You made his instagram haha.

Odds are someone will be injured “cough Gomez or Ali cough”. If not, no way he’s not getting a start.

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Let food be thy medicine...

No, the PTO have explicitly said that the final could have more than 20 athletes if wild cards earn "enough" points to deserve a start... now, they haven't stated what "enough" is but I would imagine if an athlete is high in the rankings, they will get an invite.

I might need to run the math on this but you'd think they would invite any athlete that has accrued more points than contracted athletes.

Serious question to anyone

So if he didn’t have such a large swim deficit (magically he could go back and start swimming competitively as a young person) to most of the top finishers would be actually finish 3 mins faster or is that simply wishful thinking/triathlon math?

Sam Long humbled me yet again!
When I saw how far back he was in the swim I thought he would really struggle to chase down a podium spot, I should have learnt my lesson from previous races which have gone like this.
The way he ran through the field in that heat and humidity was something else. It is so hard to describe how difficult those conditions are unless you have been to Singapore. It is not far by plane from where I live and I have never once done an outdoor training session there because of the heat and humidity. Props off to everyone who raced there today and amazing effort by Sam.

Ya as it turns out his size is not a detriment to his ability to shed heat. And like I have always said, most of being good in the heat is due to your genes, you can only affect it so much by training or living in it. Watch the interview with the dude that got 3rd and I think 2nd last year. Spent the past months in unseasonably cold weather, trained one day in the sauna just before coming to the race, is white as a ghost, and crushes these hot races.

I just have seen that dynamic too many times over the years where guys who should not be good in the heat(by going off of conventional wisdom) turn out to be great in it. Sam is just one of those guys, so I imagine he will eventually be very good at Kona as long as he figures out the distance part first...But that is easy, the heat part is the real killer for a lot of folks, and some never crack that code...

I mean in his last 3 races he just looks like he could keep running. He finishes and just seems so full of energy still, running around congratulating everyone, smiling and high fiving the crown, and all over the bodies of his competitors strewn all over the tarmac....

Yep Monty,
You just had to take one look at how Sam was at the finish line compared to everyone else to know that he seems to have cracked the code for being able to race well in the heat. He looked so fresh and if the event was a 70.3 and not a T100, with the extra 3kms in the run I imagine he would have run himself into first as Youri must have been incredibly close to collapsing seeing as how things unfolded when he finished.
Sam was also 6.5 mins faster this year than last year when KB won and his time this year would have seen him just sneak into second again. He ran through the field last year as well but nothing like this years race.

The rough math on this is a bigger guy will just generate more heat. I rider going at 250W will generate around 1000W of heat, the guy going at 300W will generate 1200W of heat, so its a question of the rider putting out more watts being able to dissipate a 2x100W lightbulbs of extra heat from the body. From what I see Sam has long arms and long legs, so he may proportionally have a good volume to surface area ratio (it is what makes Kenyans deal with the insane heat that builds up when you run at 2:02 marathon pace).

It may just be Sam's volume to surface area. It is probably not as good as Jan Frodeno, but it is probably pretty good. Generally shorter athletes have superior volume to surface areas. It's just how human proportions shake out. But tall and lanky helps and if you have a short torso relative to wingspan and inseam it helps more (not sure of Sam's torso proportions).

valid point on surface area for cooling surface vs total body mass.

BUT it's more so of how efficiency he is moving as well as his bike efficiency is tops and his run is better then ever.


If he is pedaling at 350 watts but hitting the pedal with 360 watts of muscle work he will beat the others at 350 watts with 400 watts of muscle work. ( the 400 would of course be more energy and heat)

A power meter is measuring outcome of torque not energy in.

People swim and run and bike the same speed but different levels of stress and muscle fatigue and sweat rates.

He is doing everything very well with pace and I think he learned swimming harder ( 45 sec extra sec swim speed) takes his bike away and his run. Where we are seeing huge surges in the swim and bike starts and that is destroying guys race outcomes.

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Technique will always last longer then energy production. Improve biomechanics, improve performance.
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