5150 · Erkner · 11 Sept 2027
How to train for 5150 Erkner
The organiser pitches 5150 Erkner at two kinds of athlete, fans of the Olympic distance and people who want a first taste of triathlon. The second group hears "short" and "flat" and books a gentle day out in the Brandenburg Forest. Short, yes. Gentle, no.
A Trained reference athlete is done in 2:45:18. Over that time the engine scores threshold capacity at 90 on the swim, on the bike and on the run, higher than any other demand it finds anywhere on this course. So this is an Olympic-distance triathlon raced close to threshold from start to finish, on 51.6 km of course that climbs 141 m and never once lets you coast. What decides it is the power you choose for one lap of the bike.
By Kian Briel, founder. Analysed by engine 1, updated
What is actually on the road
The organiser's own course files, drawn the way the Event Analyzer draws a member's race.
- Swim1.5 kmDistance only
- Bike40.1 km102 m upCourse file
- Run9.98 km in 2 laps39 m upCourse file
You start in the Dämeritzsee at the Strandbad Erkner, one loop of 1.5 km in a lake whose water is split between Berlin and the state of Brandenburg. The organiser describes flat wooded banks and clean, clear water. It logged 19 C in 2026 and 18 C in 2024. From the water exit it is about 150 m to the bike park at the sports centre, where you take your blue bag off the rack, change, and hang it back on its hook before you reach the bike.
The bike is a single lap of 40.1 km on straight roads beside the river Spree and out into the Brandenburg countryside, with 102 m of climbing in all. Then comes the run, 2 laps through Erkner for 10 km, past the marketplace and the Gerhart-Hauptmann-Museum, a memorial to the Nobel laureate poet Gerhart Hauptmann. It climbs 39 m.
The profile holds one surprise, and it is small. Some 115 m into the ride the road rises 228 m at 3.1 percent, and the engine gives that rise about 1 percent of the leg. From there to the dismount line the file is a single flat segment. The run is one flat segment from the first step to the last.
Course shape by distance
- Flat 100%
- Climbing 1%
- Descending 0%
The longest stretches
- Bike, climbing0.23 km1% of the bike
- Bike, flat39.8 km101% of the bike
- Run, flat9.98 km100% of the run
Each row is one unbroken stretch of the course that keeps the same shape the whole way. The number is how much of that leg you spend inside it, and it comes out the same whether you are fast or slow.
What this course asks of each leg
Twelve training dimensions scored for each leg against its own course, the way the Event Analyzer scores a member's race.
Threshold capacity, above all, on every leg. It scores 90 in the lake, on the bike and on foot. High-intensity capacity follows at 72 on the bike and 70 on the other two, then aerobic endurance at 70 everywhere, with muscular endurance at 60 or 61 behind them. The bike fills 45 percent of a Trained day, so once the scores are weighted by time the bike's threshold demand stands clear at the top of the whole course.
Just as telling is what drops away. Fueling resilience reads 20 on every leg and aerobic durability 35. Strength and force is 35 on the bike and 25 on the run. There is no climb here to reward a strong rider, and the day is too short to reward a merely patient one. The Oder-Spree region is all meadow, forest and lake, and the course through it asks one thing. How close to your threshold can you sit, and for how long?
Put the reference bands beside that. A Trained athlete swims 29:13, rides 1:14:09 at 200 W and runs 51:56. The lake alone is 18 percent of that day, a slice worth training on its own terms. The Competitive band comes home in 2:25:06, from 4.15 W/kg at 75 kg and 4:20 /km threshold pace, riding 1:05:43 at 274 W before a 44:07 run. Nothing on the course lets it buy that time with a sprint or a climb. It buys it with a higher threshold, held longer.
Ask the engine for one session shaped by this bike file and it returns a ride of about an hour whose centre is a single continuous block of Zone 4, a little over half an hour of it, with a warm-up before and a cool-down after and nothing else in between. That is the leg in miniature.
Weather is a footnote. The organiser's highs over three editions run from 18 C to 23 C, and environmental resilience scores 10 on every leg. The low was 10 C in 2026, which matters more to someone climbing out of the lake than to anyone on the run.
- Threshold capacity90
- Aerobic endurance70
- High-intensity capacity70
- Muscular endurance60
- Anaerobic capacity55
- Technical skill55
- Threshold durability45
- Aerobic durability35
- Fueling resilience20
- Sprint power20
- Strength / force15
- Environmental resilience10
Nymiva reads what you can already show, from your own data
Connect your training history and the Focus Lab scores the same twelve dimensions this course demands against where you sit today. The gap between the two is what you train.
- MeasuredFrom your thresholds and testsThreshold power, threshold pace, critical swim speed and field tests you have done. The dimensions they can carry are scored directly.
- EstimatedFrom your training historyConnected activities are read for what they prove: long efforts, late-session fade, repeated hard work, fueling on long days. Each score says how it was read.
- ProxyFrom a stand-in, and named as oneWhere only an indirect signal exists, the score carries the proxy it came from and a lower confidence, never a number dressed as a measurement.
- UnmeasuredHonestly blankA dimension nothing in your data can answer stays unmeasured. It is never a zero, and the plan does not pretend to know it.
Every dimension ends in one word
- Develop the course asks more than you can show
- Maintain close enough to hold at the minimum dose
- Covered nothing to build here
- Unmeasured the course needs it, your data cannot say yet
Nymiva reads twelve dimensions off the course file and reads the same twelve off the athlete, from their thresholds and their connected training history, and every athlete score says what it was built from and how much weight it can bear. Where the course demands more than the athlete can show, there is a gap. Gaps are then weighted by the share of the day they touch, which on this course means a bike gap counts for far more than a swim gap of the same size.
Nothing on this page comes from you, so its season takes the plain assumption that your gaps sit where the demands are highest. It lays out 16 weeks with 3 developmental blocks. Threshold capacity leads the first block in all three sports. Muscular endurance leads the second. In the third, high-intensity capacity leads on the bike while aerobic endurance leads in the water and on foot, and then come two weeks of taper and race week. Your own season is drawn from your own numbers and will set its priorities differently.
What this course asks for first
Which demands matter most across the whole race. A leg's demand counts for as much of the day as that leg takes, so a score of 85 on the bike outweighs the same score on the swim.
- 01Threshold capacityBike leg, 45% of the day90 × 45%40
- 02High-intensity capacityBike leg, 45% of the day72 × 45%32
- 03Aerobic enduranceBike leg, 45% of the day70 × 45%31
Which demand gets a block, and when
The engine freezes one lead focus per sport on every developmental block, holds the rest at maintenance, and verifies before it reprioritises.
An illustration, not your plan. This page has none of your data, so the season below is the engine’s answer to one stated assumption: that your gaps line up with what 5150 Erkner demands. Your own season is built from your history, your thresholds, the days you can train and the races you have entered, and it will differ from this in its priorities, its sessions and its load.
- 01Swim threshold capacity, a development block3 weeks
- 02Run threshold capacity, a development block3 weeks
- 03Bike threshold capacity, a development block4 weeks
In the order the allocator places them, general first, most race-like last.
- Week 1PrepPrep
A lead-in week. It develops nothing by design.
- Weeks 2 to 5Foundation 2Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike threshold capacity
- PriorityRun threshold capacity
- PrioritySwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun aerobic endurance
- SupportSwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- Weeks 6 to 9Event shaping 1Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike muscular endurance
- PriorityRun muscular endurance
- PrioritySwim muscular endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike high-intensity capacity
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun aerobic endurance
- SupportRun high-intensity capacity
- SupportSwim aerobic endurance
- SupportSwim high-intensity capacity
- Weeks 10 to 13Event shaping 2Closes with a recovery week
- PriorityBike high-intensity capacity
- PriorityRun aerobic endurance
- PrioritySwim aerobic endurance
- SupportBike threshold capacity
- SupportRun threshold capacity
- SupportSwim threshold capacity
- SupportBike aerobic endurance
- SupportRun high-intensity capacity
- SupportSwim high-intensity capacity
- SupportBike muscular endurance
- SupportRun muscular endurance
- SupportSwim muscular endurance
- Weeks 14 to 15PeakPeak
The taper. Load comes down toward the race, content stays specific.
- Week 16RaceRace
Race week.
Held at maintenance between blocks
- Swimthreshold capacity, aerobic endurance, high-intensity capacity, muscular endurance
- Runthreshold capacity, aerobic endurance, high-intensity capacity, muscular endurance
- Bikethreshold capacity, aerobic endurance, high-intensity capacity, muscular endurance
Touches scheduled by each capability’s own decay, at a fraction of its development dose, so earlier work is still there on race day.
The sessions the blocks are built from
One entry per kind of work the block trains, at the intensity that work is meant to be done at. Where the same work runs at several lengths, the entry shows the span it grows across rather than one entry per length.
- Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 553 to 167 min
4 x 10 min at Zone 4, then 20 min at Zone 4, then 10 x 0.2 min at Zone 7, then 30 min at Zone 3, 5 min easy between
BikePower, Zone 4Trains threshold capacity - Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 576 to 135 min
5 x 1 min at Zone 1, then 2 x 20 min at Zone 4, then 45 min at Zone 3, 1 min easy between
BikePower, Zone 1Trains threshold capacity - Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 552 to 62 min
3 x 8 min at Zone 4, 3 min easy between
RunPace, Zone 4Trains threshold capacity - Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 560 min
3 x 8 min at Zone 3, then 3 x 7 min at Zone 4
RunPace, Zone 3Trains threshold capacity - Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 532 to 44 min
12 x 100 m at Zone 4, 0.3 min easy between
SwimPace, Zone 4Trains threshold capacity - Foundation 2 · Weeks 2 to 546 to 59 min
10 x 200 m at Zone 3, 0.3 min easy between
SwimPace, Zone 3Trains threshold capacity
Sustained course race pressure
36.3 min at Zone 4
Compiled by the deterministic course compiler from the organiser’s file: the course’s one repeatable requirement, rehearsed at a dose the progression allows.
- Bike
- 61 min
- Trains threshold durability
- Supports aerobic durability
16 weeks, laid out backwards from race day
The shortest runway Nymiva builds for this event type, with its blocks, recovery weeks, taper and race week in place.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- Prep
- Foundation
- Event shaping
- Peak
- Race
- Recovery week
Your own season carries these same phases on your own dates, with the load solved from your fitness and the days you can train, and it changes when your data does.
What each level does on the day
Reference finish times per peer band, the pacing plan the model holds each band to, and where the day is decided.
| Band | Swim | Bike | Run | Finish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Recreational2:11 /100m critical swim speed · 2.47 W/kg at 75 kg · 6:08 /km threshold pace | 0:34:28 | 1:20:21 | 1:02:27 | 3:07:16 |
| Trained1:51 /100m critical swim speed · 3.03 W/kg at 75 kg · 5:06 /km threshold pace | 0:29:13 | 1:14:09 | 0:51:56 | 2:45:18 |
| Competitive1:36 /100m critical swim speed · 4.15 W/kg at 75 kg · 4:20 /km threshold pace | 0:25:16 | 1:05:43 | 0:44:07 | 2:25:06 |
| Elite1:26 /100m critical swim speed · 5.27 W/kg at 75 kg · 3:50 /km threshold pace | 0:22:38 | 1:00:06 | 0:39:02 | 2:11:46 |
Pacing plan
- 0 km-0.9%36.3 km/h0:11
- 0.12 km3.1%19 km/h0:43
- 0.34 km0%32 km/h1:14:37
- Run: reach 4:20 /km and this course gives back 20:12.
Where it is decided
In the opening minutes on the bike, when the number gets chosen.
Out of the water and through the sports centre, the legs feel light, the road is straight and the Spree runs beside you. Nothing on the course will ever push the effort up or pull it down again. On a hilly course the terrain corrects a rider who starts too hard. Here nothing corrects anyone. A Trained rider holds 200 W for 1:14:09, and the difference between that and a little more feels like nothing for the first half of the lap.
It does not show up on the bike at all. It shows up on the run, and specifically on the second lap. Everybody runs the first lap on adrenaline. A Trained runner needs 51:56 from an input of 5:06 /km threshold pace, and the marketplace, passed once on each lap, is the checkpoint. Riders who picked the right number hold their split through the second lap. Riders who picked the wrong one watch the Gerhart-Hauptmann-Museum come round a lot more slowly than it did the first time.
Getting it wrong
Start with the rise. It is the only one on the course and it arrives within the first 350 m of riding, so a rider still buzzing from the swim stands up and sprints it. The reference pacing plan does the opposite. It keeps 200 W on the rise and lets the speed fall. The rise is about 1 percent of the leg. Treat it that way.
Another mistake is ranking the lake below everything else in training. At 18 percent of a Trained day the swim is not a warm-up, and the 150 m to the blue bag and the bike comes straight after it, before the part of the race that matters most.
The last mistake is the crowd on the run. The organiser promises spectator support through Erkner and a finish with energy to spare. Both are true if the first lap is run at the pace you trained for. Run it to the noise by the marketplace instead and the second lap will take the energy back.
Conditions on the day
- 2026high 20 C, low 10 Cwater 19 C
- 2025high 23 C, low 13 Cwater 19 C
- 2024high 18 C, low 11 Cwater 18 C
From the organiser’s own records. Not a forecast.
Every session is a claim, every block is a test
A plan is not a calendar. Each key session states what it trains and how that is checked, and each block ends with a public verdict before the next one is chosen.
What a block promises
Bike threshold capacity moves from your baseline to a stated target by the end of Foundation 2
- The baseline is your measured score when the block starts. The target is the score the model predicts for it.
- Verified at the block’s recovery week, by a field test or a refresh of the supply read from your history.
- Confidence rises by agreement between independent signals, never by one metric crossing a line.
- A block that misses its target is a public miss. The next block is chosen from what was proven, not from what was planned.
- 01Stimulus achievedThe work landed in the zone the session named, for the dose it named.
- 02Partially achievedSome of the work landed. The session banks what it can prove.
- 03Not achievedThe load may have been there. The stimulus was not, so nothing is banked.
- 04Data insufficientNo usable stream. The session is neither credited nor blamed.
- Session verified
- Progression banked
- Block verified
- Priority reassessed
- Plan adapted
Your numbers, this course
Analyze 5150 Erkner against my fitness
The same simulation and the same Focus Lab read, on your thresholds instead of a band’s. Three numbers give a finish estimate and a partial read. A connected history gives the whole table.
The first 14 days are free.
- Trained band finish
- 2:45:18
- Of the day on the bike
- 45%
- Dimensions scored per leg
- 12
- Season runway shown
- 16 wk
Questions people ask
- How flat is the 5150 Erkner bike course?
- Very. The organiser describes one 40 km lap, flat and fast, on straight roads along the river Spree. Its file measures 40.1 km with 102 m of climbing, and the only rise the engine finds is 228 m at 3.1 percent, over before the ride is 350 m old.
- Where is the 5150 Erkner swim, and how warm is the water?
- One loop of 1.5 km in the Dämeritzsee, starting from the Strandbad Erkner. The organiser logged the water at 19 C in 2026 and 2025 and at 18 C in 2024. The wetsuit rule is not on the course page, so look for it in the race week information.
- How many laps is the 5150 Erkner run?
- Two laps through Erkner for 10 km, past the marketplace and the Gerhart-Hauptmann-Museum. The organiser's file climbs 39 m in total and the engine reads the whole run as flat.
- How long is the training season on this page?
- Sixteen weeks, with three developmental blocks followed by two weeks of taper and race week. It is drawn from the course alone. A member's own season starts from their numbers and can run longer.
Course data from the organiser’s published files, analysed 24 Sept 2026 by engine 1, demand model 4. Reference times are simulated for a peer band at a stated reference athlete and are not a prediction for anyone. Nothing on this page is medical advice.
IRONMAN® and IRONMAN 70.3® are registered trademarks, and 5150 is a trademark, of World Triathlon Corporation. Nymiva is an independent training platform and is not affiliated with, sponsored by or endorsed by World Triathlon Corporation. Course data is read from the organiser’s public course pages for the purpose of describing the event.