They talk about marginal gains. We’ve all heard the expression, we’ve all looked to beat our PBs and see a notable improvement in performance. In fact we’ve probably all achieved it, and it’s a great feeling. But there are some disconcerting questions lurking in the depths of your mind… we don’t talk about this stuff so much. What if I plateau? What if I get WORSE? That just can’t happen, so we train harder, we train more. But we can’t keep doing that forever. So what is the key?

Running the Snowdon race in 2012 – marginal gains indeed…

I’m sorry if you’ve started reading this thinking you might get answers! I don’t have a magic solution, for the simple reason that I haven’t got a clue. But I’m learning and discovering all the time. Of course it helps that I’m working with one of the best coaches around, and I see him around three times a week. But I’m three weeks into working with Rick Kiddle and the emphasis on marginal gains is very apparent….

I think everyone will know how it feels to constantly monitor, assess and reassess your performance in everything you do; from easy training sessions right through to racing.

This marginal gains things has been a really key theme over the past week, and I can actually quite neatly split it into three disciplines. This is purely coincidental and hasn’t been engineered, in fact, I hadn’t even realised this until I started writing…!

The track – dark moments of self discovery…

SWIM
After having an endless pool session in the dark with torches with Rick at the start of my training programme, he hasn’t seen me swim much since. However, he has reduced the duration of my swim sessions and increased the frequency and intensity. “Every single swim session needs to be hard”, he says. “Time everything, even your warm up.”

As a total non-swimmer at the beginning of last year, I think swimming is the area I am most proud of. I’m not great, but I’m definitely not bad. But in order to improve, there is a need to constantly analyse your stroke, after all, we all know that swimming is pretty much all technique. Oh, and swim almost every single day…

I am not allowed to swim in club sessions anymore. This has been quite a surprise, but the principles are admirable. I need to be focusing what I need to work on, not what 20 other people are doing. So predominantly solo swimming it is then. 

Oh god, here we go. One dreaded expression: tumble turns. Last night I swam with Rick in a one-o-one session. This was awesome, because it’s one thing having a coach stand on the poolside giving you sets and telling you to move your hands or arms or legs a bit differently, but having someone who is an indisputably amazing swimmer swim with you, mimicking your stroke then demonstrating how it should look, is priceless! 
 
So Rick told me I need to learn to tumble turn. “We’re not looking to make you a triathlete, we’re looking to make you a swimmer. Because real swimmers make good triathletes.” I knew this would inevitably involve copious amounts of chlorine up my nose, and, shock horror, this is exactly what happened. I felt about 10 years old as I was somersaulting in the water and getting it wrong. Triathlon training is ridiculously glamorous, especially with chlorine nasal burn and watery eyes.
 
I have now been instructed to never ever again swim by turning normally at the ends of the pool. In two weeks it will feel like I’ve been doing it forever, apparently. We’ll see! I have a suspicion it will be unpleasant for a while before I’m a tumble turning master…
 
This will revolutionise my swim. Along with the other list of things I need to improve on with my stroke. Rick told me it’s all about seconds. We’re looking to take only seconds off my swim times, so focus on getting the times down every day. I have t report my times back to him. Relentless.

BIKE
Last year I was turbo-ing a couple of times a week and one long ride at the weekend. This is another frequency thing. I am on my turbo/powerbike/bike almost every day. Again, vastly increased frequency and intensity. Two power bike classes a week with Rick, where your heart rate is monitored and projected on a wall for everyone else to see (no hiding here!) is a revolutionary way of running a spinning class! 
 
A power threshold test every few weeks to ensure there are marginal gains, even if it’s only a few watts improvement, a few heart rate beats down, a slightly higher cadence. It’s monitoring, assessing and reassessing.

This is just a no brainer. I’m working in carefully constructed heart rate zones to maximise efficiency and it’s definitely paying off. I hate power threshold tests when I’m in the middle of one but I kind of like them, I feel amazing afterwards. And everyone will be able to relate to the ‘being competitive with your own statistics’ concept! Must. Beat. Last. Week’s. Time….
 
So I did. In just three weeks of the new coaching programme I have improved my power threshold test by 20 watts. Doesn’t sound like much,  but in a short space of time, it’s a very satisfying figure!

RUN
I’m not actually doing that much running to be honest. Unusual for me as I come from a running background (ish, if you can call that after only a few years). But again, strict HR zone orders and some running off the bike (in Winter I hear you cry!? Yes, apparently so!).

Anyway, I have ‘Park Run’ in my programme. Never been to one before, but I knew the concept. In fact I have no idea last time I even ran a timed 5k – I’ve spent a year training for Ironman, this could be interesting! But with my new found love for pushing hard (I won’t say going fast as it won’t be entirely accurate…), I was quite up for this.

No pressure, it’s not a race. Why do I feel nervous then? Because I want to get a good time. Yes but it’s just training. I don’t care, I want to come in the top three. Oh god, here we go.

I was struggling after about 5 minutes but that’s the name of the game in short stuff! A few laps of the park and an absolute mission to run two women ahead of me down (as in overtake, not actually run them down), and I was over the line. 21:50. I was third female and felt quite pleased with that.

One day later, text from Rick: “21:50 – we need to get that down to below 20 minutes by March!”. I hadn’t even told him my result. Why monitor yourself when you’re being monitored!? I like his approach though, I have to say…

So, the point of my ramblings. Well, all of this is about marginal gains, all of it. And when I can see progress, in some shape or form, in just a few weeks with working with someone new – this is what it is all about. Because right now, it’s only December, and I still have months before the season starts.

I am relishing this sensation of monitoring and assessing. I used to just smash out mileage – quantity not quality – and I’m truly recognising the importance of performance analysis. All. The. Time. I’m ready for gains, not losses…..

Robert Twells December 17, 2013

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Test one is slightly off-kilter. I wanted to find time to write something which affects every day of my life, every goal I have, every dream, every challenge, and the way I think, perceive and achieve. I'm talking about inspiration. For anyone that has an ambitious streak in their personality (which is pretty much everyone, in their own little ways), inspiration is something that has touched all of us.

Inspiration is everywhere, all around us, even when we don?t realise it. Things are absorbed into our consciousness without us even being aware of it, and our memory holds onto them like a little secret envelope to be opened later on when the time is right. These pockets of memory impact us in small but significant ways, shaping our personalities, our aspirations, our dreams, our goals. And a lot of that is credit to others who inspire you as a person. Your parents, your boss, your loved ones, public figures, sporting heroes, high achievers, famous faces. These are the people who help you realise who you are and what you want from life.

I couldn?t possibly count the number of people who have inspired me in my life. But, and I'm sure most people can relate to this, there are certain figures who I have come across in my life, either in person, or through a secondary medium such as a book, a magazine, a film; and these people have inspired me to dream, to believe, to achieve. To inspire others is something even more amazing, and I hope in some small way, that I do sometimes encourage others to believe in themselves and go for their dreams.

Robert Twells December 4, 2013

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This one is slightly off-kilter. I wanted to find time to write something which affects every day of my life, every goal I have, every dream, every challenge, and the way I think, perceive and achieve. I'm talking about inspiration. For anyone that has an ambitious streak in their personality (which is pretty much everyone, in their own little ways), inspiration is something that has touched all of us.

Inspiration is everywhere, all around us, even when we don’t realise it. Things are absorbed into our consciousness without us even being aware of it, and our memory holds onto them like a little secret envelope to be opened later on when the time is right. These pockets of memory impact us in small but significant ways, shaping our personalities, our aspirations, our dreams, our goals. And a lot of that is credit to others who inspire you as a person. Your parents, your boss, your loved ones, public figures, sporting heroes, high achievers, famous faces. These are the people who help you realise who you are and what you want from life.

I couldn’t possibly count the number of people who have inspired me in my life. But, and I'm sure most people can relate to this, there are certain figures who I have come across in my life, either in person, or through a secondary medium such as a book, a magazine, a film; and these people have inspired me to dream, to believe, to achieve. To inspire others is something even more amazing, and I hope in some small way, that I do sometimes encourage others to believe in themselves and go for their dreams.

A few years ago, I was literally obsessed with climbing. I would eat, sleep, breathe, talk about, dream about, read about climbing. As you can see, this has been replaced by a spiralling obsession with triathlon! At the time I wanted to progress and climb harder routes for nothing other than a personal achievement. On the road to this achievement, I was reading books by every ground-breaking climber out there. Wow, some of these people are breath-takingly inspiring! (And stupid, maybe!? Such dangerous stuff but totally gripping).

One of the books I read referred to ANOTHER book which inspired him to become one of the greatest climbers in history. So what did I do, as an easily-influenced, doggedly enthusiastic climber!? I bought it. And I’m very glad I did. Climbing is such a mental game, and it proved instrumental in helping me understand a few things.
‘With Winning in Mind ’, Lanny Bassham.

Firstly, a little bit of background on Lanny Bassham from Wikipedia. ”In 1972, at the Munich Germany Olympic Games, Lanny Bassham failed in his attempt to win the gold medal in International Rifle Shooting. He had a mental failure resulting in his taking the silver instead. Frustrated, Lanny wanted to take a course in controlling the mind under pressure. After looking for such a seminar and not finding satisfaction, Bassham began to interview Olympic gold medallists to discover what they were doing differently to win.

Bassham created a system of mental control he called Mental Management. Within the next six years Lanny Bassham dominated his sport, winning 22 world individual and team titles, setting 4 world records and winning the coveted Olympic Gold Medal in Montreal in 1976.”

This book revolutionised the way I think. Not just for climbing, but for every part of my life. The basis of the book is Lanny Bassham’s journey from nowhere to being a gold medallist and a World Champion. All owing to the power of the mental game.

Before you switch off and think this is all a bit ‘out there’ – don’t. It outlines a mental management system for athletes and performers, but the strategy which success can be founded upon is truly transferrable to anything. Business, relationships, life itself – this book has the capacity to change you as a person. (Bold statement, road test maybe!?)

Every single one of us (even non-sporting types) has to cope with mental toughness at some time in their day, week, month, year and life. Having mental preparation can be key to how a situation is perceived, and this is very relevant to sporting performance.

The basis of Bassham's mental system is that if you have negative ideas about what you are about to do, be it a race, a business presentation, a relationship – whatever – then your body, which is intrinsically connected to the brain, actions out those negative thoughts. The vast majority of the body’s movements are subconscious. Therefore, if your conscious brain is telling you that you will fail, or not achieve, then your body will subconsciously act this out.

Developing a positive mental attitude (we all hear this a lot, but this book revolutionises this concept) is key to success, and can be the difference between being a failure and being a winner. Because winning isn’t about coming first – it’s about achieving your goals. And if you set your goals, and they are realistic, and you put everything into making them happen – they will.

I have a strong philosophy in life, which I try and adhere to (although it can be very tough at times). I try and remove all negativity from my life. If I find myself feeling negative, I do everything I can to feel positive again. If I find myself surrounded with negative people or who have a negative attitude, I try and remove myself from situations in which I am exposed to this. Sounds brutal maybe, but I'm not interested in negative people. They contribute absolutely nothing to life – to other people's lives, or to their own lives.

So my outlook is positive. For other people, for their dreams, goals, achievements, whatever. If I am positive perhaps it will inspire them to feel more positively about other people, and about themselves.

I wanted to share these thoughts because for me, it's so relevant to every aspect of your life. No, I’m not a world champion and I never will be – but I have set goals, achieved them, and I hope to carry on achieving them. I try to never, ever think negatively about what I want in life and what I can achieve, because anything is possible. Talent is not born, it is created; created by the power of will

Robert Twells December 4, 2013

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