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It is the athlete's training diet, that they consume on a daily basis whilst training, that will have the greatest effect on performance. ( Rod Cedaro; Ultimate Training Guide 2006).

Eat a wide variety of foods
Base the diet mainly on complex carbs eg breads, pasta, cereals, fruit and vegies
Reduce fat intake
Balance dietary energy intake to manage body weight
Drink plenty of water
Choose low salt foods
Limit alcohol intake
Limit simple sugar intake

Can you maintain your optimum body weight and body fat to achieve your competitive goals
Is my body getting its nutrition needs
Do you recover sufficiently between workouts and balance nutrition needs according to work rate
Do you understand and consider long term good health needs

Timing and frequency is most important for both food intake and hydration.
It is generally considered appropriate for endurance athletes (90 minutes plus work outs) to eat six or seven meals/snacks a day spread over a full day. That does not necessarily mean six or seven times more food!
When in a strenuous training block of say, 12 weeks, weight yourself before, after and once fully rehydrated.
There are a number of scientific studies that recommend that endurance athletes should consume 8 to 10 grams of carb. for every kg of weight to replenish glycogen stores.

Should any member require clarification or more information about this topic, please feel free to call me on 8568 5502.

On September 24 – 25 I attended the Triathlon Australia conference in Sydney. The subject of the conference was “Building our Base: Foundations for the Future”. In a nutshell, it was about how to get more people involved in triathlon at a club level. The majority of clubs in Australia were represented and we got to hear experiences from a large cross section of clubs: those with several hundred members who hold large events involving road closures and police presence to smaller clubs that don’t hold any events but rather, rely on external event organizers to run community triathlons. Over the weekend there were a number of interesting presentations including great ideas for increasing the size of club events and opening them up to the community, a national junior development program, a national IT infrastructure, volunteering and how to cater for athletes with disabilities. The powerpoint presentations are available on the Triathlon Australia website (http://www.triathlon.org.au/Events/National_Triathlon_Conference.htm )

While the conference provided some great ideas and advice on how to not only increase club membership, but also to ensure that the club has the infrastructure to cater for greater numbers and larger events, all the information presented was predicated on the basis that clubs want to get bigger. To my mind, Tribe Triathlon Club needs to take a step back and first ask itself the following:

What do we want from Tribe Triathlon Club? Do we want to actively build our membership base and become a bigger club? Or do we want to continue the way we are as an informal, easygoing club?

If we want to stay the way we are (and we are considered a small informal club) then I think that the majority of ideas put forward at the conference are irrelevant (eg. a centralized webpage with online booking will cost the club $750pa, which is a lot of money if we only have 20 – 30 participants and we can easily organise registration on the day). If, however, we collectively decide that we want to build a bigger membership base, then it is worth looking closer at some of the ideas presented at the conference.

Becoming bigger will mean significant changes: currently the Club is being run by a very small group of people. A larger, more organized club will mean that more members will need to step up and volunteer time and effort to promote the club and organise and run training sessions and events.

Another issue that was hotly debated at the conference was whether it should be compulsory for club members who want to race to also become members of Triathlon Australia (“TA”). In fact, by the end of the weekend it became apparent that this was really the crux of the conference. However, this is not as self-serving as it initially appears. Last year 120000 people registered for a triathlon, however there are only 9000 TA members in Australia. Apart from some Government sponsorship, TA relies on membership fees to function. In 2011 membership costs were $135pa for an individual and $275 for a family. TA is the body that runs triathlons in Australia. It provides insurance for members (during training as well as in events), it trains and accredits technical officials (who we need to sanction our events), promotes and markets the sport, it pays for an employee at Triathlon SA, etc etc etc. While the biggest financial benefit is for those competitors who participate in a large number of events and get a discount to each of those events because they are a TA member, it is important to remember that the more money TA has, the more money flows through to Triathlon SA (which is currently terribly underfunded) and the easier it becomes for Tribe Triathlon club get done what it needs to in terms of sanctioning, reporting etc.

On the flip side, would the compulsory membership act as a disincentive to join the club? At the conference a member of a Tasmanian Club said that membership to TA is now compulsory for all club members. While initially membership dropped off, within a year or two, membership increased to greater numbers than before the compulsory TA membership. Several larger clubs (the majority of whom admittedly offer enough event entry discounts and enough events to offset the cost) have compulsory TA membership as a requirement of club membership. So the other question we need to ask ourselves is:

Should Triathlon Australia membership be compulsory for membership to Tribe Triathlon Club for those members who race in club events?

These are not questions that need to be answered immediately. However they should be put to the club for feedback and opinions with potentially an idea of how to move forward in the next financial year.

-          It is a record of what you have done
-          You can go back and review how your training is going and review progress
-          You can learn what training sessions your body adapts best to
-          Record how many kms you have run in those favourite running shoes to determine when to replace them
-          You can compare how one training session compares to another if doing the same course/set to understand progress

Most people with training diaries log what they have done. A number also log their performance (speed/pace etc). I believe it is just as important to log how you felt, how tired you were, what muscle soreness you had going in and how you felt about the training session. If you log these you can then use this to tailor your following training sessions or review the overall load you are placing on your body. For example, if you are sore after your long run and always struggle with a big swim set the following day then maybe you should adjust your training plan by moving the big swim set to a different day of the week. It is also useful in preparing for a race to try and peak at the right time. The main thing is to try to keep the diary simple in a format you understand.

Rode to Norton Summit and back
90km, avg 27kph
V hot (36C), dehydrated
Tiredness = good, Soreness = calves sore, How Performed Overall = poor as dehydrated
Lesson – need to take extra biddon on hot day and refill at top of Norton Summit