The Well-Built Triathlete: Turning Potential into Performance

by Matt Dixon, Kessler Meredith (Foreword)

In The Well-Built Triathlete, elite triathlon coach Matt Dixon reveals the approach he has used to turn age-group triathletes into elite professionals. Instead of focusing narrowly on training and workouts, Dixon reveals a more comprehensive approach that considers the whole athlete. Dixon details the four pillars of performance that form the foundation of his highly successful purplepatch fitness program, showing triathletes of all abilities how they can become well-built triathletes and perform better year after year. The Well-Built Triathlete gives equal weight to training and workouts, recovery and rest, daily nutrition, and functional strength. Dixon considers the demands of career and family and the ways different personality types prefer to approach training. The Well-Built Triathlete helps triathletes apply Dixon’s approach to their season and training plan. Chapters on swimming, cycling, and running explain the most effective ways to train for each. A purplepatch section shows how triathletes can peak their fitness for long streaks of high performance. Dixon’s holistic, whole-body approach to triathlon will help triathletes become greater than the sum of their workouts. By becoming better all-around athletes, well-built triathletes will train and race faster than ever.

Genres: Nonfiction, Sports, Fitness

529 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 5, 2014

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Reviews

[Douglas Lord · Rating 5 out of 5]

Founder of the purplepatch fitness fitness and coaching company Dixon has the experience (former professional triathlete) and the credentials (master’s in clinical and exercise physiology) needed to write a pretty damned definitive “textbook” for the sport. This book gets right down to it fast, focusing on four critical foundational elements: strength and endurance training, nutrition, functional strength, and recovery. Once an athlete puts these four together, the sky’s the limit. Discrete and not overlong sections cover techniques in swimming, cycling, and running and also methods of training. For example, “Improved Cycling” covers simple stuff such as braking and cornering but also makes thought-provoking points—a shorter crank length can actually be better, for example. Nutrition and hydration strategies cover race day and everyday, and the uniformly excellent section on functional strength reinforces how this will “improve your performance and help you avoid injuries.” Periodic rest and recovery is often “the first casualty” for triathletes, a breed that Dixon knows are often overly focused on performance to their own detriment. He even profiles “typical” triathletes, such as “Overstressed Busy Professional” and “Ironman-Fatigued Athlete.” A final section puts it all together big-picture style to instill long-term excellence. Triathletes tend to be high achievers, impatient and adventurous; this title seeks to quell those tendencies by encouraging enduring superbness. Novices might wonder what this is all about, but for midcareer to experienced age groupers who are sick of year after year of the same results, this could be a shot in the ass. VERDICT For experienced triathletes looking to take things to the next level, this is gold.
Find this review and others at Books for Dudes, Books for Dudes, the online reader's advisory column for men from Library Journal. Copyright Library Journal

[Lars · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of great points, but no concise training program

The author makes a lot of great points about training and racing in triathlon. It is definitely a great read and I recommend that other triathletes also read it. The reason I am giving it only 4 stars is that there is not really one concise training program. I am not a fan of one unflexible and generalized training plan appended at the end, but I think that this book should have included at least something in this regard. You can certainly use it to build your training program, but this is rather arbitrary and the information is scattered across the book. In my opinion, Joe Friel did a perfect job at this in The Triathlete's Training Bible: The World's Most Comprehensive Training Guide. I recommend reading Friel's book first and reading this book afterwards as it still offers a lot of great points. Comparing the different opinions is also a great way to really understand either of the books.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

I should have read this book years ago, when I was still serious about the sport. I should have read it during the pandemic when I felt like a rudderless ship sitting within sight of a milestone age that begged for an attempt at excellence. Alas.

This should be *the* definitive manual for the intense, passionate, drive, motivated and self-coached athlete because Dixon covers all the bases. Anyone with the mental bandwidth to take on triathlon seriously will gain a great deal from Dixon's insight, and not just because he has coached pros to glory with his methods.

[Dom · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not at all exceptional. Very male-focused, heteronormative, and has a lot of toxic male input on athletic training that none of us need in the world. No resources here other than the author's experience, he doesn't utilize science as he should, and he denounces other training methods without data.
More womxn athletes and authors, please! Or at least less toxic male voices in the world with megaphones.

[Neil · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this books emphasis on recovery as part of the plan, not a reaction to the plan. The book itself is compete and well laid out. It makes sense and isn’t overly technical. I especially appreciated the approach to nutrition which I often find full of myths and unhealthy recommendations in these type of books. He kept it simple, logical and healthy.

[Brandon Shultz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book but I feel that the book could focus on how an amateur should go about creating themselves into a well built triathlete. The book goes into the necessary detail but doesn't speak to the amateur age grouper as much as it could.

[Ahmed Salama · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome Book

I have ordered it as e-book and I have ordered it as paper boom again :) because can not get enough of reading it. One of the best ever bookI have reading for triathlon training

[Roy Madrid · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good overview. Not much in terms of details/training science/nontraditional programs.

[Mary-anne Gillespie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it! Great points and really helped prepare me for my Ironman.

[Axel Velazquez · Rating 5 out of 5]

What I learned is that triathlon is not 3 sport ( swimming , cycling and swimming). It also has , nutrition, recovery and mental preparation as a full time sport too :)

[Dave Jorgenson · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good description of how to make yourself stronger at all three events in a triathlon. Lots of knowledge that a newbie like me can put to immediate use. It includes many examples that can highlight why your current training is not working. One of the main thrusts of the book is trying to help the reader figure out how to integrate training into your life. It's not just do this and you'll succeed because that doesn't work for everyone. It includes many examples of plans that might work for this or that type of athlete. There's also a good section on strength training that focuses on shoring up the parts that are left weak by just swim-bike-run training.

[Stephen Redwood · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 pillars of performance: Endurance Training, Recovery, Nutrition, Functional Strength. Lots of good advice and useful nuggets on each of these topics, with enough of a personal touch to reflect his experience of being a top drawer triathlon coach for many years, and to make it quite readable. There's a good balance between specifics of technique and training programs, versus more general commentary and description. Overall, in this genre it's a useful book, worth a read for even experienced triathletes.

[Bud Winn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent perspective on triathlon training and methodology by one of the top triathlon coaches in the world. Very holistic with some common sense approaches and some unorthodox techniques. One for all my fellow triathletes to read to understand a different perspective on performance.

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

Nicely written, a good approach to training.

[Stacey Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Smart

A truly scientific approach to optimal training. Many lessons to be learned for the newbie or experienced. I hope this method catches on.

[Todd · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent book that advocates a balanced approach. However, some reader have claimed that this approach works best for 70.3 athletes; it's not clear if they were just super-douche-know-it-alls.