In Reply To:
In Reply To:
My opinion is that the person who made the call for a no-wetsuit swim exercised good common sense based on my own personal experience at that particular race in varying degrees of weather on 5 seperate occasions over the past decade.
Rules are one thing, safety is another, common sense is another. They may or may not be related but at the end of the day, every participant had the right to make their own decision on whether to get into the water or not after learning the decision.
I did see a number of people riding away from the transition area with all their gear upon my arrival...
Which brings us back to two questions.
1) Why is the rule written as it is in the first place? Aren't most of the 78-84 degree swims in places that are hot?
2) If it was a safety issue at Eagleman and the decision was made based experiences at the 2008 Eagleman (and your four other times over the last decade), why didn't CTA institute and publicize a wetsuit ban for temps over 78 then? Or at least given participants some advance notice when it became clear at least a week before the event that the water was going to be very warm? Instead we have the "wetsuits are allowed and encouraged" message from CTA.
And while I'm rolling:
3) What are the safety implications of advertising "wetsuits are allowed and encouraged" and then banning them at the last minute? You've then got a whole lot of possibly weak swimmers already at the event. While a few of them may have walked away, I'll bet that most of them figured they might as well give it a shot as long as they were there. It is a good thing nothing happened other than people getting DQed or swallowing so much brackish water that they DNFed. (Here I'd like to point out that although I've described myself as a "weak" swimmer, I should have said "slow" -- "weak" has apparently given some the impression that I'd drown without a wetsuit; I was comfortable [but again, slow] all 1+ hours of my Eagleman swim.)
4) If safety was such a concern, why no effort to reverse the course? The longer swim times certainly led to a lot of congestion in the water. If I'm reading the rules correctly then CTA already had to get a waiver to have waves with 350 athletes. Given the way the current was going, reversing the swim would have reduced times, thus reducing congestion and the chance of truly weak swimmers getting into trouble.
It will be interesting to see how CTA advertises Eagleman 2011. I think they'll have to have a statement to the effect of "water temperatures have ranged between 68 and 80 degrees; in the event of water temperatures above 76, wetsuits will be banned." We'll see what that does to registration. It may still sell out, but I bet there are a lot fewer localish people at the race.
So far, these questions have been asked multiple times by multiple people, and no answers. This, for me, answers what really happened.
Now, what would have happened if a person had died in the swim this year? Boy, can you imagine the questions that would be raised.
So, WTC has a new rule that states the water cutoff is 76 degrees on Sept 1st. What they have not done is make enough detail as to what happens if over 76.0. Sure seems then need to quickly answer this since so many feel over 78 was unsafe. I guess they will now say over 76 is unsafe so we have been allowing folks to swim for years in unsafe 76-78 degree water with wetsuits. Now, how it can be safe today over 76 but not safe as of Sept 1st, this stuff just makes NO sense. And if it is unsafe to wear a wetsuit in water over 76, why is WTC waiting until Sept 1st to change? Why does USAT have, based on some opinions, a rule that put racers in a unsafe position? So many questions, so few answers.
Dave Campbell |
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