Lauren Brandon’s brick training session

One of the more uncomfortable feelings while racing in the sport of triathlon is running off of the bike. Your legs are tired from riding hard and they may often feel very slow and heavy. Sometimes it will take a few km’s for you to find your running legs. One way to help you get used to the feeling of running off of the bike is to perform “brick” workouts. Brick workouts are when you do two disciplines back to back. If you hear someone talk about a brick workout, it will most likely be a bike to run session.

There are many different types of brick bike to run sessions. Sometimes you might do a 60-minute steady run following a long bike ride and other times you might do some fast km’s after a shorter, but harder bike ride. No matter what type of brick workout you might do, they are important to incorporate into your weekly training schedule. The following brick workout is a faster and shorter session that you would do during race season, perhaps the week before your race.

Total brick session time: 90 minutes

Bike: 60 minutes

10 minutes easy

10 (5 x 2 minutes of 30 seconds hard (80%), 90 seconds easy)

30 minutes (10 x 1 minute hard (90-100%); 2 minutes easy)

10 minutes easy

Run: 30 minutes

1 km steady, 2km’s hard, the rest easy until you get to 30 minutes