Warm Weather Training Camps
What are the benefits and why you don’t need one.
Living in the north west of England you will more often than not look out the window and see one, or a combination, of: grey skies, rain smattering the windows or trees flexing perpendicular to the wind. It can really be quite grim from mid-October through to March.
Having soldiered through the weather, repeat turbo sessions and a few soggy runs the allure of spreading some SPF onto your nose and freshly shaven legs is probably beyond great. Open air 50m swimming pools, dusty coastal trails at sunset and little to do beyond swim, bike, run, gym and recover everyday make a warm weather training camp a wintery panacea for triathletes.
Idyllic! Playitas Resort, Fuerteventura.
The benefits of a warm weather camp are well documented; some are easily measurable, others less so. You will get a seriously good training return for your financial investment. Let us unpack a few:
Time with coaches is often overlooked when you get to a training camp. Being able to spend an increased amount of training and down time with professional coaches is going to offer regular technical, physiological, nutrition, race-specific and more…feedback. Equally, for coaches to get a deeper understanding of the athletes they work with will strengthen that coach-athlete relationship.
Being able to focus on physiological adaptation (exercise + recovery) away from the most of the stress featured in everyday life will bring some real tangible development. Most warm weather camps are based on sites comprising everything you need to remain focused and get what you want out of the camp. The quality of everything you do will automatically increase.
From elite sports teams to amateur clubs training camps are used at various points in the sporting season and although triathlon can be a very individual pursuit, there are many community-led benefits. The downtime in a peer group setting can encourage individuals to consider alternative approaches or options (kit!!!) and break down that individual silo you might be training in.
The warm weather doesn’t always bring clarity of thought!
Getting out to the Canary Islands or the Mediterranean can be costly and at times a logistical challenge. Triathlon is already an expensive hobby and the luxury of a week or two to train in the middle of the British winter creates further accessibility challenges for the sport.
The key word here is ‘luxury’. I believe it is exactly this; great if you can access it but absolutely not an essential to realise your potential come race day. You do not need warmer weather or an open-air pool to train smart, be consistent and to be productive with your exercise and recovery. Here are some small takeaways to consider as an alternative:
The likelihood is if you’re following a British race season is that you’re hovering around second or third ‘Base’ periods in your Annual Training Plan (ATP). Certainly around late January/ early February you can be in-between consistency and ‘C’ or ‘B’ races leading to mental fatigue. Where a training camp might break this up, see if you can mix things up for a weekend or two. Get out on the MTB or Gravel for your aerobic ride, do a point-to-point with some club peers or if time is tight, ride or run to the in-laws (obviously within reason).
Whilst you are mixing up the routes, equipment or groups you train with, be as consistent as you can with a determination to deliver ‘world class basics’. In my experience one of the pitfalls for warm weather camps is approaching them completely under prepared. This can lead to burn out, or worse injury, during the camp or soon after and have negative consequences in the long-term. As you start a new meso block of 3 - 4 weeks, strive for quality. We’ve all heard of the famed marginal gains - in a realistic world just do the simple things really well. I cannot stress this enough.
And finally, just because you are not having a mid-ride coffee in the sun it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t speak to coaches. The coaches I holding high regard are fantastic listeners, they love to help as a sounding board and really pull out of you the best you can really be. Don’t be afraid to reach out - I am open to one-off (or a series) of coach-athlete consultations, please do get in touch: coachmatt@mattwackett.com.
To summarise, warm weather training camps are fantastic tools and experiences which I think everyone who wants to perform as well as they can should access if they can. But, just like the laser imprinted tan lines, they are absolutely not essential. Keep up the consistency, add variation and reach out.