I was there too. But IMHO the RD did what he could, swim was not his call, DEP’s call full stop. Please don’t give the people who put on races grief because there are fewer every year. Maybe volunteer or start a small town one?

It’s the people there - athletes and volunteers that make the vibe fun - that make the event.

USAT gets a lot of stuff wrong but look at their finances, US Golf Association makes almost more on investment income than USAT takes in. They make hard choices about something they love too.

I would say that USAT is investing their money and time based on what triathletes have voted on with their entries. A lot of athletes consider Sprint and Olympic Nationals top-tier events that they want to compete in. It makes sense that USAT spends a lot of their resources there. USAT LC nationals I think has always played second (60th?) fiddle to Ironman. Ironman was there first with long distance races, built up the athlete base and the history in a way that athletes loved (mostly) and USAT was never able to chip away at that. As a result, most regional 70.3's are probably better attended than USAT "Long course nationals".

But they really should have bought enough jerseys if they are going to hand those out. Either do it right or don't do it. I agree with you on that one.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

The volunteers were absolutely top notch! I think the local RD team did a good job... and the choice of where to run the first run was excellent. At least from the perspective of someone that was not expecting to run :)

I am sympathetic to the OP. This is an expensive sport and it’s tough when you walk away disappointed. Not being able to swim is a big letdown. I will say that IM barely ever has marshals on the course enforcing rules, so I don’t see a big difference there.

I can vouch for the RD. Few people have worked as hard to preserve independent racing as Rich Izzo. The old venue in Croton-on-Hudson was phenomenal, but an organizer’s nightmare. Kudos to Rich for finding this venue, which when fully accessible is great.

My second time doing this race. In my opinion, very well organized by Rich Izzo. Absolutely fabulous volunteers this year. I love the area, and really like that the course has some character (hills) but good grief those roads were even rougher than last year. I think i lost a filling or two. Regardless, if they have the race there again next year, I will go.

I do agree with OP…if its going to be a USAT National Championship event, it needs to be supported properly by the sanctioning body. Shameful….

This may be an example of a downward spiral to ... nothing. Fewer participants than sprint and oly NCs, so USAT pays less attention (cost management). Participants are disappointed, so fewer show up in subsequent years. USAT now cares even less - fewer athletes - and is less involved. More disappointment, fewer return athletes...well, I don't need any more iterations to describe the result. I actually had this on my provisional race calendar, but medical stuff got in the way.

But...at the World's level - is long course as popular an event as sprint and oly? Not trolling - I don't really know. If so, long course might be an ideal way to make Team USA.

And, FWIW, in Irving this year I picked up my race bag on day 1 and they did not have my shirt size. You know, the size I told them I wanted when I registered... Chaps my butt a little even now - not that I have an ill-fitting shirt from a National Championship (well, I do...) - but c'mon. Compared to all of the logistics of the race, it would seem that the simple math of bringing the right number of each size/cut jersey from the registrations completed months before the event would be trivial.

Yeah, 1st world gripes, I know.

But I agree with the OP - I was paying attention to this race since it was on the 'maybe' list for me - but there was nothing pushed out from USAT about it (that I received).

Back to MiamiMan? That was a good race, although flat. Seemed like a big crowd and every bit as good as an IM race for athlete treatment, in fact, better.

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Kiwami Racing Team

Where's DieselPete at?

This race tells you why Long Course worlds isn't a race people care about. https://forum.slowtwitch.com/...se%20worlds#p7810638


I would say it definitely is not well attended, to the point where this year it was co-located as a race within Challenge Samorin-The Championship.

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

The swim being cancelled is obviously disappointing (especially for aquabikers!) but not at all the race organizer's fault.

That is too bad to hear that USAT doesn't put much effort into this national championship. In my opinion, they should either do it right, or not label it a national championship. There were some similar complaints about the club national championships at the PTO US Open race being a complete afterthought too. (I question the value of a club nationals, but that's another topic).

I've been to the collegiate and Olympic/sprint national championship events put on by USAT multiple times each and they are top notch events and have that big race atmosphere. I would expect the same from all of their national championships even though I realize that the others don't have the same national draw and popularity. It certainly isn't going to help these events become a bigger deal (which I would love to see) if USAT doesn't support them.

It seems like the big difference is races that are completely organized by USAT versus existing races where the USAT championship label is added on. This is the case with what used to be the regional championship and now what they're trying to do with the state championship races. There was one regional championship a while back that actually announced it during awards and gave a cool shirt to the winners, but these mostly seem like just a little more advertising for the race that gets (pays for?) the label. You show up to the race or even go to the event website and you'd have no idea you're at any kind of USAT championship.

I think there's potential for USAT to turn these into marquee races, but they have to put the effort in. Venue atmosphere (finish area, expo, etc.), social media, swag, awards, it all contributes to the overall experience. Some of it is on the race directors like making a big deal of it on their website/social media and at awards, but if the race director isn't doing it, USAT has to fill that gap somehow or these will never catch on.

Did a tough man race in NY a few years ago. Total S show. Poorly marked course, ran out of water on the run, and there were only a handful of people that did the full.
When I saw Nationals was with tough man I knew it would be terrible.

How does one even qualify for this? I've tried searching. Maybe I'm missing something.

Qualification is by giving Toughman your entry fee . Once they have your money you get a spot.

LCN in Myrtle Beach 2010 the swim was canceled because of algae. I got beat by a bunch of people that couldn't swim.

Every LCN I've been too has been well supported by USAT. I'm sorry to hear about your experience.

Toughman triathlon social media page has made 17 IG posts since the 1 day to go schedule for this event- I believe they were holding Aquabike (I dont know if this was the Aqua run champs as well) / LC Tri / LC Duathlon national champs. USAT. has not mentioned this race once on their social media IG feed (I dont use FB / Tiktok / twitter). At bare minimum USAT should promote the hell out of it's own "national championships" any chance it can get. Especially as it really doesn't cost them anything. So even if they aren't putting on the event themselves, they can at minimum "support" it's championships and thereby the athletes better.

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Brooks Doughtie, M.S.
Exercise Physiology
-USAT Level II

Sometime between 2008 and 2010 (year?) I showed up for my Saturday morning marathon group run in Tulsa, Oklahoma and 3-4 of the guys in the group were taking about wanting to make a trip down to Oklahoma City to watch the Redman triathlon. I had never done a triathlon and really didn't know a lot about them. They said it was a championship so I assumed it would be the Olympic distance. When I learned it was a 140.6 distance races I was shocked. I thought that Ironman was the only organization that did the 140.6 distance races and didn't know that anyone else held a championship at that distance. I guess I thought that all the Pro's were going to be there or something because everyone seemed really excited about the race. These guys that wanted to go down to watch weren't even triathletes. They were all pure runners.

I don't know how many participants there were at that Long Course National Championship, how many spectators there were, how many social media posts, nor how many sizes were available for the national champion t-shirts. I do know that by 2017 there was not the same excitement for the long course National Championship. I don't remember how many participants were in the race in 2017 but I was something low like 37 people. Did they have more than that at Stony Point this year? Is this really a forgotten race of just one that has never been big to begin with?

I have live in Oklahoma and Texas, back and forth, for the past 17 years. The only National Championships I have been to were the 2017 long course national championship in Oklahoma and and the 2022 Multisport championship this year. I did not complete in the 2017 National Championship. The only reason I would have done it would have been if I wanted to do a small local Long Distance race and I was wanted to do shorter races so I passed on the National Championship. I did participate in the Multisports Championship this year. During covid all the Triathlons I had planned to do were canceled. There however were some Duathlons that got race permits. I guess cities in Oklahoma felt that if no one was swimming the event could be run safer. I never had a desire to do a duathlon previously. I didn't feel that any event that wasn't even organized enough to host a swim was going to be worth it. I was wrong. I loved the duathlons. The biggest one I did had about 50 people in it and the smallest one I did was about 15 people. I had the desire to complete in a big duathlon that was really competitive this year to see how I stacked up against a full field. I looked for races for about 6 months and was considering traveling halfway across the country for a dedicated duathlon, with no triathlon attached to it, and a respectable field. Then the National Championship was announced in my back yard and it was just what I had been looking for. There were only 17 people in my AG at the Standard Distance Duathlon, but that was about twice as many and I would have seen in any other Duathlon I could have done. I was surprised to only see only other Texas in my AG and no Okies at all. So it did feel like a national championship in the sense that I was racing against people from California and New York and everything in-between rather than the field being stacked with people from Texas and Oklahoma as I was expecting it to be. There were some people fast people in my AG too so I enjoyed the event.

So for the obscure events like duathlon, the national champion gives us some direction on which race for everyone to travel to so that there are a few other people in you AG to complete against. For something like the Long Course Triathlon where there are dozens and dozens of events that already have 2,000 + participants and people from all over the world a National Championship is completing for participants with other events and not bringing a crowd together that is looking for direction.

My daughter was there doing the Collegiate division in the international distance and had a great time.

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David
* Ironman for Life! (Blog) * IM Everyday Hero Video * Daggett Shuler Law *
Disclaimer: I have personal and professional relationships with many athletes, vendors, and organizations in the triathlon world.

The long course racing scene in the US changed pretty drastically between ~2009 and 2017.

From: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ironman_70.3

"Since the first year of the Ironman 70.3 Championship race in 2006 the series grew from 14 events to over 60 events in the span of seven years. The 2016 series saw 89 events worldwide, with the biggest one-year increase in the number of events coming between the 2011 and 2012 series when the number of races grew from 38 to 57."

This period saw a transition from many many successful independent half Ironman distance races to near complete domination of the category by Ironman.

I was just getting into triathlon around 2009 so I don't really know, but I'd imagine USAT Long Course Nationals could have been a much bigger deal back then since there was still mass interest in races without the Ironman brand attached.

I think you are talking about the 2017 ultra distance champs, not long distance champs, I think. Many more than 37 people were at long course nationals 2017 in Miami.

Yes low key compared to shorter distance nationals that are more heavily attended but I've enjoyed Toughman NY these past 2 years. I value the scenic challenging course more than a big expo, crowds and social media buzz and it was great to chat over the provided hot meal and IPA after. Simple pleasures. Agree that the volunteers from Kings Point were awesome, being called "Sir" at the aid stations made me feel like we were in the 1950s!

Interestingly, with no swim, Tri and Du did exactly the same race. For the men's AGs where both competed, 6 had faster winning times by Duathletes versus 3 where the Triathlete AG winner was faster. For the women it was honors even, 3 for Tri and 3 for Du. The top 5 Tri women were faster than the top 5 Du women but the top 5 Du men were faster than the top 5 Tri men. My AG 4th in Du would have been National Champ in Tri, a travesty as I swim like a rock! Duathletes were racing the event we'd trained for, hats off to Tri-types for adapting.

There I've done it, started another Tri v Du war...

I like that USAT partners with local races for national championships but where this fell on the calendar wasn't the best spot for it with people having just traveled for AG Nats and with Kona + 70.3 Worlds right around the corner. If they're looking for more competition it might be better to partner with a bigger race that accommodates more people or to put on the race on their own. I think something early season would have been better timing for athletes to target this race. Maybe they can partner with the PTO US Open moving forward.

Not even close in terms of popularity and competitiveness. Long course, aquabike and other things outside of Olympic and Sprint distance Nationals are essentially paritipation sports to make Team USA. You don't have to qualify for the race, pay your entry fee and if there aren't 18 people in your AG... you qualify. You could doggy paddle, doddle along on your 30lb. mountain bike and run/walk under the time cut off and make Team USA... I think there should be some performance cut offs as opposed to being a participation thing.

Agree on the botched logistics of having a choice of shirt size as part of registration and showing up to the event and them not having it. Behind the scenes the shirts are probably ordered several months in advance and shipped in from China... you'd have to be a USAT insider to know these details for sure though. I'm guessing even though you registered months in advance the shirt order had already been placed.

Somewhat fun fact... you can buy National Championship shirts from the USAT store clearance section... you don't even have to go to a race to get one... just pay your 19.99 and shipping.

https://www.usatstore.com/...al-champion-tech-tee

I don't think it was Toughman NY. They were only 70.3 (and kids) for the longest time. 2 or 3 years ago they added shorter courses.

To those that raced, thank you for coming out in a challenging year. We had to change to the DU format and that was alot more work than the usual SBR for LC Sunday beong a Natl Championship.
I want to thank USAT, NYS Parks, all volunteer groups, ham radio clubs, motorcycle clubs (Ramapo was on the course both days with USAT officials in tow), and especially our team which worked extra hard the last 2 years to host the USAT LC natls.
Thanks again it was fun to see all the athletes that do funny things that make this sport still fun for us- like the guy who crossed the finish line carrying a chicken, not quite a gorilla but funny as heck. And especially the last finisher who we had to detour bc of 3 LARGE black bears at the 12m mark.
https://triathlonmagazine.ca/...-toughman-triathlon/

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http://www.TOUGHMANTri.com

USAT put an article about this race in yesterday's email newsletter...at the bottom. There are two Ironman articles at the top.