http://www.tri4grace.org in River Falls WI Only $50.00 to enter. Pool swim. Bike is fairly scenic and rural with an honest hill (Cat 4). Run is short so you can try and blast the bike. Its a memorial race for a woman named Grace. You can read more online.


RACE PROCEEDS go to scholarships for students
whose immediate families are affected by cancer.

www.wingmantri.com in Red Wing MN. Pool swim. Good scenic bike with an honest hill and run course that weaves around in shade by the sippi.


Only $60 to register and the proceeds go the the local cross country team whose parents come out to volunteer or the kids also help if not racing. Pretty good cheering from the parents bc they are used to it ;)


I should get back on beginner triathlete and post to the state forums. Always wish we had that here at ST.


Any that you have? I missed both of these last year bc of work but plan on them both this year again.

http://eauclairetriathlon.com
Have not done it but a friend did and liked it. $57 with open water and proceeds go to orphans and a free clinic.

The site you reference seems perfect for this. Obviously they have this more well thought out than I do. I'm going to study this some more and then contact them if it makes sense.

Thank you for sharing this information!

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Indoor Triathlete - I thought I was right, until I realized I was wrong.

Limiting bike technology has been discussed since the late '80s and has never gone anywhere. Maybe because all you really need to do is add clip-on aero bars to a road bike to gain much of the advantage of a tri-bike? Still the idea you suggest is a good one to continue to pursue if the main reason younger folks or less wealthy folks aren't interested in staying in tri is the perceived need for an expensive tri bike. I don't think that is the reason for the decline in popularity. If you want to stay in tris but don't feel you are competitive because of your ride, you can find a cheap bike that will be competitive at all but the sharpest point of the AG field. The overall winner at sprint distance nats this year was on a road bike. :)

For some folks money for entry, stuff is an issue.

But for most folks I talk to, it is just how long does one do the same thing before it gets boring! I sure know that I really enjoy Du's as an example since I can ignore the swim and all the issues around it. I enjoy running since I can just go out, anytime anywhere, safe, easy, and just run with a pair of shoes.

The difference now maybe compared to the past is there used to be new folks entering to replace folks leaving. But now, any sport that takes exercise I assume are not growing, but shrinking. Younger folks in general seem to have no interest in exercise. Most just would rather play on line games. Social skills and interactions are not high on their lists to do.

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

Boom Nutrition code 19F4Y3 $5 off 24 pack box | Bionic Runner | PowerCranks | Velotron | Spruzzamist

Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Well that overall winner was an unusual young man with a background who had some preselection potential by USA Triathlon. Perhaps at this stage of his budding ITU career, he may have been more comfortable/faster on the road bike. ;)

ITU does bring restriction into cycling. They don't allow tri-bars or the ones they do/did were so small that the pros there have stopped using them. As we know tri-bars on a road bike really aren't the same fit or look as a tri-bike where the seat angle is more open.

Visually it's a psyche out to place a tri-bike by a road bike for TT purposes. We are talking about the relatively initiated gaining an impression of the sport and deciding to race again or not.

Currently it's similar visually to having an Indy racer next to a Nascar car. No way does that look like it could be fair nor cheap.

Would limiting it to road bikes help the small state/local triathlons trying to stay in business. Maybe. Few people only have tri-bikes so why not? This would probably have to be tried for several years to know. Or maybe a race director could say for my race or series, you need a road bike.

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Indoor Triathlete - I thought I was right, until I realized I was wrong.

This is in draft-legal racing only. In non-drafting races you can use full-size clipons.

Tangentially to your point: the ITU is pushing draft-legal for the sprint distance hard. That means road bikes and no tri bikes. However, it also means having to ride in close proximity of people with questionable bike handling skills. So, as the famous Dutch philosopher Johan Cruijff opined: "every disadvantage has its advantage".

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Citizen of the world, former drunkard. Resident Traumatic Brain Injury advocate.

I have no idea why Tri/Du draft legal and handling skills always comes up trying to freak folks out. DL races have now been done for a few years at the AG level. I have raced them last year at Nationals and world level. I talked to many folks who raced these. 100% of the folks I talked to LOVED it!!! Because these are not Crit events, meaning all the bikes start the same time, and crit courses are not used, this is talking apples vs rocks. I have seen just as much drafting in some NDL races I have done as I saw in the DL races.

But at the end of the day, if these were unsafe, why have we not seen posts of all the crashes in these races? Why are these races having so many signing up if there were unsafe?

How many DL Tri/DU races have you done?

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Dave Campbell | Facebook | @DaveECampbell | h2ofun@h2ofun.net

Boom Nutrition code 19F4Y3 $5 off 24 pack box | Bionic Runner | PowerCranks | Velotron | Spruzzamist

Lions don't lose sleep worrying about the sheep

Nothing of what you say doesn't mean that you don't have to ride in close proximity of people with questionable bike handling skills. You're right that most races go off without issue, but I also know that very few if any of those have the participation numbers of the more mainstream regional tri series around here, which are the races with the highest proportion of novices. And you would have to agree that those novices would be the people with questionable bike handling skills.

Also: where did I imply this is a problem for me in particular? I have zero interest in another pissing match with you, but not everybody makes everything they post about themselves. Some people try to make points in the abstract.

Also: there is another, more pressing, "problem" with draft-legal races: they must be on closed roads. This is the reason that, at least here in Ontario, there are very few DL races; the only one last year was on a race track. Another race director headache is that men and women need to be separated; women can't draft off men and the other way around.

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Citizen of the world, former drunkard. Resident Traumatic Brain Injury advocate.

I want somebody to make a realistically priced vasa ergometer alternative. If they were a bit cheaper they'd surely sell by the boat load.

I was literally putting THIS together at probably the same time Kiley was writing his post.

Submit two videos and an email, receive a comprehensive response, submit follow up questions, receive a follow up response - $60
Additional rounds of the same - $45
6 weeks of unlimited rounds - $175

You can buy a ski erg from Concept 2 for $800. Pretty close....

I did two non-draft races this last season that had multiple laps. In each I was the race leader and had to pass people. I would not have wanted to do this in a draft legal format, people couldn't even figure out to stay to the right and ride in a straight line. These were definitely not people I'd have wanted to ride closely to.

Additionally, that's an interesting point of roads needing to be closed. I've directed a race before; had we needed to do it draft legal we never would have had the permits approved.

Power2Max NG is rechargeable.

Maybe, but the reason Zipp is where they are is because they made the best aero wheels (or tied for best) for a long time. I doubt most people really care where they're built.

My Garmin 920xt watch has all the functionality I want out of a cycling computer, save a bigger screen. I wish there were an inexpensive computer that simply mirrored information from the watch on a larger display, rather than requiring me to purchase a highly redundant, and hence expensive, standalone cycling computer.

[quote h2ofun
The difference now maybe compared to the past is there used to be new folks entering to replace folks leaving. But now, any sport that takes exercise I assume are not growing, but shrinking. Younger folks in general seem to have no interest in exercise. Most just would rather play on line games. Social skills and interactions are not high on their lists to do.[/quote]
So true it seems. Most would rather play a video game.

When I hear about adventure races, mud races, obstacle courses, etc. doing well, I wonder if this an extension of video games.

They also DON'T have to lay out much if any new money on equipment to do them. Just the entry fee.

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Indoor Triathlete - I thought I was right, until I realized I was wrong.

As I said, I would like road bikes and no tri-bikes all the way to and including Oly events. It would help the sport create delineation between ITU/short course and Ironman/long course.

We currently have bugaboos about drafting the way it is right now. And they're attempting to draft on tri-bikes. That would not be new. They could continue trying to implement no draft or allow drafting which would help the under 30, more specifically under 25 crowd, develop their skills for ITU.

Drafting is one of those "Pavlov dog" moments. If you can't draft, you soon learn to draft or stop trying. Generally the person who can't draft crashes themselves by following too closely. Stronger riders and better riders crash much less often due to drafting.

The way most cultures and boys are, crashes would be an enhancement to the thrill of the sport for the young.

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Indoor Triathlete - I thought I was right, until I realized I was wrong.

This.

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Indoor Triathlete - I thought I was right, until I realized I was wrong.

I service my bike at such a "service-mostly" LBS, with more wall-space dedicated to workshop tools than to the few token bikes he stocks. Most of their bike sales are as a point-of-sale service through an online service, so they don't have to stock much. The guy charges a fair and honest hourly work fee, works fast and has a very short wait, does top-notch wrenching and doesn't hold a grudge if you arrive with your new online-bought bike for assembly. He rescued my wife's Felt IA seatpost (god, 3T, what a disaster of a part) several times already.

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ZONE3 - We Last Longer

 
You must be joking about the algorithmic feed at Strava?

It's totally broken. Top of my feed I see a post for a ski in my local XC ski loop. I head out. Its shit. I go back and look on Strava. It was 4 FUCKING DAYS AGO! Why was it at the top of my feed?

We do stuff outside. We care about weather conditions, we care about dates (was that the race this sunday? what happened at the group ride last night? anyone on the trails this morning).

The new feed obscures important data.

+1

I would be one of the first to purchase a computer that could simultaneously pick up multiple power meters.

http://stravini.com/ if you use Chrome, this browser extension will "fix" the Strava nonsense.


I'm on the verge of ending my relationship with Strava. After several years with it, I find myself still going to WKO4 and TrainingPeaks for the review of my rides, and not Strava. The analytic capacity of Strava is anemic, at best. Sure, I'd lose the social part of all those segments and 'racing' my friends, but honestly Strava turns everything into a crit race, and it's just kinda pointless. (Yes, I mark 90% of my rides as 'private', and 100% of my indoor training as 'private' on Strava already)

A friend of mine went on summer vacation and didn't upload any workouts until she came home. Suddenly my feed was flooded with two months of old activities. Whoever designed the feed for Strava clearly doesn't actually use Strava.

I haven't done any tris since moving here last year, but I'll be adding at least one of these to my schedule for this year.