Triathlon and Duathlon are consecutive events that result in your legs feeling like bricks when you come to run. This fact flies in the face of the way most people train for triathlon. Clearly bike to run workouts (known as bricks because that is what your legs feel like when running after cycling) are important. Swim before work. Run after work. Cycle the next day etc. This pattern of training results in athletes that are good at individual events with some recovery between. Seems fairly obvious that you need to simulate bike to run. But how many 'Brick' workouts do you need to to and what should these consist of?

Ironman Bricks

There are two key bricks for Ironman. Long Bike to short run. Typically, this brick is 120 to 180km bike ride followed by 20-30min run. This is designed to get your legs familiar with the feeling of running with cycling fatigue. This session should include lots of hills, pushing big gears and from 8 weeks out increasing sections at projected race pace (10-120km). To get the most out of this session you should also be eating, drinking and using your race position more and more as you approach the race.

The other key session for Ironman is a slightly shorter bike ride (70-120km) followed by a 45-90min run. Obviously, you need to think very carefully about how you place this session in your week relative to the long bike workouts and also, how you will also fit a long run in. Not easy! For many athletes who don't have the time to fit in these three workouts I will recommend that they look to alternate long runs with this second brick session. I think that as long as you have run close to 30km on two occasions that these bricks are of more value than say 3 hour runs.

Most people will do a 1/2 Ironman as part of their training for Ironman. This is a double edged sword, go too hard in a 1/2 Ironman and you will end up cooked before you get to the Ironman, this often happens when athletes are fatigued going into the 1/2 Ironman (not tapering because they are worried about losing fitness for Ironman) and then go too hard during the bike and grovel in the run. The best advice I can give you is to be conservative and treat the 1/2 as training even a 90% effort will make a big difference. If thats not what you want to do than you need to allow enough recovery post the event and there is a huge range of time required (from 5 days to 14 days) before you can push on with any serious training. If you are faster than your projected Ironman pace then you are getting what you need out of it. So if you are aiming for a 10 hour Ironman and you go 4:45 for the 1/2 but are not trashed then that is fine.

1/2 Ironman Bricks

Similar to Ironman but obviously shorter. Brick one is a 60-90km bike followed by 6-12km run. As with the Ironman bricks, this session should also include hills, muscle endurance and time trials at projected race pace. One way to do this session is combine a longish club bike race (a good distance is 60km) to a 30km easy ride and then run off the bike - this should leave you with a decent effort. Just watch your effort in the race by asking if you are above 1/2 Ironman race pace at all times or use a Heart Rate Monitor with zones.

Another option is to use an Olympic Distance race and do this at projected 1/2 Ironman Pace. Takes a lot of control but if you can you will get MORE benefit than if you were to go harder and then have to spend a week recovering. I am not saying that you shouldn't race Olympic distance races leading into a 1/2 but when a 1/2 is your key event consider how these races best suit your needs.

Olympic Distance Racing

There are three distinct bricks that I recommend for Olympic Distance:

Long Brick: 90-150min Bike followed by 30-60min run. The aim of this brick is to make the racing distance feel very comfortable. I think this is a far better use of a Sunday than a 3 hour plus bike ride for athletes training for Olympic distance.

Bike Race to Race Pace Run Brick: This is THE most important workout for Olympic distance triathletes. The aim should be 30-40 minutes at projected race pace on the bike followed by 1-4km at projected race pace running and a run warm down followed by a 30min easy cycle. This is the type of key workout that I had Jill Savege undertaking before her 6th place at the 2001 ITU Worlds. To increase the value for your peak triathlon consider swimming first, open water using a wetsuit and cycling directly to the bike race. I have also done swim intervals at race pace on the morning prior (ie 15x100m at Race Pace, with 20-30sec rest, just enough rest to keep the quality there without completely smashing yourself provided you hold back just enough in the reps).

Strength Brick session: Because you can recover faster from these shorter brick sessions when training for Olympic distance triathlon and duathlon you can also consider adding a third brick session where the emphasis is on muscle endurance. Typically, this would be hills or moderate tempo efforts in large gears on the bike followed by hill reps running. Nothing like it for making your legs strong for running off the bike. Can also be done as a broken brick session (ie 2 hour solid ride on the hills and say 60min after finishing running 60min with some hill reps at about race effort). Not a bad way to go as you transition from general training to the more specific brick sessions above also.

Final comment:

I think that there is some value in adding a short run to the end of all cycles if you are weak off the bike. These runs only need to be 10min. One athlete that used this to great effect was Australian Brad Bevan. I have used this with some athletes over the years, its not something that everyone needs or benefits from, very much an individual thing.

How many bricks and when?

Below is a guide to the number of brick sessions per week in any particular part of your preparation for your key races (note this is a very rough guide and varies a lot between individuals).