Before telling you what kind of trainings did we do, I think it is important to say but what kind of triathlon coaches could we find at that time? The triathlete was a new sports figure. However of the specific triathlon coach there was no sign at all! We had to find somebody who could train ourselves and of course was either a run or swim trainer. It was always very hard to explain what we were looking for and just hope that he would understand and do a good job. They naturally knew very well how to train their specific discipline but did know very little on how to combine the three disciplines and worst how to manage help us to do a great triathlon performance. Something was for sure very clear: we trained very much and probably in a very terrible way! I knew that I had to practice the transition aspects and that it was important to do it well because the minutes which you gained were easy and earned with no efforts. Of course now everyone cares about transition and triathletes spend a lot of time (I hope!) to train on their transitions. But at that time you could really earn free easy minutes on the other race contenders.
For this reason during the summer we did short triathlons with my team and we challenged ourselves to win both the short triathlons and the transition that we created for the specific training. Another important thing was that we did not have a draft bike couse and often during the competition its final results changed either in the bike event or in the final run. This is obviously something that cannot happen today because the bike course is always a transition event that never changes the result of the race. You always look at huge packs that do not give us particular emotions, (at least to me) biking on many flat laps. Nobody risks anything and is always trying to “save” the legs for the final event. Those amazing women’s and men’s trained legs is something one cannot see anymore (only on 70.3 or Ironman events). I remember very well that my trainers were concentrated on the fact that we had to do a 10k run and a 1,5mt swim. While the bike training was a do-it-yourself thing! Just because the cyclists did not care about us at all! My bike sparring partner was my dear friend Faber who was a real Cerberus during trainings but I have to admit that did a real good job because at that time I became a very strong triathlete thanks to him! At the beginning we annoyed all the cyclists very much with those strange ideas on the bike triathlon bars and the TT-bikes to be used during the triathlon races!
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