what is perfect facilities

[doc]

nope , your just wrong
it happens.

[chrissie]

there is no one perfect place to train. even Leysin has its downfalls, when its pissing down with rain or the shops shut every bloody lunchtime, evening and sunday - and always just when you run out of food. But if we spend all our time worrying about what we dont have, we waste the mental energy that we could put towards having positive thoughts. Of course, Subic is not perfect. The monekys are nasty, and the bats are very big. The pollution from the cars can be bad, and i would prefer a few, compact trails to run on. But hey, we have some awesome hills, a wicked forest, wind, a decent track, a resident accupuncturist for any niggles, good food (beef jerky not jollibees) and sunshine. when i think of the 100km/hr winds that are buffetting the UK at the moment i know where i would rather be.

[nicola]

Matt is partly right and Chrissie is partly right (and the doc of course is always right whatever he says, so he doesn't count -do I have a brownie point now, whatever that is?). Someone not incredibly talented in a spot without very good facilities who wants to be the best very badly won't brake records because there are people who are very talented and train in better facilities who want it as badly as the first person. the athletes in better facilities will be faster. However if they train in perfect facilities and don't want it as badly as the first person, the first person will be faster. So it's the sum as Matt said, but not the sum of good facilities but the sum of physical circumstances and facilities and of the mental circumstances.

[Matthieu O’Halloran - "M@"]

YES! Good replies, that was my objective to "provoke" and subconsously initiate deept thoughts about what really makes "Pros" in a majoritairly amateur sport.

I spite people who consistently "rationolize" over vivid facts. Some call it "the silver linning" others "bullshit"

I am a closet idealist, you would not know it from looking at my bike, but I am.

To build up a topic, like this one, about a taboo subject, especially in this sport, is important to me for the people who look at this forum but never speak up, souly judge us by our impulsive replys and recent results. To hear what 3 world champs thinks about this topic, then put it up on the web, for the whole triathlon world to read, is priceless to me.

After posting my opinions, I anxiously anticipated the replys it would generate, just like a little boy hidding under a tabble on x-mast eve to catch Santa Clause in the act!

[doc]

good post,
i remeber spencer smith
training out of heathrow , when i went to check his training .
it was middle of winter and he was togged ,up , and the wind was biting the wind chill numbing
and he was pushing 45 cadence into the wind ,
and i remember him saying
this makes  me tuff er than the rest,
i need nothin more , then he went and swam in a pool with 1million kids jumpen all over the place .

his best races, were comin out of that , 2 world champs then
i rember vividly ,
him telling me in 95 , i am headin to the states , i am sick of the friggen weather , and
i just thought,
well , thats the end of you, my boy.
we are a product of our environment .

[Marilyn]

O.K...I'm willing to jump in on this thread for some fun. I have allot of stories about being in what most would call crap conditions for training and knowing quietly is was the best place to be. Just this past 07 summer Chris and I lived on top of a mountain at 8500feet. We had no car and it was 35km up the canyon to the house from anything. At the house there was no t.v, no internet, no nothing, just altitude. We would roll down the canyon everyday to swim/ bike and run and then at the end of everyday with our full back packs on we would ride up the canyon 35km to get home. I remember riding home in the dark a couple times and wondering what the heck we were doing. BUT...after that 3months up there in conditions that everybody in Boulder thought were nuts....Chris won his first IM. I said to him the day he won....you asked me what the heck we were doing living way up there with no car....I told him...making a champion :-)
So.. it is..knowing what you need to be great and never mind all the rest, and stick to it.
Oh ya....remember "the crock" Doc??? He had the pond in the country and a farm in the middle of nowhere AU. Look how darn good he was.

Cheers,
Marilyn

[doc]

he was a champion
and it was only when the monitor boys got into his brain , that he disintergrated .
but when he was coming out of mirrawinni ,
he was da man .

[Marilyn]

Matt,
I would put money on that the fact that you did those uber long trainer sessions in your super hot appartment in KL was one of the number one reasons you did so well in Malaysia. The fact that it was a million deg and no air and consant pedalling in your 53/11 killing yourself...I bet the race didn't seem to hot at all to you.

The year I won that race I was locked indoors in Calgary. It was minus 30 outside, BUT..I would do these crazy 5-6hr turbo/ treadmil sessions in 3 layers of cloths in a gym, pants, beenie, gloves, long sleeve shirt, the works. I would make sure I had no fan on me and had a change of clothes at half way. People at that gym thought I was nuts. BUT...when I got to Malaysia that year I hadn't been on actual road for cycling or running for a month and I had been living where it was minus 20 on a warm day. That was the best race I ever had. So....good grounds...ya I think so.

I would also do walking lunges with 40bls on my back for 600m at a time and then drop the weight and sprint for 1km over and over again for hours cause I figured if I couldn't be on te road cycling I coud do walking lunges to load my legs until they crapmed and then run as fast as I could. Nobody told me to do these things, I was just another tri obsessed nut who wanted to win :-)

Cheers,
Marilyn

[Matthieu O’Halloran - "M@"]

Ya Marilyn, I thought many nights about what phsycological effects that 7 weeks in Kuala Lumpur did to me...I sure know that it made me temporarely bitter...I trained hard, but was consitenly inconsistent.

My result in Langkawie speaks lounder than any compulsive and idealistic comment that I posted on this topic.

But too often, after that race I wondered, when alone, if I would have had a better result with better circumstances.

This can be easily debated from both angles.

[doc]

no ,not really ,
as i am trying to explin to  the inspector ,
my success , comes from experience
of watching human and animal behavour .
and with out doubt ,
sacrifice , and extra dimension training , seems to spur greater results than the , perfect conditions and doing it in the right hr zones and with the exemplary lactate levels .
concentration is the most , missunderstood and most underestimated thing ,needed in ironman .
it is paid little attention .
but the huge turbo sessions , make you think about concentration
they tuffen the resolve
when you say
in a race "why am i doing this"
unlike those who dont do these will power sessions
you will already have the answer , while the others start searching for it , at the most inappropriate time .
in the middle of the race

[pantani]

nice podcast interview with Spencer here. He says exactly what Doc said - went to San Diego and lost it.

Love his passion, his straight talking, and the reason he went to Ironman - he just wanted to be in a race like Scott v Allen, a fight to the death, he just wanted to get in the action and mix it up with the best

http://www.legendsoftriathlon.com/home/2011/11/30/legends-of-triathlon-episode-1-spencer-smith.html