helo guy wrote:
I have a theory on where a lot of the controversy comes from. Based on my tri friends, I divide the triathlon crew into basically two camps:
-The epic training crew. These guys are all about the long training days. They seem to be more about the training more than the racing. I know quite a few who explicitly say so. It makes sense, since unless you are a professional your race performance does not matter, except to yourself.
-The race performance crew. They are focused more on race placing and times. If they can get a better race performance for less training time, that is great. You don't see this bunch post about epic training nearly as much. It is just a means to an end.
In relation to the IronCowboy stuff, I think the big conflict is between the epic training crew and the racing crew.
Racing is all about head to head competition, failing that it is comparing performances on the same course with the same rules. Nobody is saying what IC is doing is easy. It is just not racing. He has no competition, and essentially no rules.
The conflict comes when the "epic training crew" keeps trying to compare what IC is doing to a competition or race - particularly an Ironman race. Even the title of the thread ("draft legal tris") shows that.
But what he is doing does not resemble a real draft legal tri in any way.
I don't think there are really two camps in terms of training vs racing people. If you want to get to the pointy end of swimming or cycling you will have spent a chunk of your time doing 30-40 hrs training weeks and if you wanted to get to any level of running you would have done a large part of your life hovering around 100-150 mile running weeks anyway.
So you'll inherently have an appreciation for what IC is dragging himself through. yes there are are the 12 hrs ride and 3 hrs run per weekend athletes also who will perhaps be more mentally aligned with him, but anyone who has done pointy end sport and been through the drudgery of the ultra high load training periods or camps will also strongly relate.
Where it may fall apart is ultra high performance people who feel that somehow IC is diminishing their accomplishment of speed (IC gets more ST views in general than anyone but Lionel and Lucy), or people who think they are performance types who actually have not even scratched their performance envelope with the types of volumes Frodo or Peter Reid crank/ed out. I can assure you if we got to ask Peter Reid or Thomas Hellriegel what they think of IC they would be huge fans. I bet Faris would love what IC is doing. Heck Hellriegel is closing on 50 and he keeps posting all kinds of IC like workouts from all over he world.
I don't think huge training and performance sport are decoupled, rather they are highely intertwined. I think some of the animosity is actually from age groupers sitting at home doing regular jobs who are way faster than IC, kind of envious that they are in the corporate drudgery and this guy is living a life of exercise off zero racing pedigree. Or semi fast people who may feel that the IC event is taking away from their accomplishments
On my side, I would put myself in the camp of performance through lifestyle fitness. I logged my biggest training year in almost 20 years with zero racing on deck. It was lifestyle with an eye to future performance. I kind of dig that IC made up his own events to give himself a performance focus during this pandemic whle the rest of us mark time helplessly waiting for others to put on races for us to realize our performance and "head to head" goal (I totally get the head to head part which is why virtual races are uninteresting to me).