Enter the London Triathlon and Bring Power to the People!

April 6, 2011

During the last few months the staff at Renewable World have been to some far flung places including Nicaragua and Nepal. Their work in areas such as these enables communities in often remote part of the country to generate power from whatever natural resources are available to them. The income from the various fundraising events that Renewable World organises, such as the London Triathlon goes a long way to funding some of these schemes. Below are some examples of what your fundraising could provide:

£400 could buy an 80 watt Photovoltaic solar panel for a household

£800 could buy a full solar system for a household including battery and training on how to maintain it.

£1,000 could pay for the materials and labour for the civil works of a micro hydro powerhouse

£2,000 could pay for a 1kw micro wind system including the installation, transmission and training for maintenance

One of the projects that has benefited in recent years from the sponsorship raised by participants competing in the London Triathlon was a solar lamp project in Uganda which involved distributing 750 solar lamps to refugees trying to rebuild their lives after the country’s civil war, providing light in the evenings for children to catch up on the school work they had missed due to the war.

 

With such an inspiring example of how your fundraising can make a real difference to people’s lives, what other motivation do you need to start your training? Well it appears that spring has finally arrived, the temperature has increased (slightly), the clocks have gone forward, and the nights are getting lighter. All of these factors these make it easier to get into a training routine.

Regular training is far better than binge training. Your body will adapt to regular training whereas doing nothing one week and then cramming two weeks training into one week will only lead to de-motivation and increase the risk of injury. If you have been training three times per week it may be time to increase it to four times, if training four times then increase to five times etc. However it is very important to have at least one rest day per week. A recovery day is as important as a rest day.

The London Triathlon is a 750m swim, so you should now be looking to be able to swim 400m (the difference between being able to swim 400m and 750m isn’t that great). It can be tedious just swimming up and down a lane in the local pool so try and break up your time and put together a session which breaks the total distance down to a mix of smaller distances. For example if you want to swim 750m in a session you could do a 200m warm up, 2x100m, 4x50m, 2x25m and a 100m cool down. Try and swim each of the sets at a pace faster than your normal swim pace. Have whatever rest you need between each interval and try and either reduce the rest period over the weeks or increase the distance that you swim.

The cycle is 20km and is on relatively flat roads. One or two bike rides will be sufficient to be able to complete this section of the race. The importance here is to find a pace that you are comfortable with and try to stick to it.

The run, although only 5k, is a different matter. In a triathlon you use certain muscle groups for the bike leg, and then different muscle groups to run. As we get nearer the event it is good to practise running after you have been on a bike. This is known as a brick session. You will probably feel awkward running as the different muscles kick in. Try not to fight it as it does take a little bit of time for the muscle groups to switch and you can run with your usual run style.

I’m always available if anyone would like some specific advice. E-mail me at david.wilson@bluefingroup.co.uk
In the meantime enjoy your training!