Oceania Triathlon

After winning her age group three years in a row, Laura Siddall is leaving behind her day job to focus on triathlon full time. As a world champion at both the sprint and standard distances, check out this engineer turned tri pro’s favourite workouts for racing to your best performance.

How you got involved in triathlon?
I’ve always had a background of sport, albeit athletics and netball. On moving to Australia I was looking for a different challenge. I joined some work colleagues on a charity cycle ride (90km) on a hybrid mountain bike I’d bought a week before, and really loved it. It was then suggested I try triathlon, so I search out a beginners course and signed up with Bondifit. From the first session I was hooked.

How often do you train?
Everyday, twice a day :-)

What is the best training advice you’ve ever received?
Consistency and train with purpose.

What motivates you to race?
Seeing how good I can be, how good I can get. Improving. Wanting to be the best I can be. I love it.

Favourite swim:
Great sessions to feel great on as a prep for the race but without too much intensity/effort, that you would have in a normal training block.
Session 1:
4km total
2km (500 pull bands / 500 pull / 500 fs / 500 fs fast)
2km (100 fast (1.20/1.25), 300 easy (1.40) x 5)

Session 2:
4km total
2km (500 pull bands / 500 pull / 500 fs / 500 fs fast)
1km (20 x 50m (4 easy / 4 fast / 4 easy / 4 fast / 4 easy) on 1.40
1km various warm down

Favourite bike:
Session1:
We have a loop that takes about 5mins in time, so use this for the set, but it’s easy to do the session on time or on distance
Warm Up – 20-30min building speed
3 x 5mins efforts (5-8mins recovery)
3 x 2.5mins efforts (5mins recovery)
3 x 1min efforts (3mins recovery)

I loved these sessions for begin able to open up on the efforts, or to get on top of your race speed. Just the right intensity and effort for me in the days before the race
Session 1:
40-50km total
10km easy / 10km med / 10km faster than race pace (maybe Olympic distance pace) / 10km easy

Session 2:
40-50km total
4 x 5km (Olympic distance race pace) with 2km recovery
or
4 x 7mins effort (on 11mins)

Session 3:
40-50km total
5-7km warm up
2 x 10km race pace efforts (10min recovery)
10km warm down

Favourite run:
I recently did this session with a squad in Lennox Head and absolutely loved it. It’s a great session for maintaining consistency. If you start too hard you’ll hit the wall, so it’s great for dialing in onto the right sustainable pace. Focus should definitely be consistency of pace across all the reps.
Warm Up – 15min
6 x 80-100m strides / building speed and cadence
16-20 x 400m @ 10-15km pace (either of 2:30min or of 2mins recovery)
Warm down – 10-15min