I truly believe one of the reasons I've been so prone to injuries the past three seasons is a lack of strength work. Even during the off season I just haven't been spending a lot of time in the weight room. And when I have, one of the challenges I've faced is finding a decent program to follow - a sport specific weight training program. From all my searching and reading I find that a good deal of the coaches out there (specifically, the coaches who write broad-based programs) tend to design the most arcane strength programs. I mean for general strength I guess these programs work(???). But in my opinion, triathlon requires sport specific strength work. Actually no, not in my opinion....triathlon does require sport specific strength work not just general bench presses, squats, curls and dips.
What I've found in all my searching is that triathlon coaches throw in strength as an afterthought and really shouldn't be designing strength workouts in the first place. Its kinda like the reason why a football team hires a strength coach. The same guy that coaches quarterbacks on the field doesn't design their strength workouts in the gym. Its not their specialty or focus. Of course to be fair there are strength coaches/personal trainers who don't understand the needs of endurance athletes either in terms of functional training.
I did a lot more research this fall and talked to personal trainers and coaches. I finally settled in on a pretty good plan that I've done some tweaking to. And I love it. I should have mentioned that at the outset - I love lifting weights and working out in the gym...although you would never know it to look at me. But watch out. I'm gonna get ripped. Hello ladies.
-Him.
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