The COVID-19 pandemic has prevented us from training together in a club or squad environment or gather at races like we normally would and we have had to adapt and find new ways to stay connected. The women in the World Triathlon community and ITU Women’s Committee share activities and advice to support each other during this time, to maintain consistency, stay positive, motivated and strong.
“It’s encouraging to see so many women in triathlon around the world, connecting and motivating each other during this time. I hope this continues to evolve, even when the racing season restarts. I continue to support and engage with the great efforts of the ITU Women’s Committee to drive initiatives like this,” said World Triathlon President and IOC member Marisol Casado
Michelle Cooper, President of Triathlon Australia, Secretary General for the Oceania Triathlon Union
“I have been a women in triathlon for the past 10-years and I have also been working from home for the past two-months so I thought I would take you through a couple of sessions that I am running at home for myself and my athletes. It is a little bit of a different scenario at the moment, doing some of our routine at home but we’ve adapted them to fit into a pretty small space and hopefully these will be helpful for you. The things I have replaced doing my extra sessions with is doing a little more strength and mobility, it’s the easiest thing for me to drop when I get really busy so this has been a great chance to really focus on that and have a couple of sessions a week dedicated to making sure I get on top of those things and also ironing out all the little challenges I have had working from home, I am sitting in different chair all day, almost all of my time is spent looking at a computer and having a lot of Zoom meetings and a lot of Teams meetings so the position that I am in on a daily basis changed. I don’t get up and walk around my office to see my team as much as I would normally do, so I need to make a conscious effort to make sure my body is in a position to handle the training sessions that I am doing.”
Michelle Cooper, Tri At Home session on TriathlonLIVE.tv
Riana Robertson, Triathlon South Africa
“I think when we all sat down at the end of December with our New Year plan none of us thought about the position that we are in now where most of us, in different countries, are in lockdown and we can’t do what we like doing and we’re a bit restricted with our freedom. There’s no handbook and none of us have been in this position before, it’s all new and we’re making it up as we go. Everybody in a different region or country is not in the same circumstances so this is quite a unique situation that we are in. During this time there are four points that stand out to me as I go.”
Hear from Riana Robertson on key learnings during lockdown, Tri At Home session on TriathlonLIVE.tv
Shanelle Barratt, Former professional triathlete, New Zealand
Every day to keep myself fit, I do walk 1-hour everyday with my dog and my mum and my brother. What I do also have now is an eBike, this is my latest way of feeling like an Elite athlete. I ride to work every day on my eBike and I am doing about 12km a day. The thing about my eBike is that I can crank it up on level 6, and I always ride on level 6 and at 40km/hr so I kind of feel like an Elite athlete. So this is how my dog and I go to work.
Shanelle Barratt, Tri At Home session on TriathlonLIVE.tv
Pam Fulton, National Coach, Triathlon Zimbabwe
“During these hard times of lockdown I decided I would design a daily program for my athletes where we could focus on strength work, which we normally don’t have time for during the actual racing season and also incorporated some session where they could focus on their bike handling skills. I challenged everyone to create their own little obstacle course, have some fun. No matter how big your garden is, your apartment, you can create your own obstacle course at home.”
Pam Fulton, Tri At Home session on TriathlonLIVE.tv
Natalie Van Coevorden, Elite athlete, Australia
“I really wanted to have my own squat rack during these times which is what I incorporate into my training twice a week. I thought why couldn’t I just build one myself so I found a blog on how to build one for myself and I am really proud of the finished product. Check out the steps I did to build my own squat rack at home.”
Natalie Van Coevorden, Tri At Home session on TriathlonLIVE.tv
Follow along as the ITU Women’s Committee continue to share content with women in triathlon across the continents. Continue watching the exclusive athlete content and races on-demand at TriathlonLIVE.tv.
