- The Tempo
- Posts
- Evidence-Based Performance Enhancers
Evidence-Based Performance Enhancers
And how to train when wildfire smoke hits
Matthew Sharpe
June 09, 2023
TOGETHER WITH
Good morning everyone,
Sorry for the delay in today’s email. Our host site was being updated right when I needed to finish it!
In today’s edition:
5 evidence-based things that will ACTUALLY improve your performance.
How to train when wildfire smoke hits town.
And helpful tips for long, open water swims.
Thank you for being here.
-Matt Sharpe, newsletter editor
Have a triathlete in your life who can't stop swimming, biking, or running? Fire this off to them. Forwarded from a friend? Sign-up for free.
QUICK NEWS
⛲ Trevi Triathlon: World Triathlon has announced two new World Cup events for this fall. Tangier, Morocco on October 1st, and Rome, Italy on October 7th. [World Triathlon]
🩳 Bermuda’s best: The Bermuda National Sprint Triathlon Championships will be held in Hamilton on June 25th. Shorter distances are also available for those new to the sport and younger athletes. [Bernews.com]
👀 Super attention: The Super League Triathlon Arena Games eSports Series doubled its live broadcast audience to 4 million. It’s a heady stat as the startup sport aims to be a part of a future Olympic programme. [Broadcastnow.uk]
🕈 Celtman closure: Bealach na Ba on the Applecross peninsula will be closed to traffic from 5 AM to 8 AM on Saturday, June 24 for the annual Celtman Triathlon. Which is great becasue this road looks like an epic spot for a race! [ross-shirejournal.co.uk]
TOGETHER WITH CASSADAGAMAN
WELCOME TO A CHALLENGE YOU WON’T SOON FORGET; Swim 1.2 miles, Bike 56 miles, Run 13.1 miles
CassadagaMan provides similar elevations to the courses in Lake Placid with NO CUT-OFF TIMES! Incredibly stocked aid stations on the bike and run courses. Catered meal, STBC Beer Garden, Music, Swag, and a fabulous race in a beautiful setting.
One hour south of Buffalo, NY, and one hour north of Erie, PA with easy access off of I-90.
70.3 miles of hilly, challenging, and gorgeous courses will leave you exhausted, happy, and probably a little sore, but more than glad that you chose this epic race.
Open to individuals and relay teams of 2 or 3. AquaBike option offered. Paratriathletes welcome!
Join us for this grass-roots, athlete-centered event.
Don't miss your chance to call yourself a CassadagaMan!
Would you like to partner with The Tempo and reach thousands of incredible triathletes? Reply to this email and we’ll get back to you ASAP.
TEMPO EXCLUSIVE
Looking For An Edge? Here’s What Actually Works!
Dr. Jeffrey Sankoff is a triathlete, coach, and emergency room physician based out of Denver, Colorado. He is the producer of the popular and informative TriDoc Podcast, which helps endurance athletes cut through the hype and BS of the products and programs that are thrown their way.
Jeff takes us through five of the best things, backed up by science, that will help you train, recover and compete your best! 👇
Tapering
By far one of the easiest things that you can do to dramatically impact performance.
High-quality randomized controlled trials have demonstrated that well-designed tapering as part of a training program can improve race day performance by as much as 6%.
Physiologically tapering improves:
Tissue glycogen levels 🥯
VO2 max plasma volume 😮💨
and red cell mass 🩸
Studies have even helped delineate what the ideal taper should look like. Athletic performance in a race is seen to be best after a taper that is two weeks long, has a decrease in volume from pre-taper training of 50% but maintains high intensity.
Caffeine
Caffeine has some remarkable and reproducibly proven effects on endurance performance.
Studies have shown that doses between 3-6 mg/kg can give a 2.9% boost in mean power output and 2.2% improvement in time trial performance.
4 mg/kg of caffeine comes out to around 300 mg. To get that you would need to drink three cups of coffee, four Red Bull, seven cans of Coke, or 3 Maurten gels with caffeine.
Keep in mind that women and older age correlate with slower metabolism of the drug so in those circumstances it doesn’t need to be taken as frequently over the course of a race.
🚽 Furthermore, caffeine taken in too high an amount can lead to some unpleasant side effects so be sure to practice with the amounts you plan to use when racing and ensure you don’t overdo it on course.
Beetroot Juice
❤️ Beets have long been studied for their health benefits and have been recognized for their ability to improve cardiovascular health and lower blood pressure. The ingredient in beetroot juice that has these effects on heart health is the same thing that confers benefits on performance, nitrates.
Beetroot juice is very highly concentrated in nitrates that are converted to nitrites that then have the effect of increasing blood flow to muscles, improving mitochondrial efficiency, and enhancing skeletal muscle function.
🚴 The scientific evidence for beetroot juice has been compelling but is very sport specific. For example, almost all the positive effects are reported in cyclists. None of swimmers, rowers, kayakers or runners have seen any of the positive impacts associated with beetroot juice as cyclists have.
Furthermore, the effects of beetroot juice are quite short-lived. Cyclists tend to show benefits in time trials lasting up to 20 km (2.5% shorter duration) but those benefits are lost when distances reach 50 km or longer.
There are a couple of other caveats related to beetroot juice the first being that you need a lot of it to get the reported effects and most of the commercially available products do not contain anywhere close to what is needed. Another consideration relates to the timing of the effect.
Beetroot juice must be taken at least ninety minutes before exercise with peak effects seen 2-3 hours post-ingestion.
🤔 Evidence suggests that beetroot juice does not confer any observable benefits to women. While the health-related effects are likely still valid, women have naturally higher circulating amounts of nitrite and the supplemental amounts acquired from ingesting beetroot juice do not seem to be enough to overcome this in women making supplementation of no real benefit to endurance in this sex.
Check out the final two evidence-based ways to improve your performance, we DID NOT expect number five!
Are you an expert and want to share your knowledge with thousands of engaged triathletes? Fill out this form!
FRIDAY MEME
FAVOURITES
🚬 Wildfire woes: Here in North America wildfire season has hit early and hit hard. Two days ago New York City had the worst air quality in the world! Here are some guidelines for safely exercising when the smoke hits your area. [Washington Post]
👏 Addict to athlete: Christine Piché had an incredibly tough upbringing, and through her 20’s tried to manage her internal struggles with alchohol and hard drugs. But after htting rock bottom she eventually came through the other side sober, and a dedicated endurance athlete. [Triathlon Magazine Canada]
🏊♀️ Open water season: For many, spring means warmer weather and a return to open water swimming. GTN has put together a great video with swim pacing tips for those longer sessions! [Global Triathlon Network]
RACE WEEKEND
Ironman 70.3 Boulder, 70.3 Switzerland, Escape from Alcatraz, and a Lot More!
Ironman 70.3 Boulder
Women’s race: It’s a battle of Boulder featuring extremely fast locals Taylor Knibb (USA), Holly Lawrence (GBR), and Jeanni Metzler (RSA).
Knibb is making her long-course season debut. Her run over the half-marathon is the only question mark after an offseason dealing with injury.
Men’s race: This one features a leg-heavy lineup including Sam Long (USA), Lionel Sanders (CAN), Trevor Foley (USA), and Chris Leiferman (USA). Boulder locals Sam Appleton (AUS) and Matthew Sharpe (CAN) will do their best to keep #TeamArm at the front of the swim, and the remainder of the race.
Watch the races live on Outside Watch. The race starts at 9:00 AM EST/ AM CEST.
Check out our race weekend page for the rest of the events.
POLL
On Tuesday, we asked readers, “Do you think Ironman needs to make changes to ensure this doesn't happen again?” With respect to the tragic death of a motorcycle operator at IRONMAN Hamburg.
81% said yes change needs to happen. (97 votes!!! 🤯🤯🤯)
7% said no, this was a one-time event.
12% said I don’t have enough information.
We had incredible feedback from readers, here’s what a few of you said:
“This tragedy here is that this was a wholly preventable incident. There should be a standard that is in place for two way traffic to ensure that an event such as this is impossible.”
“There needs to be a balance IMO. You cannot have a pro race with lots of coverage AND lots of age groupers at the same time. Unless the course is MASSIVE and very open. IM needs to make money, I don’t begrudge them that. But they shouldn’t have 2000+ AG athletes. And a pro field. And lots of motos on a narrow course. IMO you can have 2 out of 3 in most cases. You can have lots of AGers and a pro field, but we (as viewers and fans) have to accept that it won’t be televised. Or we have lots of coverage and IM has to reduce the size of the AG field.”
We even had an athlete who competed in Hamburg let us know their thoughts:
“I raced myself in Hamburg on Sunday and finished my first Ironman in 10:20h. To me it was a very professionaly organized event. They had a lot of volunteers on the course to help with safety. I felt safe most of the times racing the course. But sometimes it was narrow and at the same time crowded. But it worked. The only critical moments were with motos in between the riders the mix…Even after the accident I still would recommend this event to all athletes as a great racing experience.”
Thank you so much for your thoughts!
TEMPO EXCLUSIVE ARCHIVE
Start up life and triathlon. How Rod Mackinnon does it.
Expert analysis: Nail your Ironman training nutrition.
Expert analysis: The four most common nutrition mistakes.
LATEST EDITIONS
Part two of our interview with world-leading heat training researcher, Dr. Julien Périard.
A world-leading expert on how to train in the heat. And are superfood powders legit?
Open water swimming made easier. And are you making these triathlon mistakes?
What did you think of today's newsletter? |
Thanks for reading to the end. If you enjoy the Tempo, we have three things you can do to help our community grow:
Reply