Altitude and the Triathlete
I’ve been receiving an abnormally high amount of questions about
training and racing at altitude lately. It may be due to the fact that
the debut of Ironman Utah is drawing near or perhaps that more sea
level athletes are thinking a competitive edge might be found at a
higher elevation. There is some science behind altitude training but
some facts may surprise you.
When I was a student at Colorado University in Boulder I lucked into a
debate on the pros and cons to altitude training for the endurance
athlete. It was hosted by CU’s resident altitude expert Dr. Gamoff,
inventor a device called the Gamoff Bag. It’s a chamber, about seven
feet long and thirty six inches wide that can be used to manipulate the
atmosphere around one person. The debate only had maybe 30 people in
the audience but many were world class athletes. Magda King, the first
woman to ever ascend all 8,000 meter peaks was in the audience and she
spoke of using the Gamoff bag to help speed her preparation for her
Everest summit. There were also two Kenyon’s in the audience both of
whom had held the world record in 10K at one point and time, and their
reason for living in Boulder was based entirely on the elevation of the
city. The upshot of the debate is now pretty common knowledge: time at
elevation will force your body to develop a greater number of red blood
cells and therefore make your body better at delivering oxygen to
muscle tissues that need it on race day. But wait! There’s a down side.
Training at elevation is less beneficial than training at sea level (or
even below sea level). The reasons are simple; recovery time is longer
at elevation, therefore less training volume can be met, and your body
doesn’t react as fast as it might during the actual workouts. If you
want to race a 40K time trial on your bike at sea level and you want to
average 29 mph, then your training needs to include intervals that are
at and above that speed. If you’ve committed to training at 9,000 feet
you may not be able to push your bike to that speed at that elevation
so you will never really train the leg speed or power needed for race
day. The conclusion of the debate was that the ultimate situation would
be to sleep at altitude (approximately 8,000 feet above sea level) and
train at sea level.
This “sleep high, train low†theory has been and is currently used by
many athletes. The elites who train at the Olympic Training Center in
Colorado Springs (elev 6,184) often sneak up near Woodland Park to
sleep at 8,500 feet. Those elites will take the theory even further by
periodically running speed sessions on a treadmill while attached to a
respirator that simulates the air quality at sea level. That kind of
device or commitment to travel isn’t always available to people who
have jobs or family has them keeping them to one specific elevation for
daily life. Scott Tinley always used Steamboat Springs, Colorado as his
altitude getaway and I see that recently retired Mike Pigg is selling
his chamber for a mere $8,500 (retail $12,800). So the question
remains: how does a mortal such as us, one who refuses to cheat with
epo or any form of blood doping, one who cannot afford a hyperbaric
chamber, one who can’t be driving up to elevation every night for sleep
– what can we do to help ourselves? Here are some suggestions:
A) There are two schools of thought about living at sea level and
having to go up to race at elevation: 1) go up 10-14 days before and
acclimate or 2) go up the night before the race and pretend it’s no
different. These both work pretty well but it’s the middle ground that
will kill your energy. Spending 3-7 days at elevation seems to exhaust
the body as it’s working overtime to adjust, leaving you feeling beat.
At the same time 3-7 days isn’t enough time to make the biological
changes needed for improved performance on race day.
B) Hydration becomes even more critical when trying to acclimate –
drink water.
C) There’s been talk about “hypoxic training†where you sort of breath
less or hold your breath during efforts in order to dupe your body into
believing that it’s at altitude. I’ve never read a study that got me
past how absurd this sounds.
D) If you are going to go up early try what many national cycling teams
do: two days high, two days low, two days high. This seesaw effect is
rumored to produce good changes without as much fatigue
E) Eat a bit more carbs a bit less protein and bit less fat. You’re
body is at work trying to make big changes inside so give it the energy
it needs to succeed.
I’ve saved the best news for last. There are a ton of LA Tri Club
members headed to IMUT after months of training and years of living
here at sea level. The elevation at Provo is only 4, 500 feet above sea
level. In biological terms that’s not that high. Altitude affects each
individual differently but for most it takes the thin air over 6,000
feet to really start to negatively affect your average joe. So for
Provo go up when you like, get to know the course, sleep well and treat
yourself like a god for the days prior to the race. You’ll be fine.
