Photography by Simon DesRochers
The silver-tongued Olympic medallist offers up wisdom and advice.

Simon Whitfield, thirty-three, reestablished himself as one of Canada’s superstar athletes when he took the silver medal in men’s triathlon at the 2008 Olympic Summer Games in Beijing. Already well known for his dramatic gold-medal victory in the event at the 2000 Games in Sydney, Whitfield, orginally of Kingston, Ontario, now living in Victoria, British Columbia, nearly repeated his golden performance by coming from behind in the final ten-kilometre run,

Training

For all the similarities in his two Olympic-medal-winning performances, Whitfield’s approach to sport and training has changed in the last eight years.

“Well as my training has gone on, it’s gotten simpler, to tell you the truth,” says Whitfield. “There’s a lot of thought, obviously, that goes into it in the planning stage, but in terms of the execution, we try to keep it fairly simple.

“I personally don’t get too fixated on the numbers: I don’t stress if I have a ninety minute run and I get out for eighty-five minutes, or if I happen to go for an hour and forty-five. I try not to get too fixated at swim practice at how far we swam or exactly how many metres.”

Whitfield attributes the difference to National team head coach Joel Filliol’s coaching style: “My coaching has gone from a fairly detailed and analyzed program . . . to, well, it’s more quietly evaluated now. The coach quietly sits back and writes in his logbook. We don’t make a big deal of rough days, and we also don’t make a big deal about great days. We kind of just roll along.”

The difference between his current training and what he experienced in the past is marked. “In the past,” says Whitfield, “there was a fair amount of animation on the pool deck, so when previously if you had a poor swim, there would be a fair bit of ‘What’s going on? What’s wrong today?’ And if you had a great swim, it would be one step away from the fireworks going off and the tickertape parade. Now, at swimming, if you have a great swim, the coach just kind of nods at you and writes it down in his book, and he doesn’t have a great poker face—he’s definitely smiling if you had a great swim.

“And conversely, when you have a poor swim, you can tell a little bit by his body language that he’s not necessarily pleased with how it went, but, again, you’re not afraid that—he’s not standing beside the guillotine sharpening the blade. And that’s kind of our whole philosophy: just get the work done and roll along.”

The change in coaching style, from tickertape parade to logbook, has assisted Whitfield in his approach to the running training in his sport as well.

“Our run program is fairly simple: we run basically every day. It’s a classic combination of a key workout, a longer workout, and a recovery workout. There’s nothing—there’s no magic formula to it. We don’t do anything vastly different than anyone else might,” says Whitfield.

Whitfield’s specific training focuses on strength. “Our swim program is very much focused on strength and aerobic endurance,” he says. “I have fairly good natural speed, I would say, so strength was always what I needed to work on, and so we work my weaknesses.”

Mental Toughness

Whitfield admits that the mental and emotional component of sport can be as difficult as or more demanding than the physical training.

“When you first become a professional athlete and have a whole day to train, it’s much more difficult than people think because it takes time to adapt. . . . The trap sometimes that guys get into when they change to be full time is in what it takes to be at the highest level or to be a professional athlete—it takes some adaptation to learning how to manage your day and not have the whole day to think through, to overthink things and overanalyze—we call it paralysis through analysis.”

“So . . . having a family now and not having the luxury of time to think about it, I certainly don’t always pass the test, but I think I pass the test more and more often now.”

Politics

Emotions have been running fairly high in professional triathlon recently, starting with the controversy surrounding Triathlon Canada’s decision to adopt a team approach to winning at the 2008 Games. The men’s team consisted of Whitfield, Paul Tichelaar, twenty-five, of Edmonton, Alberta; and Colin Jenkins, twenty-five, originally from Hamilton, Ontario, and now living in Victoria, British Columbia. Jenkins was chosen for the men’s team over stronger contenders Brent McMahon of Victoria, British Columbia, and Kyle Jones of Oakville, Ontario, as his skill and speed on the bike and in the water were seen to offer a pace-setting advantage for putting Whitfield across the finish line for a medal. Indeed, the team approach was crucial to Whitfield’s win.

“At the end of the day our mandate and our mission statement was to win medals,” says Whitfield, “And I am very proud of our squad and Triathlon Canada for having made a decision that wasn’t necessarily popular.” Whitfield continued, “We innovated. And the fact that New Zealand did the same thing and put a person on the podium also tells you. . . . [It’s] exactly as I predicted: if we don’t innovate, someone else will.”

But for Whitfield, the team approach wasn’t solely about winning medals: “It’s not only teamwork from a race-day perspective—because that was certainly one factor—but the big thing for us, too, was the camaraderie and the knowledge that you had committed teammates in the preparation process—this three-year journey for Colin and I—and Kyle. Kyle, you know, he played a huge, huge role in the silver medal—he was a big, big factor. . . . You always knew that Colin and Kyle would be there on a ride in the pouring rain because it needed to be done. You knew that they would show up to swimming the next morning no matter what, and that’s as much teamwork as anything else is.”

Whitfield admits that he used to get into a lot of fights with the triathlon community over issues involving teamwork and support: “I have high expectations of the people around me. My thing is, well, if you expect high-performance results, if you expect world-class results from me, where I have to stand on the start line and you expect medals, then I expect the support around me to be world-class too. And that might not have always been the way it was in the past. . . . I think that with world-class demands should come world-class support.”

Nutrition

Part of being ready to win silver at the Olympics involved Whitfield’s close attention to his nutrition. He follows the advice of long-time friend Mark Sisson, the former vice-president of the International Triathlon Union, author of triathlon’s original doping code, and current opinionated blogger at Mark’s Daily Apple (www.marksdailyapple.com).

“His thoughts on nutrition and on general fitness and health are absolutely brilliant, and I just kind of follow along with what he says,” says Whitfield.

Hi-Yo, Silver

“We rode a few days before the race . . . with the whole team and both the alternates. There was Paul Tichelaar, Colin, myself, Kyle, and so on, and all in our cool team uniforms. We rode around the course and then we rode around the reservoir, and we were out laughing about something and sprinting to random signs and telling ridiculous stories like you do, and [someone] pulled up beside me, and said, ‘You know, you remind me now of what you were like before Sydney. You’re just like a kid, aren’t you?’ And I laughed, and I said, ‘Well, now I know I’m ready,’ because that’s definitely what I am: I’m a big kid, for sure. I have a great time playing with kids. I’m a pickup sports fanatic. And when I get through races with an attitude and a joy of sport, then I definitely come with the right frame of mind to race with.”

Advice

Whitfield offered some advice to anyone interested in training for triathlon:

For swimming: “Find a great Masters squad and just enjoy it. Don’t stress. Don’t stress about what the sets are or whether you’re getting enough stroke work. Remember that’s all noise. Just find a great Masters’ group or a great group of people to swim with. Have fun with it . . . enjoy!”

For the bike: “Find someone who knows what they’re doing on bike position. Get fit properly. And get fit by a fellow who understands triathlon, because we’ve all been corrupted by the guys who know about road cycling. They say, ‘Wow! You triathletes, you don’t know what you’re doing; let me show you.’ And they’ll set you up in a position that’s great for road riding and terrible for riding off the bike. So find someone who understands triathlon and the demands of riding off the bike, and get fit properly.”

For running: “Strengthen your feet. Read up on drills and exercises that will strengthen your feet. Your feet are so important.”