Olympic distance tapering

MD1983

A few questions for you (assume it is your A Race!)

How much of a taper do you take into an OD race and why? (I typically take about a week or so)

When would your last hard, swim, cycle and run session be for say a Saturday race? (hard swim - Wednesday, hard Cycle - Wednesday, hard run Tuesday)

Do you take any days completely off? (1 day - Thursday)

What would your training hours be during the taper? (not sure on this for me but probably 6-8 hours)

Thanks

MD

MrCreosote

For an A race, I usually taper over 2 weeks. Reduce intensity, and half the time.
I'd never be doing a hard session of any kind the week before- for one thing it'll be of no benefit so soon to the race.

For anything other than an A race sprint or olympic, I don't taper anymore. Might juggle the longer days for earlier in the week but that's all.

DaveR1

MrCreosote wrote: »

For anything other than an A race sprint or olympic, I don't taper anymore. Might juggle the longer days for earlier in the week but that's all.

If you don't even take a small taper before B races how do you find out what works and doesn't work for you before the A race?

MrCreosote

DaveR1 wrote: »

If you don't even take a small taper before B races how do you find out what works and doesn't work for you before the A race?

I used to taper for them.

Oryx

Olympic distance is never a target race for me, just a warmer upper, but if I was going to taper I would reduce the volume of training, and include a few little intervals or things like strides into one or two sessions. That kind of thing reminds the body whats expected of it, but the amount of high effort would be very short and sharp.

tunney

You experiment, one of my lads was rather upset that his present taper was different to one we established works, but who is to say that this approach won't be better for him.