Back in the Pool

I'm planning on doing the Mission Man Triathlon again this year, so I've deciced to slowly incorporate swimming back into my training regimen. I'll soon have to add cycling back in the mix as well. So today, I returned to the pool for my first swim workout in seven months. I took it easy with a 400-yard workout, consisting mostly of 25s and 50s.

While I enjoy the variety that multisport training provides, I feel like I need to be a bit smarter about it than I was while training for last year's Mission Man. Last year, I incorporated swimming and biking into my workout regimen while keeping my running mileage up near my marathon training levels. At times, however, I felt like I overdid it with the swimming and the running, which I feel contributed to some IT band troubles last summer.

This year, my plan is to once again keep my running mileage up for marathons planned for June and October, and add in swimming and biking. This year, however, I'm not going to be so gung-ho about going above and beyond the prescribed training in the tri plan I'm following. If anyone out there has any advice on building a basic sprint triathlon training plan around marathon training, I'd love to hear your advice.