A guide to building endurance and the importance of diet and nutrition as well as self-care and injury prevention for athletes seeking to stay healthy and be injury free.

Primal Endurance shakes up the status quo and challenges the overly stressful, ineffective conventional approach to endurance training. While marathons and triathlons are wildly popular and bring much gratification and camaraderie to the participants, the majority of athletes are too slow, continually tired, and carry too much body fat respective to the time they devote to training. The prevailing "chronic cardio" approach promotes carbohydrate dependency, overly stressful lifestyle patterns, and ultimately burnout. Mark Sisson, author of the 2009 bestseller, The Primal Blueprint, and de-facto leader of the primal/paleo lifestyle movement, expertly applies primal lifestyle principles to the unique challenge of endurance training and racing. Unlike the many instant and self-anointed experts who have descended upon the endurance scene in recent years, Sisson and his co-author/business partner Brad Kearns boast a rich history in endurance sports. Sisson has a 2:18 marathon and 4th place Hawaii Ironman finish to his credit, has spearheaded triathlon's global anti-doping program for the International Triathlon Union, and has coached/advised leading professional athletes, including Olympic triathlon gold and silver medalist Simon Whitfield and Tour de France cyclist Dave Zabriskie. Under Sisson's guidance, Kearns won multiple national championships in duathlon and triathlon, and rose to a #3 world triathlon ranking in 1991. Primal Endurance applies an all-encompassing approach to endurance training that includes primal-aligned eating to escape carbohydrate dependency and enhance fat metabolism, building an aerobic base with comfortably paced workouts, strategically introducing high intensity strength and sprint workouts, emphasizing rest, recovery, and an annual periodization, and finally cultivating an intuitive approach to training instead of the usual robotic approach of fixed weekly workout schedules. When you "go Primal" as an endurance athlete, you can expect to enjoy these and other benefits in short order: Easily reduce excess body fat and keep it off permanently, even during periods of reduced trainingPerform better by reprogramming your genes to burn fat and spare glycogen during sustained endurance effortsAvoid overtraining, burnout, illness, and injury by improving your balance of stress and rest, both in training and everyday lifeSpend fewer total hours training and get more return on investment with periodized and purposeful workout patternsHave more fun, be more spontaneous, and break free from the pull of the obsessive/compulsive mindset that is common among highly motivated, goal-oriented endurance athletesHave more energy and better focus during daily life instead of suffering from the "active couch potato syndrome," with cumulative fatigue from incessant heavy training makes you lazy and sluggish Primal Endurance is about slowing down, balancing out, chilling out, and having more fun with your endurance pursuits. It's about building your health through sensible training patterns, instead of destroying your health through chronic training patterns. While it might be hard to believe at first glance, you can actually get faster by backing off from the overly aggressive and overly regimented "Type-A" training approach that prevails in today's endurance community. Primal Endurance will show you how, every step of the way.

Completing IronFit’s “triathlon trilogy” alongside Be IronFit and IronFit Secrets for Half Iron-Distance Success, this is a “go-to,” time-efficient training guide for the Standard and Sprint-distance triathlons, which are the most accessible and achievable distances for time-crunched athletes. The Standard Distance is the original triathlon configuration: a 1.5 km swim, 40 km bike, and 10 km run (0.9 mile swim, 24.8 mile bike, and 6.2 mile run). The Sprint Distance usually includes a 750 meter swim, 20 km bike, and 5 km run (Half mile swim, 12.4 mile bike, and 3.1 mile run). And there are duathlon equivalents of both triathlon races. These Short Course distances are the “everyman” races of the sport, and Don and Melanie Fink offer their time-efficient IronFit® training approach to them here in this book.

Providing exactly what the fastest growing segment of the triathlon world yearns for, Melanie and Don Fink have created a complete training guide for women triathletes with highly efficient, easy-to-follow, multi-distance training programs. Women encounter all the same challenges as men in their triathlon training and racing, but there are a host of issues unique to them, issues about which most men don’t have a clue. From the stay-at-home mom to the professional woman, female triathletes face societal expectations, and unique physical and emotional concerns. Until now, there has been never been a go-to source of information and guidance. IronFit Triathlon Training for Women arms the woman triathlete with everything she needs to know to persevere and lays out exact step-by-step training programs to help her to achieve her goals. This book includes three training programs designed for women at the Sprint/Standard (a/k/a "Olympic") Distance, Half Iron-Distance, and Full Iron-Distance. Each program is presented at three levels: Competitive, Intermediate, and "Just-Finish." The reader can select the program for the race distance she wants to train for and the exact level, based on her individual competitiveness, experience, and available training time.

Why is the Half Iron-Distance the most popular triathlon distance? Because it is the perfect length for busy athletes with demanding career and family responsibilities. Full Iron-Distance races require such painstaking planning and sacrifice that it’s difficult to keep life in balance. The Half Iron-Distance is accessible, while remaining challenging. Also known as the “70.3” for the sum of its 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike ride, and 13.1 mile run, the half-iron triathlon is not simply a race for which an athlete can use a full-iron training regimen chopped in half. Doing so would in no way approach maximizing an athlete’s performance. The races are performed at completely different intensity levels, with completely different approaches. As a result, the training is completely different. IronFit Secrets to Half Iron-Distance Triathlon Success does for the half-iron what Be IronFit has done for the full-iron. It provides three sixteen-week training programs—Competitive, Intermediate, and “Just Finish”—and details everything an athlete needs to know to successfully prepare for and maximize performance at this racing distance. In as little as four months, any athlete can be physically and mentally ready for the world’s most popular triathlon challenge.

Take your healthcare into your own hands create a personalized diet and exercise plan to keep you fit, healthy, and active throughout your...

Every event covered in depth, the strengths and weaknesses of various approaches and styles are examined, and hundreds of line drawings illustrate techniques in the field events, sprints, and hurdles.

When it comes to eating paleo, trainer, nutritional consultant and author of Paleoista Nell Stephenson knows that pre– and postworkout foods are some of the most challenging meals. What you eat when you're training for a triathlon is far different from what you eat if you're about to do a Crossfit workout, and both vary still from your snacks if you're just going for a quick jog. Add to that your exercise goals, body weight and what time of day you're working out, and you've got a lot to take into account! From high–intensity training to mid–level exercise to low–key workouts, this indispensable book has the right paleo recipes for your regime, goals and body type. POCKET PALEO: BEFORE AND AFTER WORKOUT RECIPES includes • 50 recipes, like blue Hawaiian sweet potato and Maui onion hash, two–step banana and egg pancakes, chilled coconut breve latte, savory yam and apple Napoleons and more • Fueling for volume training and racing, strength sessions and lighter workouts • Quick and easy recipes • Workout treats