A plain-language guide to what TPI is, what it does for your programme, and what you need to do to get your first athlete report in your hands.
Most training programmes are built on a mix of experience, feel, and general physiological principles. That works up to a point. But at the level where tenths of a second separate All-Americans from also-rans, general principles are not enough. You need to know this swimmer's energy ceiling, this swimmer's anaerobic reserve, and this swimmer's precise training paces — not the ones from a textbook, not the ones based on a time trial, and not the ones borrowed from another athlete who "looks similar."
Troika Performance Intelligence gives you exactly that. It is a complete metabolic profiling system — developed over 35 years of elite international coaching science, peer-reviewed and published, and field-tested at the highest levels of the sport. It tells you what is happening inside your swimmer's body during training and racing, in language a coach can act on immediately.
TPI is not a fitness tracker, a heart rate monitor app, or a general wellness platform. It is a purpose-built, sport-specific metabolic intelligence system. Three integrated tools work together to give you a complete picture of every swimmer on your roster.
The Swimmer Profiler is the foundation of everything else. It uses a short battery of timed swims — typically three efforts over 45 to 90 minutes — combined with a small blood sample at the end of each effort. From that, it calculates the single most important number in training prescription: WERP — the Weighted Event Reference Point.
WERP is your swimmer's individual aerobic ceiling for their primary event. Think of it as the fastest speed they can sustain without digging into their anaerobic reserve. Everything below WERP builds the engine. Everything above it burns finite fuel that can't be replaced during the race. Knowing exactly where that line sits changes how you write every training set.
Alongside WERP, the Profiler calculates W′ (W-Prime) — the total anaerobic energy reserve available above that ceiling. This is the fuel tank for surging, racing hard, and finishing. The Profiler tells you exactly how big that tank is, how quickly it depletes at race pace, and at what point in a 200m your swimmer will hit the physiological wall — before they ever race it.
The Profiler shows you exactly where their anaerobic reserve runs out. In most cases it's not fitness — it's pacing. The first 50 was 4% too fast and the tank was empty by 140m. That is a fixable problem once you can see it.
The Profiler generates a 9-zone training table built entirely from your swimmer's own data. Not age-group charts. Not percentage-of-best-time approximations. Paces derived from their own physiology, accurate to the tenth of a second.
The Race Intelligence Report takes a timed swim — from a time trial, a dual meet, or a championship — and produces a complete metabolic breakdown of what happened in that race. Not "they went out too fast." Exactly how much too fast, exactly where the energy system shifted, and exactly what training stimulus would have prevented it.
Each 50m split is shown as a percentage of the swimmer's personal energy ceiling. When the second 50 drops to 81% of ceiling it means they went anaerobic at 80m. That's the split where the race was lost — and it's visible in the data before the results board goes up.
The report partitions every race into three metabolic contributions — aerobic, aerobic-glycolytic, and anaerobic — using the swimmer's own blood data rather than estimates. A 200m swimmer running 54% aerobic is undertrained anaerobically for their event. A concrete number leads to a concrete training decision.
Every race report ends with a specific, actionable training prescription: what set to run, at what pace, with what rest, and why. There is no ambiguity about what to do next.
FuelEdge uses a continuous glucose monitor worn on the athlete's arm — the same technology used by elite endurance athletes and Type 1 diabetics — to give you a real-time readout of training intensity during every session. No blood draws. No stopping the set. No laboratory.
When glucose rises above a specific threshold during a set, it tells you the aerobic system is being genuinely stressed. When it flattens out below that threshold, the set is too easy. Coaches can see this on a tablet or phone at poolside, in real time, and adjust the session accordingly. It turns every training session into a data-collection opportunity — and over time, builds a picture of how each athlete's metabolism responds to load across the season.
A standard lane, a stopwatch, and a basic lactate testing kit (finger-prick blood sample, lactate analyser). That's it. No specialist equipment, no laboratory, no sports science degree required to run the protocol. If you have a sport scientist or athletic trainer on staff, they can run the session themselves. If not, we walk your staff through it on a 30-minute video call before the first test.
The athlete swims three timed efforts in their primary event — typically at 85%, 92%, and 100% effort. Push start or dive, depending on your protocol preference. Time each effort, record stroke count, and take a small blood sample (one finger prick) at the end of each swim. The whole session takes 60–90 minutes including recovery between efforts.
Fill in the submission form on our website with the swimmer's times, stroke counts, and blood lactate values. You can also include glucose readings from a CGM if you're running FuelEdge, and split times from any race swims you want included in the Race Intelligence Report. That's the full data submission — no spreadsheets, no software to install.
Within 48 hours you receive the full one-page coach report — energy system triangle, WERP velocity, 9-zone training table, anaerobic reserve analysis, race split breakdown, and a five-point training prescription. All in plain coaching language. Share it with your assistants, your sport science team, or the athlete directly. If you want a deeper walkthrough of the data, we schedule a follow-up call — typically 30 minutes — to go through every number and answer every question.
| What to record | How you get it | Equipment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Swim times | Handheld stopwatch or touchpad timing | Stopwatch | Required |
| Stroke count per length | Counted by a coach or assistant on deck | Paper & pen | Required |
| Blood lactate | Finger-prick sample at end of each effort | Lactate analyser | Required |
| Blood glucose | Same finger-prick sample as lactate | Glucose meter | Required |
| Heart rate | Chest strap or manual pulse count post-swim | HR monitor | Optional |
| Race split times | From a timed race effort or time trial | Meet results / splits sheet | For race report |
| Body mass & height | Standard team pre-season measures | Scales & tape | Optional |
Partner programmes receive full platform access, protocol support from Emma directly, and co-authorship on emerging peer-reviewed publications where your athletes' data contributes to the research base. Current university partners include Tennessee (Coach Matt Kredich), Arizona State, and Amherst College.
There is no minimum roster size and no long-term contract for initial access. Run one athlete through the protocol, see the report, and decide from there. Most coaches who see their first athlete report ask when they can test the rest of the roster.
30 minutes. We show you a complete athlete report using real elite swimmer data. You see exactly what you'd receive for your own athletes. No commitment required.
Already have test data? Complete the submission form and we'll process your first athlete profile within 48 hours and schedule a call to walk through the results together.
If you received this document from a colleague or assistant and would like to forward it to your athletic director or sport science coordinator, it is designed for exactly that purpose. Every page is printable to A4 and has been written to be self-explanatory without a prior conversation.