They do have the best shirts

It was a girl of course...

I was a lifeguard at a swanky health club in DC during college (Sport & Health. Is it still around?) and one of the aerobics instructors used to tolerate me flirting with her. (this was the 80's and she had the full package - tights, legwarmers, big hair). She knew I ran and obviously swam and started pushing me to to try a tri. It was the Tinley Tin Man, a sort of half-iron distance, except it was swim, RUN, bike.

I only had a very primitive Mountain bike, and knew I needed a road bike for something like that. I saved my paychecks and did almost all my bike training on the Lifecycles at the gym. I bought a bike from REI about a week before the race and only got a few rides in before . ( A bright yellow Novara Trionfo with downtube shifters, Bell V1 plastic helmet, basketball shoes with toe straps, and of course a cotton t-shirt flapping in the breeze)

The swim was some sort of river crossing and a non-standard distance, and went fine. I was on the U Md water polo club at the time so I was out front in clear water for the swim, did some sort of insanely hot run course ( I remember begging sunscreen from a spectator ) and then getting in a groove on the bike and passing a lot of people on nicer equipment than me. I remember I finished in just under 6 hours so I'm no sure where the time went I was a pretty strong runner then - I had run a 3:10 marathon the previous fall I probably farted around in transitions or maybe just overheated and jogged the run. I've tried to look up the race in the years since and never found any on-line evidence it ever happened.

I never got anywhere with the girl, but I was hooked on tris from then and I've been at them for most of the 25 years since
.

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" I take my gear out of my car and put my bike together. Tourists and locals are watching from sidewalk cafes. Non-racers. The emptiness of of their lives shocks me. "
(opening lines from Tim Krabbe's The Rider , 1978

I got into running at the same time as my Mum, during the whole 'Run the World' thing mid 80s (aged 11-12). The running continued until this day; but in the late 80s 'Running' magazine started doing articles on Triathlon, and then 'pull-out' Tri supplements. The first evocative images and articles were all about Kona and the 'Big 4'; plus there was a television documentary in the UK about a guy who did the Nice International Triathlon. That piqued my interest. It wasn't until 1992 aged 18 that I did my first event (think that was the min age) - in a cut-off running vest and unpadded trunks on an MTB.

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29 years and counting

I was 22 and doing a lot of distance running. Was loving the training volume but couldn't escape the feeling that my knees were at long term risk.

I was bored waiting for a flight in an airport and picked up a copy of "Iron War" by Matt Fitzgerald, I read it within a few days.

A week later I had signed up for an Iron distance race, and had begun saving up for a road bike.

Facebook! Tri gave me THREE times as many opportunities to post pics of finisher medals and tan lines as well as daily below average workout stats!

After my having open heart surgery in December 2000 to replace my aortic valve, my cardiologist told me to cut out my heavy weightlifting and instead focus on aerobic exercise. "As much as I could handle", was the way he put it.

Just over three years later in February 2004 at age 50, with the urging of one of my work colleagues, I did my first sprint tri. Wasn't DFL, but close to it. That first race got me hooked on the sport. Haven't looked back since.

Mark

My uncle, who lived in Minnesota, called me up and said "I am going to sign up for Ironman Wisconsin this weekend when registration opens, you should do it with me". I said "ok, a long day outside should be fun" and hung up the phone. I then realized I wasn't even sure what an Ironman consisted of, so I looked it up and realized I would need to learn to ride a bike and swim. I found a used bike on craigslist and signed up for some beginner swim lessons. Mostly I just continued to run. I then proceeded to crash my bike and put myself in intensive care, where my neurologist told me that I could not raise my heart rate above 100 for 4 months. So I laid in bed until June. The week my neurologist cleared me to start "light exercise" again I went out and raced a duathlon to make sure I wasn't going to be afraid of the bike after my crash and to practice T2. The following week I raced Boise 70.3 to see what open water swimming was about, and to practice transitions. I made just about every mistake you can make (but I didn't crash again!), but still had a blast. I rode my bike for 2 months, practiced open water swimming a few more times (still terrible) and headed off for Madison. What a kick! That was 2008.

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The plural of anecdote is not data. :-)
- Andrew Coggan

Vitals:
After birth of first son, was 275lbs (former football player) and fat
Wife and I did P90X a few times, got down to 230ish
Got into running, got down to 220ish
Got stress fracture, borrowed a bike
Got conned into doing a Try a Tri, did something like a breaststroke on my back for 300 yards
Did the same thing at the actual tri the next week
Learned how to actually swim (not fast, but as far as I need to)

Still consider Tri as "cross training" for running, but Oh so fun :-)

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“What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” -A.W. Tozer
"The best things in life make you sweaty." -Barbara W.
"I was never great at math, so I had to learn to run faster." -Robbie Sandlin
“Life is like a 10-speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.” Charles Schultz

Jr National Team rower in HS that completely burnt out going into college. Basically spent 15 years doing nothing good for my body after that. Watched my brother finish one of his 6 IM's at Penticton in around 2004 and swore I would never do an IM. Fast forward 8 years weighing 232 lbs (>50lbs heavier than HS) and wife expecting a daughter, I decided to get back in shape. I convinced my brother to come out of "retirement" to race Boise 70.3 in 2012. Worse weather I've ever seen as I walk down the ramp to the water and a shortened bike course forced me to sign up for Lake Stevens 5 weeks later since I didn't finish an actual 70.3. My legs were destroyed from Boise and RnR 13.1 before Lake Stevens and still finished 5:17. I knew I could go under 5 with fresh legs, so I signed up for 2013 at Lake Stevens. Went 4:55 the next year on an injured foot that cost me 5-6 minutes on the run, but still felt great and made massive improvements on the bike (16 min faster with a faster run as well). Decided I was ready to make the jump to a full and raced Canada last year (11:40 with the same foot issue popping up at mile 90 of the bike, and could barely put any weight on it through the whole marathon). No racing in 2015 for various reasoning, but hope to come back in 2016 with a healthy foot and renewed focus at Whistler.

Raced bikes after college, tried duathlon for a couple of years, and then stopped and just got unhealthy. My brother, out of nowhere, decided to complete an ironman. I went to see him up at Lake Placid, and was so amazed by the participants, crowd, venue and energy, I decided I had to try it out. My first tri was a sprint in Vegas. I wore a wetsuit in Lake Meade (sp?) because I hadn't swam in ages, ended up breastroking the entire swim. I finished, and I was hooked.