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If you’re not quite the fitness fanatic you might be daunted by the thought of entering an event where people are competing to be the fastest across three different forms of fitness. But you shouldn’t be, the triathlon world is full of people of mixed abilities, from young to old, fit to fat. You don’t just have to go all out and compete in a full triathlon either; many people don’t even do the full event, maybe just two out of the three for fun.

That said, it’s no walk in the park, it is a sporting event to be taken seriously and taking part without any training could risk injury or serious health issues. The key to success is training, lots and lots of training. The event consists of three activities, swimming, cycling and running, assuming you know how to run, the only thing you might need help with is cycling and swimming, there is no point doing generic exercise without practicing the three disciplines.

You will need running shoes, a warm swimsuit/triathlon suit, and a bike. The first two are relatively cheap but getting a bike is more serious than it sounds. You won’t necessarily be able to just pull your old chopper out of the garage and make it work, if you have an old bike take it to a bike shop and see if it is worth repairing. If can often be more cost-effective to buy a new one that fixing up an old one as you still end up with an old bike. The bike will need to be suitable for the event, there are triathlon specific bikes if you want to get serious but a decent lightweight mountain bike will do. You will need to train on this and learn basic maintenance in case of an accident, fixing a puncture is a must as is a pump and spare inner tube.

If it’s your first time, you are best off choosing a ’sprint’ triathlon as this is a much shorter distance as usual, it doesn’t matter if you have run a marathon before as you use different groups of muscles and they are not as similar as you might imagine. The sprint triathlon consists of a 750m swim, 20km bike ride and a 5km run. People taking part in this kind of even are likely to be beginners too which will help you feel better about being out of breath.

You should begin your training well in advance, it takes around several months for your body to adapt to new activities but if you are in reasonably good shape and are already into sports you could probably train in as little as three months. Concentrate on your weakest area at first you will have to build up your skill before your fitness. Create a training schedule, have a strict timetable of at least 1 – 3 hours per day, 5 – 6 days per week. Vary your workout intensity, focus on sprinting and power one day but distance the next, this will help your body build up both strength and endurance.

Over time, increase the intensity of your training to a point where you do two of the three activities on a few of the days each week, perhaps to triathlon distance. If you want you could complete a whole triathlon as training but bear in mind that this is very exhausting and could take up a couple of days in recovery which will interrupt your training schedule.

Build up a good diet; make sure your daily intake consists of the appropriate amount of calories for your training and all necessary proteins, vitamins and minerals. This will aid your training and also get your body in the right condition for lengthy exercise. In the days leading up to the event you might want to stock up on proteins and possibly consult a dietician, for the actual event, which will probably be an early start, have a light healthy breakfast with fruit. Take along plenty of energy supplements for the race in case you begin to tire. Finally, good luck!

If you want to take part in a triathlon, don’t go thinking you need to spend a heap of money, if you want you could do it in a Manchester United football shirt and a pair of Adidas f50 Adizero shoes.