So I am going to be competing in my first triathlon ever this fall on 9-12. I decided to give myself a good challenge and do the half-ironman. With that said, I planned on doing a 20 week training program to prepare myself. While I have a good biking past, and am able to run decently well, I have not swam much since my younger years before high school. Now that I am 24 it has been a few years. With that said I am now in my fifth week of training and this is my current situation and problems. First I have found that having the time alone for this much training a week is hard. I do 9 workouts a week, three of each discipline with occasional brick workouts mixed in. The past two weeks have almost been non existent with working out since I am working 2 jobs in the service industry and also doing an internship at a fire department that requires me to be there for 24 hours on my days there. THe good news is that my internship ends on Wednesday and that My two jobs are starting to become more balanced with time. Now that I am 15 weeks away will this be enough time to prepare myself if I can get into a good routine of workouts? Also my dieting is going alright but staying hydrated enough each day and getting enough calories and energy in me seems to be a problem. Does anyone have advice or ways that I can make all this training go more smoothly?

It sounds like you're in pretty good shape so assuming that you have a decent base, 15 weeks is plenty to get ready. Try to make time for a long ride and a long run every week and do what you can in between. Keep us posted.

Wow. That sounds like a pretty tall order, but kudos for getting into it. I'd ease in with a more natural transition from sprint to Olympic to Half if I were you (i.e., plot some midpoints and do like a sprint in June and an Oly in July/August). This might help:

https://www.beginnertriathlete.com/cm...p?articleid=52

Good luck!

If you can get back into a regular routine, I think you'll be fine. To reiterate what CJ said, make sure you're getting one long run and one long ride in a week. Don't overtrain because you're feeling tight on time and start working on a nutrition plan on those long workouts so you know what you're going to do come race day.

With regards to H2O, I recommend calculating your sweat rate. Beginning Work out Weight - Ending Working Out Weight + Weights of Fluids Consumed during work out. This will give you a feel as to how much water you really need during your work out. For example if you don't consume any water for an hour run and you lose 2 pounds then you know should have attempted to mitigate that 2 pound loss in H2O.

Next, I'd probably consider getting some private lessons to evaluate your swim stroke since don't have lots of recent swimming experience.

I second Joe Friel's work, especially The Triathletes Training Bible, 3rd Edition. In my opinion he also has some decent nutrional advice which may help you out with the calories intake and eating correctly to maximize your health on race day.