Jabba,
Thanks for sharing your data.
Poor performance in a 70.3 is almost always one of three things:
1. Improper pacing on the bike
2. Insufficient or inappropriate calories
3. Insufficient or inconsistent training
Let’s take a look at all 3:
1. Your bike pacing was excellent. You average mid to upper Zone 2 for the bike ride. This is a conservative pace, and you certainly did not sabotage your run with an aggressive bike. Run pacing also was perfect, at least for the first 30 minutes.
2. Nutrition might have contributed to this, particularly as your description of “felt great until I didn’t” matches running out of glycogen. Muscular fatigue typically onsets bit by bit, but running out of glycogen is like running out of gas, it’s immediate. You should be taking in at least 200 calories per hour on the bike, and you took in 226, so you are down near the minimum. Additionally, hot weather requires even more calories. No calories on the run is also an issue, you’ll want at least 100 calories per hour there as well. Possibly 200 calories short on the bike and 200 calories short on the run.
3. You had great cycling workouts leading up to the event, your bike was ready. Your run was not, as it looks like you adopted an every-other-week long run approach instead of a weekly long run. Your training pattern was good, not great. You had strong training for the last few weeks of May, but the month of June was inconsistent with 70.3 training, and you really did not have a taper with 3 straight weeks of increasing, but low volume prior to the 70.3 week. A 4-hour ride one week before the event did not help your taper.
In summary, you did great in training, and the points to improve would not necessarily sabotage your event. But, something did, and my best guess is a contamination of nutrition, training pattern and heat.
David
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