Triathlon training: Hit the streets

In the second part of a series on triathlon training, EMMA SOMERSgets some inspiration from a local professional and some mystical Mexicans

THE EARLY BIRD catches the worm, but the little fecker has to be up by 4.30am to get it. Try as I might, a sunrise run eludes me: only Ryanair can get me out of bed at that hour. As luck would have it, Dublin has plenty to offer when the sun is high in the sky.

So far, the cycling has taken a back seat to the swimming and running: the former because of a not unreasonable fear of drowning; the latter because of Caitriona McKiernan’s advice and a book called Born to Run.

The advice from McKiernan, a former long-distance runner for Ireland, came during an all-day chi-running workshop in Castleknock Hotel. Starting at 10am and going until 5pm, we begin with a videotaped run around the car park that is later used in evidence against us. We begin with posture and move on to technique, before going to a nearby park to try out our new tricks. The drills are repetitive and monotonous, but necessarily so. By the time you get back out to the car park that evening, after watching footage of yourself heel-striking and bizarrely propelling yourself forward with just the one arm, like Nelson without the strategy, the technique almost comes naturally. But more than anything else, it is McKiernan’s constant reminders to relax – relax your knees, relax your shoulders – reinforced by her uber-chilled approach that stay with you and make a difference on every run afterwards.

But you don’t need to tell that to the Tarahumara people of Mexico, the subject of Christopher McDougall’s inspirational book, Born to Run. Anyone with even a passing interest in running, or humanity, should read it immediately. Having retreated to the remote and treacherous landscape of the Copper Canyon in the Sierra Madre Occidental in the 1500s – following the arrival of the Spanish and small pox – the Tarahumara now live in dispersed settlements. They can run up to 200km in a couple of days, sometimes just for the fun of it, and always in thin leather slippers with some chia seeds for sustenance. And there’s not a heel-striker among them.

It’s all quite simple, despite what the likes of Nike and Asics would have you believe. Your foot is, essentially, a marvel of engineering, its robust arch imitated in architecture throughout the ages. Cushioning your feet with runners weakens the arch by supporting it in the middle, defeating its key strength. The book quotes a number of studies that suggest the same thing: often, the more expensive the runners, the more banjaxed the runner.

But Born to Run is more than a treatise on barefoot running. It’s a book to keep you awake at night and get you up in the morning and give any training plan a kick up the bum.

To which end, I find myself on beginnertriathlete.com, setting out a programme to get me over the finishing line of this triathlon. Websites such as run.com and mapmyrun.com have been helpful in suggesting routes, as have friends and Twitter, but best has been the realisation that some of the most scenic runs the city has to offer are right on work’s doorstep.

From Irish TimesHQ on Tara Street, Dublin city opens out like a runner's playground. I go down Pearse Street, past office workers enjoying a sunny pint at Grand Canal Square and on to Ringsend, catching glimpses of the theatre and the convention centre. Crossing the canal at Bridge Street I get (for shame) my first proper look at the new stadium on Landsdowne Road. I go around by Ringsend Park and on towards the Pigeon House before looping back along the Liffey and gaping at the glory of Dublin's quay on a sunny evening, even if the powers that be at the O2 won't give a dishevelled runner a go on their fancy big wheel. The Tarahumara can keep their rolling canyons, but I wouldn't say no to their chia.