One point of reference is how Lionel did relative to others last year. My quick check shows he was 2+ mins behind Matt Russell and Michael Weiss at Kona last year. However, today he was at least a min ahead of them. Not bad.

Probably goes to prove a few points - he's improved his swim considerably but also was indeed going hard today. Of course, none of it matters till next Saturday.

Lol. As I stated, I simply provided the info for context. I could care less about your theories.

Lol. As I stated, I simply provided the info for context. I could care less about your theories. //

Ok, I guess. And they are not theories, just comments on observations.

Probably goes to prove a few points - he's improved his swim considerably but also was indeed going hard today. Of course, none of it matters till next Saturday.//

Agreed, dude has improved quicker and faster than I can ever remember any pro of his starting ability. His coach should be proud, and hopefully he executes all this progress this Saturday. I find it funny that many on the thread have gotten so defensive about my comments and think somehow I'm bagging on the guy. I'm totally on the Lionel bandwagon and wish him to do well in the race. What I don't and have never done is to try and blow smoke about things that are known and apparent.


I was waiting for this swim to be over before I did my top 5 kona picks, I feel I am very close now....(-;

Talked to a few athletes and anecdotally it was a bit rougher out there than in recent years.

Any opinions or anecdotes from your athletes?

Cheers,

Some good observations made first hand of some folks take out speed and subsequent pacing, all good homework done for next weekend.

As some folks said the time is less telling the % delta more relevant.

Regards

David

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David T-D
http://www.tilburydavis.com

Love your response to armchair quarterback 😂

Nice to see Sanders and Hanson have great swims.

Seriously? I can't believe I read this response towards Lionel's coach, and even worse, coming from you.

Seriously? I can't believe I read this response towards Lionel's coach, and even worse, coming from you. //

Well he started it.. (-;

Yeah, but in this case it sound like Monty either knows Lionel's profile better than his coach, or the coach does not know his athlete. Seriously David, you think that Lionel is going to show up at a swim race and sandbag a 3.8K swim to play mind games with others. I think Monty understands the profile of a professional triathlete better than you do. I know you talk with them and coach them, but Monty lived that life in the mix with others and knows a good deal about how most of these guys think. I realize you will tell us to go away and you know what his strategy was, but there is no way he is getting inside of 4 minutes of Wiltshire, when Wiltshire himself has to gun it to not get chick'd. I think Monty is bang on that Lionel did this swim as fast as he can on this day.

I think Lionel's coach/advisor was being snarky in his response to Monty. Firstly he could have declared who he was (relationship wise since he posts infrequently enough around here for not everyone to know who he is) rather than some codewords implying he knew better than Monty. Secondly I think Monty nailed it better than the coach. No way Lionel was sandbagging and ends up 4 min behind Wiltshire. Look what Monty wrote in his analysis and i bet you he nails it for race day. I hope he is wrong and the delta to Frodo is 3:xx....keep in mind on race day, you have Amberger, Potts, Frodo and Wiltshire all doing a formula 1 race pack with each other. Josh is not going to sandbag this swim and I expect he will pull these guys along faster for a while. Or he will gun it and drop them. Lionel should hope that Josh just drops them and not pull them along.

Dev,

First few comments are off side and out of character for you. IMO...basically personal attack on DTD. Just my opinion.

Check out LS results the past year and in terms of relevance to next weekend his results this am.

Read between the lines of DTD's post above and I (won't speak for him) but I interpret that to mean that today's work out was focused as much on tactics/technical execution as effort.

Re take out speed and settling in, I am guessing LS has been quietly working on the first 100-400m in order to get a better set of feet than years past.

Anyways like Monty said, not theories just comments and opinions.

Basically only on st does a guy who was previously a shitty swimmer go 52 (he surprised most of us) and we still find the time to criticize the coach who got him there.

2c,

It was choppy out there today but not too bad. It was difficult coming back in mainly because there were no buoys set up so you had to just swim between the volunteers or site of something on the beach

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Team Every Man Jack

Bottom line on all of this... Jan Frodeno may be at risk of streaking his pants when he sees the swim time. Russell is a vastly better swimmer this year IMHO from racing him numerous times. Lionel lead the 2nd pack at Arizona last year albeit that was a wetsuit swim. Hanson pretty much made the front back of the IMTX swim this past spring in what I consider the swim of the year by a non-swimmer.

This all means IMHO that Lionel has a very good chance of making second packs as they happen in past races. I do think Josh A adds a wildcard to this race and may create an additional pack, alas Frodeno, Potts, and McNiece one year. Regardless I think that just helps Lionel as that small front pack is simply going to make the second pack slower and then the delta between 2nd and 3rd smaller. There may even just be one large second back as a result.

Either way, Lionel is quickly improving his chances of a potential podium IMHO.

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LOL

All good. Let’s just say today wasn’t nor was meant to be a ‘going to the well’, as Maurice said ‘tactics/execution’.

We’ll all really see exactly where Lionel’s swim fitness is in relative terms in 6 days.

Best,

David

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David T-D
http://www.tilburydavis.com

Hey just to be clear, David could have just said, "I am Lionel's coach, so you may not have the full picture on what he was doing". Personally I think Monty nailed it. The coach is as much in Lionel's body and brain during today's swim as an ex pro like Monty is....so maybe Monty has a better perspective. I do feel that Monty's analysis was close to bang on. You don't have to read between the lines of Monty's post, you just have to read them. David's post was cryptic and unclear to anyone without context of his relationship wtih Lionel. He's not the first coach on here who comes on with the "I know more than you" angle which in some cases may be true, in other cases, it might be incorrect. He could have just responded with, "Lionel and I spoke and we decided on a tactic of xyz that was not a flat out 3.8K swim".

BUT either Wiltshire is sandbagging while Lionel was sandbagging or they were both racing hard for the gap to be sub 4 minutes. So if I have to read between the lines, I'm not buying that Lionel was going anything but as fast as he could go combining pacing and tactics for today's race. I THINK this is what Monty was getting at but maybe Monty can qualify that.

Just to add, whether it is a discussion between engineers, between math guys, between physiologists, between whatever....the "I know something more than you, or I am smarter than you angle" just never really results in anything productive and it is why I responded to David they way I did. Just be clear, don't talk code words, don't make people read between the lines. It can be interpreted too many diverse ways especially if you don't have context. He was talking down to Monty. Not cool in my book. I think Monty's has pretty well the earned the global analysis guru title on anything to do with Kona swim splits and tactics. David is only a newbie in this domain.

We know the times, but that's it. We don't know the circumstances for Lionel's or Harry's times. Was Lionel sitting in a big group the whole time? Did he Lead a group? What happened? Same for Harry. If Lionel sat in the whole time, I don't think he necessarily redlined. His problem previously was the all out speed at the start, where he'd end up swimming on his own the whole time. That could be way more taxing than if he has better high end speed now and was able to make a group and sit in.

“Newbie”

LOL

Chill out dude, mahalo.

D.

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David T-D
http://www.tilburydavis.com

All good. Let’s just say today wasn’t nor was meant to be a ‘going to the well’, as Maurice said ‘tactics/execution’.

We’ll all really see exactly where Lionel’s swim fitness is in relative terms in 6 days. //

No worries mate, all good and fun. This is how we all get pumped up for the big day!! I'm guessing your are like me in that this is the single biggest sporting day of the year to watch. You obviously have a little more skin in the game(well I used to), so perhaps you are even more excited than me, but I doubt it..(-;


Anyway I put up my top 5 on the prediction thread, check it out...

i should read context first, oops

Hey David, we're all newbies compared to Monty. You should get advice from him. Seriously you can't know everything. This is why doctors refer their patients to specialists. Consider the free benefits he can provide you. I appreciate you have data from multiple athletes. Monty has a different data set you can benefit from.

2004 ST login vs Monty living the Kona swim lead pack with Rob Mackle and Wolfgang Dietrich all through the 80's and early 90's and then him following every Kona swim, conditions, tactics, players since. As I said, it's hard to beat Monty's database on the Kona swim leg! That was basically his A event as a pro and now as a follower!

yep you're right I thought you were calling him a newbie to the forum discussions, that's why i edited

Thanks for the feedback....in spite of being Canadian and an LS fan, I am 10x more concerned about athletes and friends in the 1:10-1:25 area.

Ie not so much take out speed etc but general conditions.

One comment I heard was "worse over the past 3 -4 years" including race day.

Anyways, best of luck for yours, mine, LS and every one else.

Cheers,

We know the times, but that's it. We don't know the circumstances for Lionel's or Harry's times. //

Correct, but we have the finish times and places of everyone, and their MO's on how they swim. Not having seen the swim I bet Harry sat on most of the time letting about 3 others do the pulling and then sprinted for the win. It is his MO, he doesn't care about time, he wants to win the race so plays it like a sprinter on a big flat stage. Pull the last 200 where it counts.


It looks like Lionel was in a group of about a dozen or so, probably not pulling any groups. Towards the end of these swims the pace gets hot for the places and it looks like he got shuttled the back end of that group, beating a couple guys. It could have been two distinct groups, but probably not having only been separated by about a half minute at the end. And that would make sense, Lionel is now swimming with real swimmers and as good as he has gotten, when the afterburners come on the old swimmers usually have an advantage.


And of course we have Lionel's coach telling us he did not go into the well, and I actually believe that for the last part of the swim where it is a drag race for places. But I think he worked hard to be and stay in that group for the rest of the swim.


It would be fun for someone that could actually see the whole race, maybe someone on a lead boat come on and fill in the gaps..