Multisport Blogs

Age Group Profile: Jaakko Hiekkaranta

Since reading about the lifestyles of the pros is usually educational, sometimes entertaining, and rarely practical, I am far more interested in learning more about Jane and Joe Lunchbucket. You know, the multisport athletes like you and me. Folks who fit training around their jobs, family, school and other commitments. Weekend warriors who don’t have the luxury of taking a post-training nap during the weekday.

One such noteworthy age group triathlete is Jaakko Hiekkaranta of Finland. The 22-year-old triathlete is a student at the University of Jyväskylä where he is studying marketing and entrepreneurship. Since joining the sport in 2005, he has competed in five sprint triathlons, three Olympic distance, eight half-Ironman and two Ironman-distance triathlons, plus and a handful of duathlons.

In his first Ironman-distance triathlon in 2006, which was also the Finnish national chamipionship, he  won his age group.

Jaakko Hiekkaranta takes a corner during a recent triathlon.

Question: How did you get started in triathlon?

Hiekkaranta: It was quite by accident I guess. I had plateaud with my golfing for a couple years mainly because all I did was drink and party with friends! Then one day at the golden age of 17 I didn’t want to look anymore at a 25kg (55 lbs.) overweight guy with a drinking problem in the mirror. I guess I was becoming a bit addicted to the booze and cigarettes and I needed an alternative, healthier addiction. It had to be something pretty radical!

So I started training and did my first sprint a couple months later and got hooked for life!

Question: Did your lifestyle change from party boy to triathlete have an impact on your social life? How did your friends react to your new change in direction?

Hiekkaranta: I was in my senior year at high school at the time and at school I did hang out with the same posse. But during weekends I just trained all the time. When I got out of high school I went to do my military service and during that army year my social life pretty much ended completely.

Question: How did you go about preparing for that first triathlon?

Hiekkaranta: It’s funny, performance-wise my first two years were probably the best training I’ve ever done. I had absolutely no knowledge on training for endurance sports and I thought everyone from beginner to pro should at least try to train in the same way. I think I first ran into Craig Walton’s training week example and just tried to emulate that. In every session I wently nearly as hard as I was able to for the duration. In my first complete training year, I went from virtually zero training to about 750 hours! And while it brought some great results, in hindsight it was propably not very good for my body.

Question: With your university studies, how do you fit training around schedule? Give us a sampling of a typical day.

Hiekkaranta: There are a lot of variations during the school year depending on how much I have to be present in classes. Nevertheless, my days are always pretty packed between training and studying. Since I’m working on my bachelor’s thesis this year, I only spend about 10-15 hours a week at school and otherwise its pretty much just studying at home or at the library. That’s great in that I can pretty much fill the day’s work around training.

A typical day would start with a 5.30 a.m. wake-up and a light breakfast reading e-mails and stuff. I’ll then bike to the pool (15minutes) and swim from 6.30-8:00 a.m. Then it’s back home for a second breakfast and I study until 10:00. Then I do another workout before lunch. After lunch I try to break the bike commuting speed world record so that I don’t arrive too late for class which start at 12.15 p.m.

I get home from school at 4 p.m. and do some training. After that I cook and eat dinner and continue my studies. At 8:00 p.m., the computer goes off and then I stretch and read until I hit the pillow at 9 p.m. so that I can start as rested as possible the next day.

Question: I would imagine that being as far north as Finland is, you would have a short triathlon season. H

Hiekkaranta: Triathlon race season in Finland is embarassingly short, from mid-June to early August. Because of that, the triathlon community is almost nonexistent.

I loved to cross-country ski during the winters, but the last two winters have been very bad with very little snow and more lots of rain. Thus, I’ve not been able to enjoy that sport anymore.

Question: Ahhh…you are in the land of nordic skiing. Is it truly a big sport in Finland?

Jaakko looks strong coming out of T2.

Hiekkaranta: It has been big. Every kid has to learn to ski in school from a young age. Kids usually hate cross-country skiing because they don’t think it’s a cool sport. But, like I said, the winters over here are really turning more like British weather where its dark, rainy, windy, and cold, but not cold enough to snow. Ski conditions are pretty bad lately. Also, the national skiing federation’s doping messes are not doing good for that sport.

Cross country skiing is a great way to build fitness though. I’ve had my best seasons when I’ve been able to put huge amount of work on skis.

Question: Wow. That’s a short racing season. What type of training do you do for such a long off-season?

Hiekkaranta: My “off-season” training at the moment is consisted only of swimming, riding on the trainer, strength work, and some occasional aqua-jogging. I swim four times, ride eight times, do gym work twice and core strength three times a week. Plus, I commute on my bike about five hours a week. There’s no running until late November or early December (knock on wood) as I’m healing a stress fracture on my left tibia.

You can follow Jaakko Hiekkaranta’s training and racing at his blog: www.jaakkohiekkaranta.blogspot.com

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