MP1664 wrote:
Swimming is not more of a problem, but it is another barrier to be overcome. If you want to get into triathlon, you know you’ll need to be able to swim. If you lack the motivation even to learn that skill, the sport is not for you.
There are multiple ways to look at this. Yes, we want the sport to grow, but it will only ever attract people motivated by challenge; those people will learn to swim/swim better. Triathlon will never attract as many people as parkrun, but if it was that easy, many of us wouldn’t be interested either.
Speaking as a runner first and triathlete second who started recently enough to remember "barriers to entry," there is swimming, and there is open water swimming. I am a decent swimmer, though perhaps not by ST standards. I did swim team for a few years as a kid, and there's never been a time when I couldn't go to the pool and swim 1600 yards with relative comfort. However, where I live, the triathlon with the shortest swim is 400 yards in open water. If you've never done it before, that seems like a long way. I live in the PNW, and that open water is also cold. So first I had to get used to the idea of swimming in open water, and second I had to either purchase a wetsuit, or swim in cold open water. I am a skinny person and do not particularly like swimming in cold water.
I would probably have tried tri years sooner if one of the following had been possible:
1.) A triathlon with a pool swim
2.) A triathlon with a 200 yard swim
3.) A triathlon with a swim in which one could touch the ground
A friend of mine in Houston did lots of tris with pool swims and 200 yard swims when she first started. I don't know why these options aren't available where I live.
Many local tris have kids' events with shorter swims in shallower water. I think a lot of people would be more inclined to "try a tri" if they weren't worried about drowning.
In the end, I finally did a triathlon after doing two duathlons. Without the duathlons, I probably would have just given the idea. The dual barrier to entry of open-water swimming AND buying a road bike would have been too much for me. (I had a 40+ pound ancient Schwinn with not-really-working brakes which I replaced with an entry-level road bike.) But I got the road bike and enjoyed the duathlons, and the tackled then second barrier to entry of buying a wetsuit and getting comfortable swimming 400 yards in open water.
My local tri club having open water swim practice open to all was tremendously helpful in that regard. Without those practice sessions, I'm not sure I would have done that first tri.