By all accounts, our Ironman® Wisconsin Tri-Rally was a huge success! Coach Rich was joined by 60-70 athletes for a FREE training weekend on the course. In addition, you should know that Endurance Nation will have nearly 20 women racing this year, a grassroots movement that added a “unique” flavor to this camp, and will to the race, as you’ll see below in pictures. Many, many “EN Chickas” were in attendance to strengthen old friendships or add a real world component to solid “virtual” relationships.

The highlights:

Thursday Presentation — Four Keys of Ironman® Execution, Wisconsin Version
Visit our podcast page to download the podcast for the talk, about 80 minutes. Rich lays out the Four Keys and then discusses, in detail, their application to the Ironman® Wisconsin course.

Afterwards, the EN Chickas enjoyed dinner at Harvest, a gourmet organic restaurant downtown. They were kind enough to invite the boys as well.

Friday: Race Rehearsal, Recon, or Hammer Ride
Rich set the campers lose at 7:30am on the Wisconsin course, armed with the Ironman® Wisconsin version of the Four Keys. Options were to either ride the course as a full on race rehearsal (pacing, nutrition, etc just as if racing), a route recon (pay very close to terrain and learn the course), or to just hammer it and have fun.

A few of the campers, ready to hit the course!

Some post-ride bike swapping

Coach Rich and Matt Ancona, ’09 M25-28 winner, decide to hammer the course and sufficiently shelled themselves.

Evening Presentation — Advanced Ironman® Racing Topics:

• Proper gearing for Ironman® racing
• Tips and tricks for Ironman® bike setup
• Bike handling, cornering, and descending
• Techniques for conserving momentum on such a hilly and challenging bike course.
• Nutrition
• Principles of bike fit
• Introduction to racing with power
• Much more

Visit our podcast page to download the podcast for the talk, about 50 minutes.

Finally, 50-55 campers joined us for dinner after the talk. All attendees received a Four Keys DVD as well as sponsor schwag from FuelBelt, Nuun, BioFreeze, and GU.

Saturday: Repeat/Refinement of Friday Ride or Epic Ride on the Horribly Hilly Hundreds Course
With two solid days of Ironman® execution discussion and topics in their heads, most campers chose to ride all or part of the bike course again, to refine their execution skills. A hearty few TeamEN rode the Horribly Hilly Hundreds route as part of an epic tri training week.

Presentation: Ironman® Training for Self-Coached Athletes
Rich shared with the campers the lessons he has learned from 9+ years in the trenches coaching age group Ironman® athletes. Unfortunately, after having caught a stomach bug the evening before and spending all day in bed recovering…the talk delivered at our IMUSA Tri-Rally is probably a better version.

Go here to download the Ironman® Training for Self-Coached Athletes podcast, already enjoyed by over 2000 listeners in just 5 weeks!

More Saturday fun on the course

Sunday — Walk Thru of the Wisconsin Transition and Long Run
Rich and the Campers met at the swim exit area to walk through the Wisconsin transition: the Helix, conference-room-as-change-tent, tips, tricks and more. Campers then ran all or part of the run course, camp ends!

Camp Summary:

• 3-4hrs of instruction on the entire gamut of Ironman® training and racing topics.
• Opportunity to ride >200 miles on the Wisconsin course, as well as run all of the run course.
• PRICELESS opportunity to meet and network with other Wisconsin athletes, creating friendships, sharing resources, tips and advice for the race.
• Cost: FREE, for everyone, TeamEN members AND the public!

Interested in our next Tri-Rally opportunity? Become a Fan of Endurance Nation on Facebook to receive updates.

Interested in joining TeamEN? Join our waiting list to receive an invitation, next round to be sent on Monday, July 19th.