a number of us have been talking this over. there's going to be some big hitters coming forward with this. virtual racing. virtual triathlons and duathlons. this thread is to discuss this, because here's what i know: 1) whatever gets decided, people are going to whine; 2) the most verbal whiners are going to be those who are professional whiners. (we all know them; we know they can be counted on reliably to whine.)
so, in order to assuage the whiners, but more so to just get this right, this thread is where we're going to hash out some formats, rules, platforms and the like. a lot of important people are going to rely on what we decide here. so...
PLATFORMS
what i mean by "platform" is: are we talking indoor or outdoor? virtual does not necessarily mean stationary. a "platform" in my parlance could be: this is a zwift event. zwift ride. zwift run. put them together. voila. duathlon.
or, this could be an outdoor ride of, say, 25 or 56mi. followed by a run of some distance. and the "timing company" is not bikereg or active but, in this case, garmin or wahoo. it's your ELEMNT Bolt. or it's your garmin 1030 and/or 945.
or the platform is rouvy, or RGT. obviously there's a lot of honor system here. but i think slowtwitchers are by and large pretty honorable. i'm not worried about that.
FORMATS
is it ride/run, start to finish? if so, then there are problems, whether it's a GPS unit "platform" or whether it's a zwift platform. for example, if it's outdoor, then you're likely to ride using a head unit and run using a watch. one would have to start immediately upon the other ending. i don't know that this is realistic. if it's zwift, and if we race in groups, the only way to do it the run is if we, say, ride as a group (we start a group ride), but then upon ending the ride we jump on a treadmill and start running, just free running, not part of a scheduled run, because we start scheduled runs altogether.
it is my guess that the best way to transact virtual multipsport events - whether outdoor or indoor - is to have the run occur at some distance from the ride. in fact, i could see that we do this sort of like a "postal" event. in either a running or swimming postal event you have from this date on the calendar to that, and the swim is 3000 yards, or the run is a half-marathon, and you have to achieve it between those calendar dates. i could easily see something like that, where there's both a ride and a run, you have several cracks at both. come the end of that time window, your best ride and run aggregated together is your "time".
so, look, as we discuss formats, i encourage you to think outside the box. when i started racing triathlons there were very little rules. if the first 5 triathlons i entered, 4 were draft legal. several were odd-format, with the bike at end, or the swim at the end. this was back between 1977 and 1981, so, we didn't have rules or tradition to violate. think of the best, most interesting, most accessible formats you can. and give me a succinct event, as in:
activities: bike and run
distances: 40k and 5k
format: bike on the trainer; run on the treadmill or outdoor; run and bike discrete accomplishments; multiple efforts okay.
platform: bike 40k memorialized by a file from zwift, trainerroad, sufferfest, etc; run memorialized by a zwift effort, or by a GPS unit, or a footpod.
calendar: ; efforts must be achieved and uploaded between May 15 and May 30.
data aggregator: a slowtwtich challenge; (or bikereg; or sportstats).
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
so, in order to assuage the whiners, but more so to just get this right, this thread is where we're going to hash out some formats, rules, platforms and the like. a lot of important people are going to rely on what we decide here. so...
PLATFORMS
what i mean by "platform" is: are we talking indoor or outdoor? virtual does not necessarily mean stationary. a "platform" in my parlance could be: this is a zwift event. zwift ride. zwift run. put them together. voila. duathlon.
or, this could be an outdoor ride of, say, 25 or 56mi. followed by a run of some distance. and the "timing company" is not bikereg or active but, in this case, garmin or wahoo. it's your ELEMNT Bolt. or it's your garmin 1030 and/or 945.
or the platform is rouvy, or RGT. obviously there's a lot of honor system here. but i think slowtwitchers are by and large pretty honorable. i'm not worried about that.
FORMATS
is it ride/run, start to finish? if so, then there are problems, whether it's a GPS unit "platform" or whether it's a zwift platform. for example, if it's outdoor, then you're likely to ride using a head unit and run using a watch. one would have to start immediately upon the other ending. i don't know that this is realistic. if it's zwift, and if we race in groups, the only way to do it the run is if we, say, ride as a group (we start a group ride), but then upon ending the ride we jump on a treadmill and start running, just free running, not part of a scheduled run, because we start scheduled runs altogether.
it is my guess that the best way to transact virtual multipsport events - whether outdoor or indoor - is to have the run occur at some distance from the ride. in fact, i could see that we do this sort of like a "postal" event. in either a running or swimming postal event you have from this date on the calendar to that, and the swim is 3000 yards, or the run is a half-marathon, and you have to achieve it between those calendar dates. i could easily see something like that, where there's both a ride and a run, you have several cracks at both. come the end of that time window, your best ride and run aggregated together is your "time".
so, look, as we discuss formats, i encourage you to think outside the box. when i started racing triathlons there were very little rules. if the first 5 triathlons i entered, 4 were draft legal. several were odd-format, with the bike at end, or the swim at the end. this was back between 1977 and 1981, so, we didn't have rules or tradition to violate. think of the best, most interesting, most accessible formats you can. and give me a succinct event, as in:
activities: bike and run
distances: 40k and 5k
format: bike on the trainer; run on the treadmill or outdoor; run and bike discrete accomplishments; multiple efforts okay.
platform: bike 40k memorialized by a file from zwift, trainerroad, sufferfest, etc; run memorialized by a zwift effort, or by a GPS unit, or a footpod.
calendar: ; efforts must be achieved and uploaded between May 15 and May 30.
data aggregator: a slowtwtich challenge; (or bikereg; or sportstats).
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman
