We love getting to know our Purple Patch athletes! Please welcome Squad member, Jason Murray!

Athlete bio

Jason Murray is 33 years old and lives in Boston, USA. Originally from New Zealand, this will be his fourth year in triathlon. He's currently learning how to integrate sport into life with a newborn. His number one goal for 2020 is to get through it injury-free. To him, that means a strong emphasis on strength and conditioning, gradual progression, and letting his body determine what constitutes adequate recovery. Sounds a little like the Pillars of Performance! He’s training for a top 10 AG result at Lake Placid 70.3 and plans to complete his first full distance event in 2020. 

Story

I’ve had setbacks due to injury every year since I started in triathlon. If I was being honest with myself I knew why it was happening too. I was overemphasizing the run during training, not consistently incorporating strength and mobility, progressing too quickly early in the season, and not listening to my body. But 2019 was a new low. Plantar fasciitis. I missed out on almost an entire season.

I’ve known about the importance of strength training for injury prevention and endurance for a few years. On a few occasions, I even tried to incorporate it but never stuck with it. I found it boring and didn’t notice any benefit to my preferred disciplines. In a time-starved life I’d rather be biking or running. So it is perhaps a little ironic that I was finally convinced to commit to strength training during my long rides.

After a few hours into a long ride, I’d consistently fade in the same way. My breathing was fine (at low efforts) and I still had the will to go on but my legs were no longer there. I needed to get stronger to get faster. Strong like bull as we say around here.

My strength and conditioning journey got off to a rocky start. I remember reading that one of the best things you can do as a time-starved athlete is to remove all the little reasons that tilt you in the direction of opting out of a workout. In my case, I was fine spending 30-40 minutes driving to the gym to get in a 60 minute swim but, for me, that cost was too high for (what was then) a 20 minute strength session. It was too easy to say no.

After a few weeks of occasional strength sessions, I removed that reason to say no by buying a few pieces of equipment for at home. For about the same as the monthly PPF subscription, I purchased a few kettlebells and resistance bands which was sufficient to get me started. In the beginning, I was deadlifting 0.2x bodyweight, goblet squatting 0.1x and I’d be sore for 2 - 3 days afterward. I never pushed myself to add more weight but consistently focused on good form (I watched a lot of YouTube videos) and trusted that consistently would lead to results. 

After a few weeks, I was complete the max prescribed reps and sets easily so I’d bump up the weight a bit. I never did a test to see what my one rep max was but I strongly suspect I was working out below the target weight range even during the postseason. I’m a pretty small guy with no history of weight training. I fully expected that it would take time for my body to adapt and set no expectations for how long that might take. It was at least 6 - 8 weeks before felt ready to push harder in these workouts and now, four months later, that I think I’m in that 70-85% target range. I say think because I still haven’t tested my one rep max as I’m still seeing steady progression being conservative and doing what feels right for me. I’m now at 1.1x bodyweight for the deadlift (using a hexbar) and 0.2x for the goblet squat. I’m contemplating moving to a barbell for squats as I’m using the largest kettlebell I have and not feeling challenged anymore. When I bought my hexbar I thought I’d gotten enough weight to last me a long time. Now I think it’s likely I’ll need to get more in a couple of months.

I’m now seeing real results too. I feel great with all the low cadence work we’re currently doing and have noticed an extra spring in step during hill work on the runs. As Matt always says, there are no shortcuts. It has taken me at least four months of consistent work to start noticing these benefits but I now really enjoy the strength work and prioritize it over other supporting work. I hope that after reading this those of you that haven’t committed to strength training will too. That Dixon guy might have been onto something when he made Strength and Conditioning a pillar of performance.

Why Purple Patch? 

I'm not really sure how to answer that, to be honest as I feel like I could write an essay on that. If I had to boil it down it's that the PurplePatch philosophy feels like the right fit for me. Based on my own experience a lot of the conventional wisdom about multisport training just didn't work well for me. So when I stumbled across a group saying something a little different but that reflected my own experience I was sold.