Swim fast, try not to lose too much time on the bike and then run like the devil is chasing you.

Or actually steal something so you REALLY have to run... kinda reminds me of a lame Brick training joke I read somewhere one time:
For lightning fast bricks- get some darker clothes and head down to a somewhat seedy part of town, wait till you see a police unit. Pull down your mask and throw a brick through a window of a building or car. Now run like hell. Going to be you fastest run ever :rolleyes:

cycling is my weakness. I wont probably "really" train for the swim until mid month (doing Canada in August). I have been focusing more on my cycling to get better (IT IS SO HARD!!!) . That is my recomendation :)

The plurality of my training is biking (~46%). I do two 3 hour rides during the week plus a long ride on the weekend wheras I am only swimming 15,000 yards and running 50 miles a week with my long run no more than 3 hours.

Initially, as you work on your biking, let yourself go easy on the bike, and you will have one of the fastest run splits. The problem is as you become stronger on the bike, to know how HARD to go on the bike and still be able to unleash that awesome run. This is where a power meter helps you, as you can "try out" different bike pacing strategies to understand just how hard you CAN go and still run well.

It's easy to bring up your biking with hard, focused work. Since you are a strong swimmer, you probably aren't penalizing yourself very much at all by using your swim fitness to go as fast as you can.

You actually have a very good problem! Rock on!

You will have to do some work before race day.

Get on the bike and work on it,

After I started working more on the bike it definitely made me feel better when it came time to run.:D

Am I reading this wrong?? He asked "What is a good race strategy" He didn't ask for tips on BECOMING a better biker, although he would like to be, as we all would. Anyways, my 2 cents:

I would say, from your bio, for half IM the race strategy for bike would best as:

Bike: Start low Z3 bring it up to low Z4 in the second half, but you have to train that way before the race so that you can sustain this.

low blood sugar, trying to lose some wheight (translation...hungry)....strategy is what I know some elite AGs use. Could be for all I guess as long as you train in those zones. Bottom line is that you will ride or what ever in the Zones you train in. Go above that in a race scenario and you'll blow up (been there done that).

But I may add that the srtgy for IM is different for the bike! And still different for Olys. That's whay I asked what race dist. first.

Not what I mean. I mean that the HR zone plan for an IM is different to that of other race distances. You would NEVER do a bike split of Z3-4 for an IM distance race. That would leave you with nothing to run on. That's what I am talking about. But for a half it is possible if that's the way you train and you are a good runner like he is. But if it's the bike or the run that separates you, that is another issue.

Anyway, a little support on cutting back the running:

I jumped up to 50/wk for a while in the beginning of the season when I was trying to learn how to run, but got hurt after only a few weeks. All I could do was bike, so I put in 300+/wk and raced in April with almost no running under my belt in two months (seriously, maybe 5 miles/wk) and still ran a PR. All the bike fitness carried over surprisingly well. When you're doing 50 miles/wk, there are a lot of 5-10 mile easy/moderate runs. All I do now is run really hard when I need to and make up those easy runs with bike rides. I'll do one tempo run, one track workout (both as bricks, of course) and one long run, so maybe 20-ish miles/wk. I'm still recovering a little from ITBS, but even after a full recovery I'll probably do only 30. Triathlon training and running training are very different and you really don't need that much mileage. My roommate only does about 30 (I follow his training plan a bit....he's a lot faster than I am...lol) and he's done 1:52 non-drafting (33-high off the bike).

Absolutely true in my case. 50 miles in a week would break me! Others can handle serious volume a lot better, but I get by pretty well (and am still improving) on about 25 miles/week.

Guys I was up to 60/wk running around christmas 06 and the only way to run that kind of mileage is to go slow, way below AeT anthing above and you are risking. It can be done but must be done at a slow pace.

Thanks for all the advice, I appreciate it.

So, let's say I back off the running mileage (I thought 50 miles/week was backing off), and add extra biking workouts. My biking may improve but realistically given my running and swimming background, biking is still going to be my weak leg.

Given that biking will likely always be my weak leg, what would an appropriate race strategy be?

Thanks,

Dan

A common race stgy that many use for longer races like the IM and 1/2 IM are as follows:

Swim IM & 1/2IM: basically as you would normaly swim an endurance swim. The key is to come out of it feeling refreshed and ready for the remainder. Not tired. This should be accomplished during training.

1/2IM - Bike & Run As you have trained pretty much but not faster cause you will blow up.

Bike: Start low Z3 and go to low Z4 for the second half of it.
RunL: Start in Z3 for first half and for the remaining 1/4 do Z4 with final bit in all out what ever you have in you in Z5

IM - Bike & Run
Bike: Z2 ride, not above. You may want to enter high Z2. Finish last few miles in very low Z3
Run: start Z1 (low to mid) to about 5bpm into Z2 for the first half mary then for the next 5kms into Z3, then into Z4 for the next 5-6kms finally finishing the remaining 5 or so in Z5 or what ever you have in you.

As I have heard, the real part of the race starts at km 10 (last 6mi). That is what all say IS the race for am IM when one, if the cards are played out right, can pass most of your AG. So they say. Still have to get all this tright though. Some day :P

I agree with Red's advice, I just wanted to elaborate a bit with my experience. One thing that I've noticed about biking (I don't know if this is for everyone else or just me because biking is my weakest leg) is that it hurts a lot more for the same energy expenditure when compared to the other disciplines. What I'm saying is that the burning in my legs at AT on the bike is a lot more than what it would be on the run at AT. To put it another way, I may be able to hold some given RPE on the bike for an hour, but only for 20 min on the run. I think you can really crank it a lot harder than you think on the bike and still have plenty left for the run (as long as your nutrition is planned well). Basically, as long as you follow reasonably closely to the HR zones Bryan was talking about, don't be scared to go hard on the bike. I feel that the bike is where you should be going the hardest. Then worry about running people down (this is where I do the most passing/getting passed).