Part of me wonders if Charles is fast enough to catch the third group of men out of the swim and ride with them for a bit.

GTN's Mark did pretty well! And I saw shortly after his name an Alistair and got excited....until I saw the last name.

Good showing by Tim Don!

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808 > NYC > PDX > YVR
2024 Races: Taupo

Wurf 50:58
.. nearly 3 mins better than IMWC swim last year .. (ETA): Puts him swimming with likes of McKenzie, maybe Starky.. Lionel and Seb to miss that train?

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Coaching - Future Endurance

Lucy Charles is a weapon - I'm really looking forward to seeing her race. Fitter, smarter & more experienced - should be epic and I hope she can hit T2 first!

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Coaching - Future Endurance

Sanders was only 24 seconds back

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Matt

Sanders looks like he might be swimming with the first pack of the real contenders now.

Wurf 50:58
.. nearly 3 mins better than IMWC swim last year .. (ETA): Puts him swimming with likes of McKenzie, maybe Starky.. Lionel and Seb to miss that train?


Sanders looks like he might be swimming with the first pack of the real contenders now. ////

Slow down everyone, not that much has changed, really.. Good news for Wurf and Lionel that they are closer to the front, but they are not anywhere near the front. Wurf is not swimming with Starky, sorry guys, Starky would have been in the 47 group today. And Lionel was not dropped from Wurf, it looks like he just trailed off at the end, imagine Keinle would have been in that same huge group too.

All this really means is that the uberbiker train is going to get a bit of a head start, but of course they will need it as the front train will be much faster than last year too, so basically the same dynamic. Josh will probably be in the 46+ range if the day is comparable, with his full week taper. I think the others swam where they will on race day, except for Lange, he just soft swam in the main pack today. He will be in the 48 group come Saturday.

And if and when either the men or women swim faster than the old times, they will not have beaten the record, but it will retire the old records to the books forever. It will be a new course record on a new course that is over 200 meters shorter than what those old times were swam on. The only thing I don't recall, is if the womens record was set after they separated the mens and womens pro starts? That has a huge impact for the lead woman, as we saw today with Lucy. Pretty much guarantee you she is not swimming within a second of Josh on Saturday, probably do well to be just 1 1/2 to 2 back of what he swims..

Aaaaaand, Monty with another reality bomb.... ;-).

But seriously, that’s a pretty good assessment.

What amazes me is Magnus Michelsson. He's a 2:14:00 marathon runner, among other things.
https://www.iaaf.org/athletes/australia/magnus-michelsson-174631

This is what Caroline Steffen did at IM Melbourne ~2013. She caught the slow men swimmers and then rode with them for a 4:37 bike split into T2. I think the gap to the pro men is too much though? Is it 10 min or 15 minutes? If 10 minutes and she transitions fast enough then she's in a train with guys swimming 56.

10 minutes if I’m not mistaken.

No way that Charles is be able to stick with them. The guys who swam 55-56 last year rode between 4:32-4:47. She rode 4:58.

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Matt

Braden Currie is incredible for a man so late to triathlon!

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Aaron Bales
Lansing Triathlon Team

Could this mean a possible Wurf and Sanders train on the bike?

You think she can't ride in a train with 4:47 guys given she rode 4:58. I bet she could. In the recent video they were talking about her IM race wattage being 230W. That's probably around 4W per kilo given that Wikipedia says she is 58 kilos. With the legal draft from a bunch of guys, I bet she could hang in. it would be epic if she hung with the lagging group of men. It would be funny to see a train of pro men riding somewhat back of the pro woman lead vehicle!!!!

Go Lucy, make it happen! I am certain Chrissie Wellington is cheering!

Monty ... speaking of records

* The Swim Course is now shorter than the previous as you mentioned ... so lets say 2+ minutes

* Since the change to "wave" starts ... the pro men start 25min earlier and women 20min earlier than he old 7am ... that means 20-25min of typically better wind conditions on the average day for our pros. Less chance of the earlier wind by Waikaloa if that wind comes up AND 20-25min more tailwind on the Queen K on the return. That 20-25min pending speed is a lot of miles in advantageous conditions

*Environmentally speaking its like a a bonus 20-25min ... Swims are faster ... Bike times should be faster ... Overall times should be faster in general

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Dave Latourette
http://www.TTENation.com

Likely to obliterate the 50-54's if he is anywhere near fit.

Every time I see him pull out a fast swim I am surprised...but he keeps doing it!

Correct. Not gonna happen. You’re smoking something good if you think otherwise. She’s an outstanding swimmer but maybe 5-10th best women on the bike and the bike is the one leg in Kona where you see a distinct gap between males and females

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Matt

I like Lucy, but barring accident Ryf will be the 1st female in T2. She is better now than ever!

Let's stay civil and not put down the other person's point by using wording like "your smoking something good". It's OK to disagree without that type of wording which leads to a downward spiral in terms of tone and where a discussion goes.

So back to the discussion, if we can civil about it.

If she starts with some of these men and if she is truly riding at 4W per kilo (which is what Lange rides at), she won't be dropped on climbs and then the question is how aero is she and can she sit back in a slipstream and use all these guys as super domestiques. Their male egos alone will probably be sufficient to shed her with some solid surges, but it is totally viable for someone to ride 10 min faster legally following a faster rider. In practice, I suspect that she will have sufficient pride to not draft guys in the grey overlap zone since she will have cameras and refs all around her anyway.

Now we can discuss if the 230W IM bike pace target is true or a marketing ploy from her camp. It does not seem out of the realm of possibility given the size of her engine for those fast swim splits. It's not all perfect technique. There is an insanely large engine coming with that 47 min swim.

Dev ... Lucy & Lauren will presumably be together starting the bike. What that partnership includes is race officials & "television" and a lot of eyes on them. EVen of they were around the pack fodder of men, I doubt there will be any train ... plus Lucy & Lauren will not want any questions to their tactics or ethics

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Dave Latourette
http://www.TTENation.com

I'm not sure about your math Dev, if she swims a 48+, then she catches 58+ men pros. And guess what, you can look at those guys who swim that time bike splits, but I can guarantee you that most of the slower ones are not negative spits. They will go out hard and die somewhat, if not all together, so hanging out front of the womens for a large portion of the ride. That is the nature of that part of the field, not the most experienced pacers, and anyone swimming a 59 minute in Kona is really done already.

But no need to worry, the lead vehicles and camera bikes will pop in enough for her to get some good watt savings, then when and if Ryf catches, she will have her 10 m draft to T2 if she wants it. Guessing Ryf will not want here there just for show, so maybe some fireworks, but probably not as it is still a long day of running, no need to jeopardise your run because of pride..

I really like Lucy's chances for 2nd(obviously 1st if there is a huge problem with Ryf) this year. I believe she has a 3 hour flat run in her now, that ought to hold off all the chasers starting 20+ minutes back. Maybe even a little better, she seems to be fine in the Kona heat, and that is always the real question for newcomers..

Not sure how you let one off hand comment get you riled up. Playfull sarcasm. Obviously I don’t really think you are high when you said that (even though you are from Canada)

I don’t trust watts or ftp or any numbers the athletes put out there. I trust results. She went 4:45 Roth this year - Ryf has gone 4:31, Chrissie has gone 4:36. I think Ryf’s best time in Kona is 4:50 and Chrissies was 4:52.

As for slipstreaming. Name the guys that are going to come out in 56-57. Then name the ones who will take off at at 4:45+ pace. Now the latter is different than the guys who will finish at that pace, because most pro guys who ride slower than 4:45 are going to take off more aggressively trying to catch the packs ahead and then burn out later. So at best she has 1 or 2 guys to ride with?

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Matt

Seriouly though, if Lucy can ride with some slower pro men (and that's an if, but its been done before by Caroline Steffen at Melbourne and Lucy is a bigger engine than Caroline), then suddenly she gets to T2 with a lead on Daniela...and if Lucy can run around 3:00, then its a matter of what bike gap is at T2.

This may not be as much of a slam dunk as everyone is making it for Ryf. But that's why we have a race next Saturday for these athletes to do, and the rest of us have the internet to speculate about it.