and Nutrition Endurance Triathlon Training Camp.

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN!!!!!

Reserve your spot before the camp fills up!

Learn more here:

TRIMARNI CAMP 

(any questions, send me an email - Marni@trimarnicoach.com)

See you at Camp!
Your coaches, Marni and Karel Sumbal