I have a Half Ironman approaching on June 5th. Oliver Half Iron to be exact.  Including today, that is 12 days before race day (maybe that is when the rapture really is, raptures are tough to figure out, lots of math involved).  

It could be hot, could be cold, could be somewhere in between which is usually the case in Oliver.  Cold and warm are not really an issue, however, hot can be and requires me to take some extra precautions in my training.

So, thought I'd take a peak at the weather.  I always google for weather and the picture above is what showed up for the next four days.  We are lucky to be in the Okanagan and we have had better weather than most  in North America this year.  However, even for us, it has been a cool and cloudy spring.  The picture set off even more alarm bells.  It seems like every cool/wet spring we end up with hot early races.  And, the forecast like above is cool till race day thus no hot training days left to get used to any kind of heat.   

The extended forecast for Oliver is a high of 24C (75F).  OK, not exactly HOT, but it is going to feel hot on the run since I am used to running at those comfortable temperatures we have had all spring.

Now what?  Well, I started some acute hot weather training mostly because I want to do well in Oliver.  My training has been far from perfect and especially so with my running.  As a result, I am really encouraged to do what I can to make sure my run is as comfortable as possible.  Thus, I started today.  I had a very easy run so I put on three long sleeve shirts and left with a water bottle in my hand.  I never cooked, but, I got a good sweat going.  I'd say it simulated 24C quite well.  

12 days is not exactly a long time to acclimate for any temperature.  Our trick is to speed up the acclimation process by doing passive (sitting) sauna training.  My athletes don't usually argue when I put sauna training in their plan.  For some reason, they seem to enjoy it compared to 800 repeats on the track or bike hill intervals?  I'll be hitting the sauna after every swim that I can fit in (5 to go before race day).  The key to sauna training is to sweat a lot but never cook yourself.  In other words, get the sweat going for a few minutes, then get out.  I have more tips to sauna training if you are interested.  Use the comments below if so.