When to Ditch the Watch: Training Without Technology

TriDot Podcast Episode 285

When to Ditch the Watch: Training Without Technology

‍

Announcer: This is the TriDot Podcast. TriDot uses your training data and genetic profile combined with predictive analytics and artificial intelligence to optimize your training, giving you better results in less time with fewer injuries. Our podcast is here to educate, inspire and entertain. We'll talk all things triathlon with expert coaches and special guests. Join the conversation and let's improve together.

Andrew Harley: Welcome to the TriDot podcast. Today we are talking about training, doing your swimming, biking and running without the technology. Specifically, is there an occasion, is there a time in your training week, month, year where there is benefit or value in leaving your data collecting devices at home and just training off of feel? Very excited to get into this topic with two of our coaches and find out, is this something we should be doing from time to time or should we always collect that sweet, sweet data? Our two coaches on this conversation, the first one is Will Usher. He's the head coach of Precision Coaching, a top ranked triathlon team based in the UK. And we also have Ryan Tibball, who is a respiratory therapist with coaching certifications for running, triathlon and strength training. Will, Ryan, welcome back to the show.

Will Usher: Hi there. Yeah, pleased to be here.

Ryan Tibball: Hey, thank you.

Andrew Harley: And I am Andrew, the average triathlete, voice of the people and captain of the middle of the pack. As always, we're gonna start up with our warmup question, get in to our main set conversation and then wind down with our coach cool down, tip of the week, lots of good stuff. Let's get to it.

Announcer: Time to warm up. Let's get moving.

Andrew Harley: For our warm up question today, I want to know from you guys, what is an incredibly normal triathlon action that you were especially proud of the first time you did it for yourself? Between the tech gadgets, between the swim, bike and run technique, between the skills we have to learn to be in this sport, there's a lot of things to learn when you're becoming a triathlete and a lot of it is just pretty simple, pretty straightforward stuff. But that doesn't necessarily mean it's easy to learn. So anyway, I'm excited to hear from you guys and our audience. What was something you were just incredibly proud of? You just patted yourself on the back, wanted to tell your friends and family, hey, today I finally figured out how to do X, Y and Z. Ryan Tibball, what is this answer for you?

Ryan Tibball: Well, you know, Andrew, admittedly I'm a big DIY person, so I feel like, you know, incredibly normal, I really need to water that down for myself real quick, but I had to really think about this a lot. And I think about my smart trainer and connecting all those things, and it seems to be a common frustration for many. But at the same time, when I finally got that, it's like, oh, got the kicker connected to the power meters, got the power meters connected this, I got my heart strapped and it's like, it's glorious once it's all connected. And so for me, that's my answer for this one. I think that I feel like I should be incredibly normal, but connections sometimes can be tricky.

Andrew Harley: Oh, they certainly can, right? And it's so different, right, depending on what computer you're using, what training device you're using, what, what this, what's pushing your workout to that. And yeah, for a lot of people, that tech learning curve is a steep one when you become a triathlete. So I can definitely see some pride there. And the first time you hop on and your workout is right there, ready to go? Yeah, definitely a really cool feeling. This answer for me, Ryan, unlike you, I'm not a DIY guy. Like, if something is simple and one YouTube video can teach it to me and it's going to take me like 15 minutes or less, I will DIY it. But if not all three of those boxes are ticked, I would rather pay somebody to do it for me who can do it better than I could do it myself. And so that bleeds into triathlon. And so my answer here is the first time I cleaned my drivetrain. So specifically because after I go for a ride outside, I'll give my bike a hose down and I'll wash my bike and keep it clean and all that jazz. But I, for a long time just relied on the bike shop to maintain my drivetrain and re-oil everything and just clean out all the grime and grit out of that drivetrain. And so the first time I finally bought a bike repair stand to put my bike up and actually do everything properly, I got the little squeegees and brushes that help you really clean that chain and re-lube it and all that stuff. The first time I did that start to finish by myself, I felt very proud of myself for taking initiative to actually do that. And now that I have the tools to do it, I do it more often, which we should all be doing that more often. Coach Will Usher, what is this answer for you?

Will Usher: Yeah, so I think for me it was the flying dismount.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, good one.

Will Usher: Specifically the Aussie dismount. Because if anybody who's ever tried it, the point at which you're trying to dismount and you bring your leg, your rear leg over, if you don't bring that leg through, then actually you fall off the bike sideways and that's when people's shoes unclip and the bike hits the floor. And it's all very embarrassing. But the flow that comes with doing the Aussie dismount or bringing that leg through is a great feeling. It's like the sort of feeling you get from dropping in on a big wave or whatever. It's like, wow, that just actually happened. Amazing. And then you have to concentrate again so you don't hit the Marshall. But yeah, that was definitely for me, flying dismount, but an Aussie dismount specifically.

Andrew Harley: Well, I'm gonna put this question out to the TriDot audience. Make sure you're a member of the TriDot Community Hub. We post the warm up question every single Tuesday to that channel because I want to hear from you what your stories are, what your experience in the sport is. So go find the post asking you of all the different things we have to do in triathlon, what was something that when you did it for the very first time, you were super proud of yourself. Can't wait to see what you, our listeners have to say.

Announcer: On to the main set going in 3, 2, 1.

Andrew Harley: All right guys, getting into our tech savvy main set conversation. And guys, I'm not gonna intentionally flex my youthfulness here or anything, but I was a young 20 something when kind of the fitness tracking watches really started to hit the market. And so I had my first Garmin forerunner to track my daily runs early in my 20s. And by the time I became a triathlete in my mid to upper 20s, multi sport watches were the norm. Almost everyone at local sprints to IRONMAN races had them. Tracking all of your swim workouts, bike workouts, run workouts was really commonplace. But you guys have been in the sport longer than I have. Not to call you out or, you know, poke at anybody's age or anything. Both of you with your gray beards on the episode. I'm starting to get some gray hairs. It's not where you guys are at yet, but I'm on my way there. I actually turned 37 two days ago at the time we're recording this conversation. But anyway, I'm curious to hear from you guys in your time in the sport of triathlon. What was kind of your first memories of the fitness trackers that really help us collect data from all of our training sessions. Coach Will?

Will Usher: So I remember, probably date myself now, but going back to the 80s and 90s, I had the Timex, they had Ironman on it and I didn't, you know, I was a young kid, but I was a national swimmer and runner, so I was running and it was the best watch on the market. You either had that one, you had the one that was a little calculator, right with all the buttons, which was also awesome. But yeah, no, had the Ironman on it and I had no idea that I'd be working in Ironman and in this industry at that stage, but that was a great watch. And you know what, I used that from late 80s, early 90s all the way through university or probably till 2008, 2009. Well, I did use some other fitness tracking devices like Garmin came out with the 305 and the 205 back in the day that had to be held at a certain angle to get the satellites whilst you're running, you know, and I tried on various ones along the way as this market was growing. But ultimately, you know, a lot of it didn't work that well in the initial stages, particularly the GPS stuff. You'd be stood out there for about six hours with the arm held up, right, and holding an antenna in an attempt to get some sort of signal.

Andrew Harley: You know, sometimes I get annoyed Will, if my watch takes longer than like 20 seconds to acquire a signal and I'm like, come on, I want to start running. Like, come on.

Will Usher: It was so bad you got to a position where you didn't dare breathe. It's like the old TV antennas like there with trying to make it move. But yeah, no, so I did try them as they came through, but for reliability I continued to use the Timex IRONMAN watch all the way through to like 2008, maybe a bit more like 2007. And then got involved, I think the Garmin Forerunner, the couple of models before the 920 XT, which is probably still one of the best watches of all time. My favorite, yeah, looked like a brick, but it worked. But yeah, and you know, before that I've always enjoyed math problems, but speed, distance, time specifically, and I had loops around home where in the Wiltshire countryside in the UK, I'd gone out with my dad and painted on the road. No, but you know, just a little dot, which was the mile markers. And then I'd be doing the maths. And over time, of course, you learn where the landmark was for that specific document and you didn't need to paint anymore. But I'd be there doing the maths in my head and working out my speed on a mile by mile basis. But yeah, that's what we did. That's what we had, you know.

Andrew Harley: Yeah. That takes me back to college, the university I went to. There was a lake nearby that was a very popular running spot in my hometown. And the lake was 2.82 miles around and thankfully the city of Lakeland, Florida, shout out to my hometown, they had official lines on that sidewalk. It was such a popular running route where if you started by the Lakeland Yacht Club, shout out to the Lakeland Yacht Club, if you started in front of the Yacht Club where the parking lot was there, there was a start line that literally said start and on the other side, it said 2.82 miles. So one lap around the lake was 2.82 miles. But they had a mile marker, a half a mile, mile and a half, two miles, you know, three miles. And so again, I would do the math. Okay, 2.82 miles. If I go down to this mile marker and back now I've done a 5K. And so you kind of learn your little hacks for whatever distance you're trying to run and whatever pace you're trying to keep. But yeah, so even I, in my youthfulness do have some memories of doing some workouts that way before these watches were really commonplace. Coach Ryan, what's kind of your first memories of these data tracking devices that help us nail our workouts coming onto the market?

Ryan Tibball: Yeah, I have to admit, Will, I had the same watch, the Timex Ironman watch.

Andrew Harley: Nice.

Ryan Tibball: And you know, I kind of reflect back and go, what exactly was I doing with that watch besides measuring time and many times maybe if I was lucky enough to jump on a treadmill and perhaps be able to measure something there with distance and then go out on the Trinity Trail here in Fort Worth, and those markers are out there. But I just remember having something as simple as that and really wasn't very techy, obviously, until I got to the Polar. I got the Polar Watch. And I thought, wow, this is game changer. And moved to the Polar and I was touting Polar, get Polar. And then Garmin comes out and I got that brick on my wrist and I tell you, that was, yeah, growing up through that and finally getting that GPS was just absolutely a game changer when it came to training because now I found I started to see, ironically, I was like, wait a minute, man, maybe I'm not getting hurt as often here because I was just running by time before and no measurements and now I'm getting a little techy. So that's my answer for that. Yeah, it goes back. Will and I, I guess we share some same memories.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, and I wanted to start there today because now in the sport of triathlon it's almost, you become a triathlete, you buy a multisport watch. And I think we all have friends that are just runners or just fitness enthusiasts or just people that like techy watches. I mean loads of people have Garmins, Polars, Apple watches, all these things, you know, Coros watches are becoming very popular in the running space that track workouts, track our heart rate, track our health, track all sorts of data. And you go back even a decade and these were not nearly as commonplace as they are now. And so in a conversation about should we ever disconnect from these watches, disconnect from these data tracking devices and do a workout just by feel, I kind of wanted to start by recognizing where in the history of training did this even become the norm? Because now it's the norm to just use the data. And as coaches, why is this the case? Why is it so valuable to collect data from the training sessions to the point that multisport trackers have become so popular so quickly? Coach Will.

Will Usher: Yeah, so I mean, there's two parts to this. I mean the reason it became so popular so quickly, I think a lot of that had to do with Bluetooth technology and Bluetooth technology getting much better because I remember Ryan talking about Polar. I had a Polar, but it was a real pain to connect the thing to a computer. And then the computers were slow and it was hard work and then suddenly Bluetooth technology started the data transfer being much easier. And I think therefore, and people, processing power computers is just, you know, it's a huge exponential shift. So that has really helped. But why is it so important to collect the data? Well, one, it's interesting so for people in the continuation of sport, people like to have, it's almost in its most base form, it's almost like a gamification of training because they have a little bit more of an understanding. Right. You put your time and effort into this and you want, particularly if you don't have a coach, you want a little bit more back than just well done, pat myself on the shoulder. You know, it gives you that little bit of information. But specifically as well, previously we'd only really look at time and distance as our metrics and the effort load was very hard to gauge. I mean, RPE or rate of perceived exertion has been used for many years. And now however you look at that, if you look at a scale of 1 to 10 or you extend that for other systems, it's really hard. If you were to ask an athlete, you know, I want you to run exactly RPE7, we're like, all right, got no idea what that actually means really. Because, you know, even if you say that, well, it's kind of a little bit faster than medium, but not quite as fast as fast.

Andrew Harley: Yeah.

Will Usher: And maybe you can find it. But at the same time, you know, some days you're not feeling it right. And it could be because you ate a curry last night, right, or you didn't get enough sleep or work is stressful and any number of things can make something feel much harder. And so actually being able to be objective about the data is really important. I mean, that's what data is, right? Data is ones and zeros and it's accurate, it's exact, it gives you a non-emotional but contextualized piece of information about your run, which I think is why it's so important.

Andrew Harley: Coach Ryan, how does TriDot specifically use data to adjust an athlete's upcoming training? We all know it's happening, especially the athletes in our audience that use TriDot and so they can see their assessment numbers change, their paces coming up and all this stuff. So they see stuff happening right in the app on their behalf in their training. But what is TriDot actually doing? When we record our watch or record a workout to our watch, that data gets pushed to TriDot. What is the algorithm doing that adjusts our upcoming training?

Ryan Tibball: Yeah, and man, this question is the deep one. You know, first off, TriDot taking in all that data is giving TriDot the ability to quantify your workouts on a level that's so deep. Specifically talking about normalizing your training stresses and then being able to again quantify training loads as well. And considering all that, you know, it looks at the discipline types, the environment, the intensity, the intensity distributions, intensity levels, intensity durations in each one of your workouts. And so it also takes into account with the data that's coming from your devices. It's actually looking at the athlete too as an athlete's unique training profile and looks at, if you want to supply even your genetics to TriDot, this will continue. This is what's so important about tech and data. Going back to the fact that TriDot is quantifying each piece. When it's coming to pace, power, heart rate values, it's able to quantify that residual training stress per session, so important. And then on top of that, it adds into the residual training stress over a seven day rolling average. So why is that important? It's because TriDot can optimally and personalize each one of your training sessions based on these metrics that are coming in, all the data that's coming in. So in the background, TriDot is doing a ton of work back there and being able to, again, I use that word quantify many times, but that is an important factor to utilizing your tech appropriately. And this just plays a huge role in your upcoming training sessions and your microcycle, your macro cycle of training. And I know Coach Will probably loves this piece and I'd love to hear what Coach Will's about to say to this too, because we geek out on this.

Andrew Harley: Coach Will jump on in.

Will Usher: Yeah. So I think one of the key features of TriDot is its capacity to handle the data. Right. The amount of information that's coming through on your watches now is off the scale. And you know, we've always used computers to compute. Right. And that's what we're doing here. We're getting a whole load of information coming in at us, but we don't have the capacity to take that on and understand it. Well, we can, but the calculations would be very slow, you know. I mean TriDot does 11,000 calculations in any given moment, which is extraordinary. Right. So we could do that, but it's going to take us weeks to do one calculation. And if I was to say to you, I've got a 55 year old female going through perimenopause training in the Sahara, but this weekend she's going to be in the Amazon, right? Okay. Slightly unlikely in terms of travel, maybe moving north from Sahara into the Alps, right? That would potentially be possible. But the point is, to be looking at her genetic profile, right, and then applying that as well, the complication of that. You know, the expression in the military, a plan half developed beats a plan that's late. And in the same breath, if we're taking on all this information, we're getting it, we can't deliver it back or analyze it in a timely fashion, then it's basically useless, right? Apart from for the history books. And we need to be able to do that. And that's what TriDot allows us to do. And the example I give to people is that TriDot is the only platform doing this. But if I was to take the session discipline type, the intensity distribution, intensity levels, durations, your individual profile, your genetics, humidity, etc. but I didn't include heat, all that data would be dirty, right? And useless. So having that depth of analysis is super important because unless you take into account everything, you've got nothing. And now we can take in everything. And that's the big difference to the past, right? We've taken very limited information. The watches weren't giving it in the first place. So we used effectively educated guesswork, you know, because that was what it was. We didn't have the device to monitor it, so we had to read between the lines. And then people talk about the art of coaching, but really it was a math problem without all the components, you know, but now we have that.

Andrew Harley: So in short, to remove a lot of the physiological speak and the coach speak, in short, TriDot is receiving the data that our fitness trackers are collecting and it uses that data, analyzes it, runs it through all the AI algorithms, compares it to all the other data points, does all the tech stuff it does on the back end and it uses the data from your watch to make sure that the workouts you have tomorrow, next week, the week after are the best possible workouts for you. And so knowing that, the big kahuna question for today: knowing that we have these high tech devices at a good price point that can track our workouts, knowing that TriDot receiving that data is super valuable to making sure it's analyzing what you did in the session and giving you the right session tomorrow, is there ever a reason to go out and knock out a training session intentionally leaving our data gathering devices at home?

Will Usher: Coach Will, yes and no. There you go. There's an answer for you.

Andrew Harley: Perfect. Yeah, shut the episode down. We got what we needed.

Will Usher: Yeah, see you later. Let's do cool down. But yeah, no, I think, let me say this first. I like a combination of both in so much as an over reliance on technology can leave you vulnerable. Right. So I've done a number of races. I remember in particular one in Barcelona many years ago where my power meter and heart rate monitor failed coming out the water. And so I trained to power and trained to heart rate and now I was blind. So all I had, happily I had satellite coverage. So I was able to take speed at the time. But you know, it's like going back to old school with the Cateye little speed computers and stuff, back to the 80s and 90s where I was running around the country lanes doing speed distance time calculations. But the point is I had also done a fair bit of RPE work that I had connected to my power. So what I mean by that is when I'm doing a specific session, like a tempo work or race pace session, is taking that moment and seeing my environment, thinking about how I'm feeling, my breathing rate and how my heart rate feels, because you can sort of control, make sure you're relaxed and all those sort of things. Because if I'm just dialing on the data, sometimes you forget to do that and that leaves you vulnerable in a race situation where it could all go wrong. Outside of that, is it useful? Yes. You know, why do we get into this sport? Well, there's a whole host of reasons, but I would say that there's a lot of mindfulness in training. For a lot of people it's an escape from work and it allows them to de-stress. And sometimes if you're overly focused on the metrics, it maybe doesn't achieve that. And certainly for some of the Zone 2 running, whilst it's very important to stay in Zone 2, there are much easier physical cues that you can work on or check to ensure that you're actually in the right zone. But you don't necessarily have to have the pressure of the watch. And that would, you know, for example, an easy run. If you were able to talk still, then that would be a good indicator that you're in the right zone and not going wildly off plan. So yeah, you know, and then because there's less distraction, there's more mental engagement and it's potential that you enjoy the moment much more. You'd be much more connected with nature. It might be that you're running in the middle of inner city dodging cars in which case, you know, it might be preferable to be looking at the data, although frankly that is also equally dangerous. So maybe running without the tech in that instance is also a good case. But that could also be a reason for not using the tech, your environment. Right. So if you are like we have in the city of London, a lot of high rise buildings as do many cities but it really messes with the GPS, right. And say you're doing a pace based workout and this is the way you can train for whatever reason, then this could really mess with your head. Right. Because one minute you're running like a five minute K, suddenly you're running a 2:30 minute K. What just happened there. And dealing with the lag is hard now. Things like that have got better. But yeah, the other piece I would say is that you know, it encourages internal motivation. Right. So one of the things I say about IRONMAN is that in long distance racing, you're always going to have a dark moment and it's how you deal with that moment that's going to determine the outcome of your race. Now you know when you're in a hole and your watch is telling you you're doing, you're going twice as slow as you'd intended. Right. The watch is not motivating you, it's quite the opposite. It's pushing you deeper under. Right.

Andrew Harley: Antagonizing.

Will Usher: Right. And so to have that ability to motivate yourself outside of the numbers I'd say is super useful and you know, being mindful, intentional around your environment and just really then listening to your body. But I think where I would sit with this is that if people do, I have had people do this sort of thing in the past. What I've often done with them is to get them to put some electrical tape over their watch, right. Record it so that things like TriDot can take the information away from the session but remove the pressure of the targets.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, good point. Yeah.

Will Usher: So you know, you're still recording it so therefore TriDot can help you with the session afterwards. So if you've gone too hard, too easy, not long enough, et cetera, et cetera. But you still have that element of being free.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, it's such a simple suggestion that I never thought of on my own. Like, oh, you can go out and execute a session off of feel, get all the benefits coach Will was just talking about, but still have TriDot collecting and analyzing and being able to use that data by wearing the watch and just not looking at it or wearing it backwards on your wrist or putting it in your pocket, putting it in a back pocket where it's still recording but just not visible to you.

Will Usher: And actually sometimes the data can be quite intimidating. So scenario, I'm sure Ryan's had the same thing, athletes doing a 20 minute FTP, right. So often they go out too hard or they find it really intimidating. So you know one of the methodologies done there and it's still data focused but it takes some of the pressure out is I get people to get their heart rate in the warm up, up to just shy of the average heart rate for their previous test and then they put a towel over the power meter and just keep the watch running. And the idea is that they keep their heart rate the same as the average heart rate from the previous effort, which we know means they've worked the same and if they're fitter, they'll have more watts. If they're sick or for some reason their heart rate is higher than it would be otherwise, that's still the best they could have done with that heart rate. And so it's a nice way of taking the pressure off of some of the data. But still, I'd say it's still recording it and letting the system do its thing.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, very good point there, Will. Coach Ryan, I mean just to pitch this big kahuna question over to you as well. I mean do you agree with Will that there is, or do you disagree and say no, let's always record that data?

Ryan Tibball: No, I actually do agree and I think Will touched on this very deeply here on the psychological standpoint of our sport. You know, our sport is, like many sports, 60%, some say 70% mental. Right. And that psychological piece is sometimes you got to remove that tech out of there because a lot of us admittedly are type A personalities. We have that obsessive kind of thing about staring at our watches, staring at our metrics, staring at our heart rate. And sometimes, unfortunately, it affects how we continue to perform throughout a session or whatever it is. Will definitely touched on it. Another piece I might mention here, too, is it can just be disruptive if you're trying to learn a skill, such as swimming, you're working on your swim drills and you're too focused on your upfront display on your goggles. If you have that, you know, again, it can throw things off where you're supposed to be really, truly focusing on working on skill, working on technique. Same thing could go for running, same thing go for biking. Again, technique is so imperative to efficiency. So. And if you're too focused on, oh, man, my heart rate's up there, my power's too much, it's like you're not doing what you need to intentionally do throughout a workout. So really thinking about that. Sometimes tech can get in the way. And I like what Will said. Put a piece of tape over it and forget about it. And I didn't even think about it. That's so simple. It's like, well, that way you're not looking at it. I've had a lot of conversations with athletes over the years saying it's like, hey, how's that heart rate value affecting you? When you stare down at it, suddenly you look down, you see 170. Does that make you feel tired instantly? And sometimes the answer has been yes. And I was like, okay, listen, let's get rid of the heart rate off your screen for the moment. Just go to another screen and not use that for the next couple of sessions and see how that goes. So, you know, lastly, I guess if you're technically inefficient with your equipment, then perhaps you might want to consider at least taking a break from it for a moment and then coming back to it and then obviously employing somebody to help you get dialed into your tech too. So lots of different ways to approach that question for sure.

Andrew Harley: Yeah. And, Ryan, I want to call out your mentioning that you can change the data fields on your watch. Right. If there's a certain metric that is throwing you or a certain metric that is being a detriment to the workout that you're doing, you can just not have that on display for a certain workout. Right. That's another form of this, removing the data you don't need. An example of this that I've been doing recently is as I, I don't have perfect fitness right now. I'm not as fit as I once was. I'm trying to get my fitness back a little bit in this season of my life. And I used to be able to go out and do a zone 2 run workout at 7:30, 7:45 pace. I was comfortably in heart rate zone 2. Well, now I gotta run 9 minute miles, 9:30 minute miles, 10 minute miles when it's hot outside to keep my heart rate in zone 2. And as a guy who is used to being a 7:30 minute mile zone 2 guy, it's like, man, really, this is how slow I have to go. Okay, well, let's get pace off the screen. That's messing with my head. Let's just have that heart rate value there. So the only thing I'm seeing is my heart rate, so the pace is irrelevant. I have to run how I have to run to keep the heart rate under a certain zone. So just, you know, Will's giving us the tape idea, also throwing out Ryan's idea that depending on what values might be messing with you or might not be valuable to a certain session, you can adjust what your watch is actually showing you during the workout. Guys, the next thing I'm curious about. So we've established that both of you think that there's a place for this in our training. When should we try this? Are there specific workouts that are great for going techless or is it just more kind of athlete to athlete just figuring it out what works for them or what makes it more valuable for them? Coach Will, what do you think?

Will Usher: So I guess there's probably like three instances I reckon it's useful or doable. The first instance, as I mentioned, would be part of your race prep. So when you're doing those race preparation sessions and you're in your zone 3, it might be that you want to not switch off but again, go with the taping idea or just not looking at the technology. So recording in the background, but really then trying to identify what this breathing rate, this heart rate, this general feel correlate to what power and what heart rate actually is. So some of it is cross referencing it, but it's for those race situations when the tech goes down or somebody else connects. I mean, I don't think it happens so much anymore. But I have quite often seen when people have been trying to set up their Garmin or their device in transition, connecting to somebody else's power pedals. Right. That used to be quite a negative thing. Right. You had to have a 10 meter radius in all directions. But yeah, so there's that. Then I'd say it's the easy runs or the easy sessions. Right. Those are probably the gems for going techless. You know, again with the cycling, it's pretty easy if you want to record what you're doing still, but you don't want to be looking at it. You just put the bike computer in your back pocket and ride on, providing you know where you're going. Because that's the other useful thing about bike computers of course. But yeah, those easy zone 2 ones because it is much easier to modify as opposed to a structured workout where you're supposed to be doing 3 x 5 minute hard or something. You know, you're never going to guess what time it is, the effort level.

Andrew Harley: Sure.

Will Usher: It's just not great. And then the third one for me is swimming. You know the software, TriDot and other software systems are set up to deal with swimming. The hardware sadly, sorry everybody, is not. And you know, you'll see this evidenced if you like in that the best swimmers in the world do not use watches. Right. They use the pool clock still which is the pace clock that's doing the second hand in the pool and they don't use it for a number of reasons. One, it does impact your technique to some level. It can cause you to drop your elbow but mostly is that the hardware isn't ready. Just again despite what they say, unless you're swimming a perfect stroke with no one else in the lane doing granny breaststroke and you know your drills are perfect, you're not going to need any kick, all these things you get sessions and you'll get the data back and it's like what even is that? I didn't do that, you know, or it clearly says you've done 2,975 meters. Well that's impossible because I've finished at this end of the pool or it's a 50 meter pool. What's going on? You know, and so you know that it's not accurate. And that can be very frustrating for people. And so I would say that is a key area that I encourage people not to use it and manually complete the sessions.

Andrew Harley: Yep. Very good. Ryan, anything to add on certain sessions you like to have your athletes try techless or did Will nail it across the board for you?

Ryan Tibball: I think Will did nail it pretty darn well. I will add one little thing here and that's after, you know, especially after a race, you think about this, you know, we've done a big half IRONMAN, Ironman or, you know, it doesn't matter, Olympic distance. And you've been training so hard, you've been hammering for months and months and months and getting after it and just staring at your tech, staring at your tech. You're like, okay, race is over. I've told many athletes, hey, go for a jog, leave your watch at home. If you want to manually complete your workout, manually complete your workout and enjoy the scenery, enjoy the day, enjoy nature, enjoy just being in tune with yourself. And same thing, go out for a bike ride, just manually complete it. Turn your tech off, don't bring it with you. You know, I think that's a great time to kind of basically release the brain a little bit from all that hard work you've done through your season, through your racing. So that's one of my additions to that, when a good time to try that.

Will Usher: Actually I might just, if I may, there's a further sort of time that I would use it and it's something just because over the years I've had various injuries, just getting old really. But when you're coming back from an injury is actually a great time not to be using.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, great point.

Will Usher: Because, you know, it makes you much more in tune with how your calf muscle's feeling, right, or is it on the edge of tearing again? Or are you so focused on trying to hit that 4 minute K because that's what you used to do that you go and tear something. Right. So that's another great opportunity is when you're doing that sort of thing. I'd say coming back from injury or illness equally as well.

Andrew Harley: Yep, really good addition, Will. So when we go out and we're doing a session without looking at our watch, maybe we have it with us, maybe we don't, but we're out, we're swimming, we're biking, we're running, and so we are self regulating, we are in charge of how fast or slow we're going without our watch yelling at us. How do we pace these workouts even if it's just all zone 2 or if we do for some reason attempt a training session where there's some zone 3 and 4, how can we try to best complete the workout as prescribed even though we're not looking at a screen? Is it just going off of vibes and just how you feel and hoping you get it right, or are there some strategies to be smart about this without the tiny computer on our wrist? Coach Ryan. We've talked about this for a minute.

Ryan Tibball:  The RPE, rate of perceived exertion and being able to equate that to when you have the tech on your watch and you have the tech to utilize, and you can equate how you feel versus what is your actual pace, your power, et cetera. And as you continue to understand and learn your body, I think this is one of those opportunities that you can start to identify what, hey, a comfortable zone 2 is. And Will mentioned this earlier too. It's like, can you talk? Are you comfortable? Are you talking comfortably? That's your zone 2. Another zone that's easily identifiable is that zone 4 where you're like, hey, I can get about one or two words out. And it definitely feels uncomfortably, but it's maintainably uncomfortable, so to speak. And I think, you know, obviously you can get away with, yeah, if you're not using tech or you're not using your watches, you want to identify your feeling, your RPE throughout that. And I think that's so important to, as you continue to train through your sessions that you really put these things together. You put that puzzle together as you're training, because God forbid, you know, in a race, and it's happened to me as well, like Will, I literally all my tech went out and I was fortunate enough, it didn't happen in an Iron. It happened in a sprint. Well, in a sprint, your effort is like out the roof anyway, so fortunately it happened in that distance. But again, you want to be able to rely on how you're feeling and equate those to your real zones. And I think, you know, you could say, go off of vibes. Yeah, that's a great way to say it in a nice way. I like that. But certainly, again, I think those are opportunities to continue to dial in yourself and understanding your body and how it's feeling, for sure.

Andrew Harley: Will, anything to add there on how to do this?

Will Usher: Yeah, so, I mean, it is difficult to work out RPE. And so what I've often done in the past is I've broken it down further and just said easy, medium, hard. Right. And that with an effort level of 1 for RPE being walking and 10 being sprinting. So you've got the numbers in between to work out into easy, medium, hard. Because it's just very difficult to distinguish between two slightly different levels. I think what Ryan said about something being sustainable, but sustainable for that rep, you know, if you're doing five 1Ks or something like that, being able to run effectively the same pace for all of them. And the interesting thing is, you know, if you have been aware when you've been doing your other sessions, you will know what a K rep feels like. Right? And that's when, you know, being mindful and understanding how that feels becomes really useful because you can go and do that. You know, we used to do that when we were running a lot of club sessions. You know, people would run in the group and they'd be trying to challenge each other and beat each other, but you know, teach them to run at the relevant level where they can make it consistent. I'm not interested in somebody doing, you know, a 3:20 K and a 5 minute K. Right. I want, you know, tight groupings. So if you're still achieving those tight groupings, I know we're talking about not using tech at all, but you know, you get the point. It's that having that mindfulness about the effort load and making sure that it is sustainable, because if it's not and you're doing like one rep in zone 5, one rep in zone 3, you know, you're missing the point of the session. So, you know, that needs to be taken into account. Which is why generally I'd say you want to keep it to race prep, zone 2 and not swimming.

Andrew Harley: Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. So because I'm sitting here and I'm closing my eyes and I'm trying to picture myself in the pool, doing a swim, at the track, doing a run and out on my bike, you know, at the park, country roads, knocking out a bike session. And we just talked about pacing. Right. Some ways to help pace this. But just as a coach for each sport, swim, bike and run. For an athlete who's out there, they're not looking at their watch, they're doing the session. What do you want them focused on? What do you want them thinking on? What are the other opportunities and things they can do? Kind of best practices for this that you would encourage an athlete. Hey, when you're in the pool without a watch, when you're on your bike without a watch, when you're running without a watch, I want you thinking about X, Y and Z. I want you capitalizing on this opportunity by doing, kind of a vague question here. But just overall, what else can we do to really optimize these sessions? Coach Will.

Will Usher: So swim is a great place to start just because there's a lot going on even for those that have been to pool school, which dramatically simplifies traditional coaching, which I think is half the strength of the program. There's still a lot happening. And by not using the tech, not worrying about, you know, how's this going to look on Strava, right? My average hundred is going to be down, but it's a really great opportunity to go and just focus on, for example, swimming in the fast position, right, or you know, whatever drill we've been given or working on people's kick, which often is lacking when they come to pool school and so on. You know, it's that opportunity and therefore you're not attached to the data. It's one of the reasons I enjoy gravel biking, right, because the stats are out the window. Because a 12 kilometer an hour could be a full on murder, death, kill experience, right, or it could be a nice casual day and nobody knows. So, you know, you throw the data away effectively and you just enjoy being out there. But in terms of swimming specifically, it allows a lot of time to think about specific actions and technique of swimming and to be trying to be a little bit more fluid and take away the pressure. So swimming, very easy to make some gains from not using tech. With cycling. I think actually Chris Froome did this and there was a device that was designed in Australia. I don't know if it actually made it to market, but it put resistance on your rear hub to slow you down. So it could add a specific number of watts. Right. And the concept was that you could ride with different people with different abilities. But Chris Froome did this in South Africa. When he's riding in traffic, he actually locked his brakes on, adjusted these brakes to the rim, right. Because it'd be dangerous in certain environments to be so focused on the numbers and so worried about the numbers that you miss the traffic light, right, or you don't do that blind spot check because you're so focused in on that data. So from a safety perspective, it's sometimes more appropriate for the environment. But also, you know, one of the great things about cycling is the ability to be disconnected. I've had various athletes over the years who lead very busy lives and having that moment to disconnect, they actually re-engage and they come back enormously energized. This is particularly useful for the long rides, right, because they can't look at their phone, they can't look at data coming in. And of course, if you have your device up nowadays, it's attached to your phone almost undoubtedly. So you're getting loads of messages about stuff that's happening, it's pinging all the time with emails and that's not helpful for anybody. So, you know, that mindfulness space. And same for the run, you know, same for the run, I'd say.

Andrew Harley: Right. Anything to add there across the swim, bike and run coaching points, focus points.

Ryan Tibball: Yeah, I think, you know, something that I've done with athletes is telling them, obviously we go back to starting with the swim, is focusing on your form, your technique, you know, and that way you can disconnect your device essentially and just really just be in the water and getting and working on those drills that you need to work on. And I think that can, again, I've mentioned this earlier, that still applies for even the bike and the run. In particular the run, you know, many athletes do run poorly and so working and focusing back on some of the important aspects to improve efficiency in your disciplines. I think that's a great opportunity to say, hey, let me turn this watch off for a moment, let me turn this computer off for a moment and just get to what I really need to do and then come back to it. And again, I love exactly what Will said as well is that turning it off and not using it, sometimes you feel like the fun has been leaving a little bit and to bring it back, you know, bring the fun back and then turn it back on. And now let's get back to the fun with the tech, so to speak.

Andrew Harley: No matter how you train, whether it's with a coach, whether it's just training yourself or using TriDot, you are at a disadvantage not having something measuring your workouts. Right? You are limiting what you can actually know about your workouts regardless of how you're training. So if you're going to train for triathlon and not have a device collecting the data, TriDot is still the best way for you to be training because it's still going to be picking up things about your workout and it's still gonna be prescribing workouts to who you are and what your race goals are, even though it doesn't know what you're actually doing in your sessions. So it's still the best possibility for you. But across all the gizmos and gadgets you need to buy to get into the sport, yeah, these days just pick up even the cheapest budget sports watch you can and, Coach Will, that's actually something I've heard you talk about before is this is pretty up there for you in terms of what you have your athletes purchase if they're coming new to the sport. Right.

Will Usher: Yeah. 100%. You know, years ago, things like power meters, I didn't force people into buying anything. You know I would never force anybody to buy anything, but I didn't heavily encourage it, should we say. Because you know power meter like PowerTap, it was £1,200 but that was only for your training bike so you needed a training and race wheel as well. So you're in for two and a half grand basically. And then the same on SRM, you know, that's two and a half grand off the bat. And those were the options. But now there's a lot of different options. Right. And even if you can't afford a power meter, which you know I would say that most people, if they're entry triathlon, you know, it's a lot of bang for your buck. But certainly you know something like a smart turbo, it's going to really help your training on the specific work that you need to do. But if you were to get nothing else, I have to say, you know, like a smartwatch, it pays dividends and there's some great watches out there now at a very reasonable price point. I mean I know some brands are, I'm not being paid by Coros for this, but like the Coros Pace 3. Right. It's a really high end watch and you can get it for around about £200. What's that, like $250 or something? So it works out probably in the region of about $50 per session to help you achieve the best out of your workouts. And you have to consider what is it that you're training for. Is it you're trying to complete something or you're trying to get fitter. In both those instances you have to remain uninjured. Right. And so the simple act of having a watch means that you're so much more likely to achieve your goal, because if you can feed the data back to TriDot, we know that you'll be 30% less, so it's three times less likely to get injured. Right. On the flip side, you could say not having a watch and not being able to upload the data to TriDot, you're three times more likely because TriDot is not getting the right information. And even if you weren't using TriDot as a coach, if you're feeding back to me without any data and we're blind effectively, then the likelihood of injuring you is much higher. And so you have to ask the question, why is it that I want to, is it for general health or is it to just complete the race or is it to be faster? All of those things point back to one place, is that this is a very good use of your funds, arguably the best use after getting yourself onto a proper training platform.

Andrew Harley: Yeah. And it's also something where you buy it once and you're good for a decade. Right. You buy a turbo, you're going to use that turbo for a decade. You know, you buy the multisport watch, the multisport watch will still be working just fine five years from now. Right. So it is, you know, maybe not as cheap as a pair of running shoes or cycling gloves or running socks or whatever. But you know, you buy it once and it's going to work for you for a long time. So anyway, last question I wanted to ask about going techless, going dataless. We've talked about it in training. Is there ever a scenario where you would encourage an athlete to go out onto the race course intentionally not using their data tracking devices? Will, you told a story earlier where you've had tech not work in the middle of a race. You know, I had my watch die on me, you know, midway through the run of my IRONMAN. Right. So there's occasions, I think, for all of us where we've accidentally not had our tech out on the race course. But is there ever a reason for an athlete to intentionally not take their device out on the race course or not look at their device out on the race course? Coach Ryan.

Ryan Tibball: Oh, man.

Andrew Harley: The answer is no. Like, I'm just poking. Is there a benefit ever to try this?

Ryan Tibball: Maybe one and then that. And I had to really think on this. But if you just don't give a hoot what happens, I suppose. I mean outside of that I would say, no. But yeah, if you don't care what's going on in the world and you're like yeah, I'm just gonna go out there and I'm gonna do my thing, I'm gonna kiss on all the babies, pet all the puppies that you see along the race course, great. You know, I suppose don't use your tech that day but ah, yeah, that's all I can say about that.

Andrew Harley: Coach Will, same question over to you. Is there ever an occasion for an athlete to try this?

Will Usher: Yes.

Andrew Harley: Okay.

Will Usher: So not in middle and long distance. Middle long distance it's much more important to be able to gauge your effort otherwise you're gonna have an awful day at the back. But short course, 100%. Most of the top end short course athletes won't record their races even. I mean I remember racing short course, sprint in particular. I actually think sprint is probably one of the hardest races to train for because of the intensities that you're having to deal with and the small margins that will result in gains. I mean we had a national final here in the UK age group level where the first eight athletes came home within a 17 second window. All right. And so it's super tight and just the act of pausing to start your Garmin when the hooter goes or something like that can be enough to blow your race. You don't hit the feet, you know. And with sprint racing as well, I would say you're on the limit. If you're not on the limit, you're not racing. Right. Particularly if you're at a level where you're really trying to compete. If you're at a level where you're trying to go around and then you know, get into the sport and enjoy it, then equally there's an argument you don't need the tech. But maybe you would like it because it's easier to work out when you're doing a PB and stuff. Right, or PR. But yeah, certainly. I think short course even up to the standard. Again if you're draft legal racing, that sort of thing, you have to be more reactive to what's going on around you because if you miss that break, it doesn't actually matter what happens in the rest of your race. The race is gone. So you know, going deep into Zone 6 for 90 seconds might be what you've got to do. Right? But yeah, when you get into middle and long course it changes. I think for the pros it can be slightly different. You know, you look at the pace lines. I mean, there's been a lot spoken about this in Kona this year with, you know, master tactician Patrick Lange. In my opinion, absolutely a master tactician because he's using the race and the rules and everything that are in place to get his best result. But then you still have to react. And in the pro field, that is different. In the age group field, obviously, it's a different game.

Announcer: Great set, everyone. Let's cool down.

Andrew Harley: All right, we're on to the cool down portion of our show. And coach Will, let's get from you today a coach cooldown tip of the week. Can you leave our athletes with one final triathlon training, racing or lifestyle tip?

Will Usher: Yeah, it's not going to be that popular, I'll tell you.

Andrew Harley: I'm intrigued. Let's hear it.

Will Usher: It's down to your alarm clock, right? You got to set it early. And the reason being that I see this time and time again, people not getting their workouts done because the day has happened and you know, it's escalated. Work, family, any number of things and all these things are largely predictable, right? We know that when we ask our 5 year olds to do something, they won't do it, right? And really there's three minutes and suddenly everything's built up over the entire course of the day and you're in trouble. You don't get your session in. I say the morning time is your time, right? Nothing is going to happen to change that for you. And if you do get that done first thing, then you're doing something for yourself early, which is a great way to start the day. I've not been training as much recently and then today was the perfect start of the day. Got up there, trained, walked the dog and I come straight into work and knowing that those things have been ticked off. So I feel immensely fulfilled for myself and otherwise it hangs over you. So, yeah, set the alarm clock, get up early. It's worth doing.

Announcer: Thanks for joining us. Make sure to subscribe and share the TriDot Podcast with your triathlon crew for more great tri content and community. Connect with us on Facebook, YouTube and Instagram. Ready to optimize your training? Head to TriDot.com and start your free trial today. TriDot, the obvious and automatic choice for triathlon training.

‍