Published on April 2, 2026 at 06:00 AM
The coach explains common mistakes in triathlon speed
You have finished training. I’ve done long runs, brick workouts, and open water swims at 5am. But on race day, nothing reveals a well-thought-out athlete at speed more than the wrong pace.
The good news? All of these mistakes – every speed mistake – can be avoided, all you have to do is know the red flags to look for.
An overview of the most common triathlon pacing mistakes
For the most part, triathlon speed errors fall into a similar pattern.
- Swimming or riding a bike too quickly
- Operate on emotion rather than physiology
- Neglecting nutrition until it is too late
- Failure to take into account circumstances in performance
The result is almost always the same: a race that turns into a march for survival.
Swimming: Where the speed problems really start
Few athletes consider swimming as a speed discipline. They should.
the Swimming is not where races are won – But it is definitely the place where they were lost. The first 400 meters of crazy anaerobic exercise raises your heart rate and cortisol in ways that feel good about your bike leg.
You may feel fine a quarter of the way through the bike, but your body is already running from a hole that didn’t come thanks to anything you did after the cut.
The main mistake in swimming is seeding too hard and then coming out with enough force to justify it. Athletes wave faster, experience contact and chop, increase their heart rate and struggle for the next 20 minutes trying to find and regain their speed – all while swimming.
How to avoid it:
Steer clear of your recent performance in open water, not out of the pool.
Consider the first 200-400 meters as a warm-up. Set your effort to 5 out of 10, breathe intentionally, and maintain control of your stroke. Let the field sort itself out.
The middle of the swim is where you push; The beginning is where you protect your entire race. for you Target RPE For most swims, it’s 6-7, with a slight build up over the last 400 metres.
You’ll already know in the first few minutes if you’re in 9th place. You’ve already lost.
Triathlon bike speed: If you get this wrong, your run will be disrupted
Here’s what most athletes don’t fully understand until they get through it: The running portion of a triathlon doesn’t start at the first mile. It starts the moment you mount it on the bike.
Every watt you use after your goal in the first half of the race is a watt you’ll have to pay back with interest late in the race.
The most common version of this mistake is what coaches refer to as an “ego surge” — starting several miles off the bike, when your legs feel fresh, the crowd cheers, and the faster athletes pass by. The allure of welcoming them is almost too good to resist. no.
How to avoid it:
For the first half of the bike, ride for power, not feel. This is usually a target of 70-75% of your target FTP (Functional Power Threshold). Now set the hardtop and do a reality check about a quarter of the way through the bike. If your average power or heart rate is above target while riding, hit it now — not as soon as you feel uncomfortable.
Errors in power goals: Considering them as fixed rather than flexible
This person travels to old-timers as often as newbies. You’ve done the sums, you know your FTP and your numbers are recorded on your trunk. But on race day — jostling in a 92-degree Fahrenheit headwind, or dealing with fatigue you didn’t account for in your preparation — your strength goal may direct you to push harder than your body can handle.
Power goals are an opening position, not a contract.
The most common version is performed when climbing: the athlete sees that his strength is falling, overcorrects it, and hammers in to get the figure back up.
What they have to do is organize power on the way up and recover on the way down. It’s all about the natural power at the end of the bike, not one part.
Heat multiplies this exponentially. At temperatures above 80 degrees Fahrenheit, the physiological stress will become greater even when power remains constant—your heart rate rises to produce equivalent watts, and the cost of running is greater than your data indicates.
In hot races, many coaches suggest lowering the bar Bike power goals to 5-10%, and your body will be your best guide instead.
How to avoid it:
Instead of a fixed number, think in voltage corridors. While climbing, set a maximum power limit—usually no more than 10% above your flat target—and stick to it.
For example, for heat, if your heart rate is 5-8 beats higher than normal Zone 2 At a certain target energy level, your heart rate becomes too high to continue exercising at that level, and you need to cut back on production.
You should review your training cycle beforehand and create a strength strategy for each leg, not just a single race day number.
Feed: fluid and fuel speed
Most athletes think that nutrition is a separate item on a checklist. It’s not like that. Refueling is all about speed – and getting it wrong has the same consequences as going too hard on the bike.
The most common mistake is waiting too long to start eating and drinking. With the excitement of swimming and the first miles of cycling, feeding It is pushed back. By the time you feel hungry or thirsty, it’s already too late.
Dehydration and glycogen depletion don’t announce themselves politely — they show up as a sudden, irreversible collapse in energy production, mental fog, and a run that crashes no matter how well you ride.
The second mistake is to treat nutrition as fixed and not responsive to circumstances. In the heat or on a mountain trail, your calorie burn and sweat rate increase. A plan designed for a flat course on a 70°F day will leave you on a 90°F day in the mountains.
How to avoid it
Start refueling within the first 15-20 minutes of riding – before you need it. goal 60-90 grams of carbohydrates per hour On the bike and carry this discipline while running. Hydration should be proactive: Aim for a consistent intake of water at each aid station rather than drinking until thirsty.
Link your nutrition plan directly to your pacing plan. At your target energy output level, you’re burning a predictable number of calories per hour – know that number and match your calorie intake to it. As with your strength goals, adjust the conditions. In heat, increase fluid and electrolyte intake even if your solid calorie needs remain the same.
Practice race day nutrition during training, especially on long days. Race day is not the time to try something new.
Running Start: Another area of speed has been destroyed
Even those who kill the bike often destroy their trail in the first couple of miles. Legs feel deceptively fresh leaving T2, the crowd is buzzing, and muscle memory settles into a rhythm that probably wouldn’t hold up 26.2 miles after a 112-mile bike ride.
Walk the first 30-60 seconds of T2 intentionally, because walking resets your nervous system. Regardless of pace, the first two miles are run at an RPE of 5. Know your target running pace, and know that the first 10 miles at that level will be very slow if you run the bike correctly. This is the feeling you are practicing for.
Lesson from the road: Three years, three hard lessons
The most difficult part of an Ironman for many Masters athletes isn’t necessarily the training. You’ve come to terms with the fact that the athlete you are now is not the athlete you were five or ten years ago.
Boulder, Colorado, 65-69 Grant Burkhart has over 20 years of racing experience. At his peak, he was faster and better at recovering than the rest.
By 2022, injuries had piled up, including a nagging calf issue that kept him off the track entirely. Surgery came at the end of 2023, and by 2024, he was starting to make a comeback.
Boulder 70.3 was the first serious test of his comeback. He got to mile 12 of the race — and collapsed. In retrospect, and especially looking at the bike that day, he understood what had gone wrong: He was riding the bike the way he used to ride, not the way his body needed him to that particular day.
“I thought I knew where I needed to be in power,” Burkhart said. In light of the high temperature, the production cost was much higher than the indicated numbers.
At St. George 70.3 one year later, the same pattern emerged, earlier this time. It lacked an objective anchor and no power meter. He ran through the feeling of being lied to, and ran mile 8 of the race.
“If I had been driving slower, I could have run,” he said.
Then Boulder 70.3 in 2025. Same path. The same summer heat. This time, something was different. He approached it with a strategy designed around the race and its terrain – not the athlete he once was.
Call back on the bike. He respected the heat. He intensified his efforts instead of trying to reach a specific number. He crossed the finish line, recording his first finish of 70.3 in three years.
The difference was not in his physical fitness. It was his preparation to run the race in front of him, not the one in his memory. to Master athletes in triathlonThis change in perspective may be the most important training adaptation of all.
Prepare yourself before race day
FTP: Test it and find out. Most athletes should stay in the 65-75% range for the bike, depending on their running goals and cycle profile.
Heart rate zones: If you don’t have a power meter available, HR is your next best tool. Your bike’s HR should fall within Zone 2 – Aerobic, Conversational and Sustained.
RPE: Race day is different from your training days. For the first 50 miles of the bike, my RPE is 5-6 out of 10. If it sounds “too easy,” it’s absolutely true!
Target operating frequency: Undo your goal time. Practice running your bike at this speed so your legs get used to it on race day.
Complete a little Brick racing simulator At Target Effort: Pair it with your pace plan and Order your nutrition. Write out a simple race day cheat sheet that includes target power or HR, feeding intervals, and mile markers to actually check yourself.
A little preparation goes a long way in Ironman speed strategies
Ironman speed isn’t about suffering less – it’s about suffering smarter. The runners who finish strong are not the ones who did their best. They are the ones They were trained to build a bombproof triathlonput in the right amount of effort on race day, and make sure you have something in the tank when it counts.
Know your numbers, don’t get caught up in someone else’s race, and above all: trust your training.
