Who says it would attract more people?
A possible field sprint for the finish. With multi-sporters on aerobars.

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#swimmingmatters
Laugh hard. Run fast. Be kind.
The Doctor (#12)

Gotta finish race on the run IMO.

If you think that’s the case the way to find out is for you to put an event on. I don’t think you’d necessarily get more people just a different set of people who prefer cycling to running

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Trust me I’m a doctor!
Well, I have a PhD :-)

I think it would be interesting. I think you’d want to make it road-style bikes only as you would have large packs on the first leg and possible finish with a bunch sprint. Basically a road bike race with a run in between

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Matt

Similarly, as someone who runs well and swims less well, I’ve always thought it would be interesting to do a backwards sprint tri. Spend the last leg trying to hold off chasers rather than trying to chase down people.

There was a local race that considered trying it one year but unfortunately never happened.

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Matt

Wouldn't a Reverse Duathlon be: long run > bike > short run?

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

I agree that that is the way a race would pan out but don't see it as a good thing. The whole thing about road cycling is because of the draft effect you need to do something to mix it up. You need gradient or cobbles or multi stages or you get a race of tactics and teams rather than best individual won.

I guess each to their own but a mass bunch road start isn't appealing to me and if the out front runner can be closed down because people behind them work together then it's a very different sort of race.

Lots of formats work for novelty but think the existing pattern has it's advantages and is there for a reason.

I sure like this idea, it would be wacky to see the start of such a race... maybe a tt format start. Would be an interesting... finish, but of course that's what 15% inclines are for.

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http://www.fitspeek.com the Fraser Valley's fitness, wellness, and endurance sports podcast

Well it would double to bike course marshal and police time requirements most likely, that's an issue. And it basically a bike race with extra steps.

It's going to run into branding issues. See, duathlons are already unpopular. They'd probably get a lot more interest if they changed their name to something more badass. Perhaps Cyclasaurus Rex or Duenstein's Monster. Then host events that weren't triathlon's bastard, uncool step-brother who's only allowed to play on the same course because mommy forced it to tag along.

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

no different from cyclocross then.

Maybe I will put this race on fiesta island in san diego. For logistic to mass start problem, everyone is to be off their bikes and do quick jog to their bike (like they do in alley cat races)

From an organizer perspective, this is a much harder race to administer.

1. Mass cycling start issues (road closures, pack riding, etc.). Consider that the TdF peloton is less than 200 riders.
2. Much harder to get results for cycling finishes than running ones (chips aren't going to be accurate for sprint finishes where people are separated by inches, and the area after the finish is much harder to control with cyclists coming through at >30mph. Unlike USAC races, the entrants may not be fluent in pack cycling or race protocol (ex. don't hit your brakes and stop 20ft, past the finish line).

I've done a couple of run-bike duathlons. They tended to be smaller events, and the first run (5k in every case) was sufficient to spread out the relatively small (100-200 entrants) field.

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ECMGN Therapy Silicon Valley:
Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Having raced both Cyclocross and Duathlons, despite both involving running and cycling their are strangely very very different:
Cyclocross requires very good bike handling skills and bare minimum running talent to do well.
Triathlon requires very little bike handling skills (to the point that Triathletes are a known mass start menace) but a good amount of running talent to do well.
Cyclocross is a brutal over/under interval for 60 minutes, Triathlon is pure aerobic endurance.
Hosting cross is easy- just need a park, some course tape, a couple of planks for barriers and a slight sadistic streak for course design.
Hosting Tri's less so- need a large non-disgusting body of water, a decent road without too much traffic you can get permits and cops for, and a run course that better not be over or under by .1 of a mile or the wailing and complaining will be endless.
Safety for cross- convince the CR Official that the course is not designed to kill the participants. Having a EMT would be nice.
Safety for Tri- trying to keep multiple people from panic attack drowning, safely getting the terrible swimmers who just discovered how terrible they are back to shore, and worse keeping an eye out for the swim induced massive health issue in the middle of the swim pack. And that doesn't even touch the issues with the road course and run courses (triathletes have an innate ability to get lost and take new and inventive turns on your courses). . . .
Crossers are chill, but ruthlessly competitive despite the constant smiles. Most are pretty low maintenance.
Triathletes are not chill, but most are not really competitive (except against their internal goals) and often quite nice if somewhat high maintenance.

Having done both sorts of racing, my only real conclusion is most Tri race promoters are damn saints.

I'd hate a TT start and prefer mass starts (or at least wave starts where you are on the same time as your direct competitors) for shorter (Olympic and shorter) races. Mass start on the bike would be horrible unless it was draft-legal and there was a neutral start. Why couldn't you still bike to and from a traditional duathlon? I did that at duathlon nationals a few year back-loved it.

you can bike to a traditional du. lets admit it, triathletes spend most their time on their bikes (cause its easy), and there are more people that rather take up running than cycling

Pardon my hair of cynicism, but it's because the pure runners don't like losing duathlons by having to actually ride the bicycle a fair distance or amount of time.

I like du, as it gets rid of the most consuming part of triathlon.........the need for a second life and pile of gym time to swim. But the whole small bike ratio as compared to triathlon is a bit crap.

It is what it is at this point, but I usually don't sign up for du's unless the ratio is a hair over 3:1. Triathlon is 4.3:1. Most duathlons are 3:1 or so. That extra bit of bike is often just enough to level the field.

Neither a pure time triallist nor a pure run talent should win a du. That's not what I've seen locally. It's really really runner biased. When the ratio of run/bike is worse than 3:1...........duhhhh. Of course.

I'd be interested to understand how this event would be insured or how much it would cost to insure compared to a standard duathlon?

Also, assuming you would need to have individual time trial starts, how much does that complicate the event compared to a regular duathlon with a single or at most a couple of waves?

And because you have the bike course open from the very beginning to the very end of the entire event, how much extra does this cost you for traffic control?

For many reasons this reverse duathlon just sounds like way more trouble than its worth, unless it was somehow massively more popular than regular duathlon. And as someone who likes duathlon, my first thought is it sounds problematic and I would probably sit this out initially until they demonstrated this wasn't going to be a clusterf#$k.

I think a bike finish might be a disaster.

Back in the mid 80's when I started the "biathlons" that I did were mass start-5 mile run, 20 mile bike- in that order...the only problem would be sprint finishes on the bike, although the fields I was in (150-200 racers if memory serves) I did not see or hear of any problems at any of the races I did...the finish chute had to be much longer and we did not have chip timing obviously so someone was there to with a timing plunger and used the honor system to line up in the finishing chute to retrieve your name tab from your race number.....

it seemed that the 5 mile run spread people out enough that drafting on the bike was not a problem.........so there you go....

A conventional R-B-R duathlon is infinitely more sensible. You're no newbie and must realise this. I think you're trolling.
Starting and finishing on the bike is silliness. Safety and logistics advantages of the conventional sequence is obvious. Everyone starts together on the bike? How do you propose to manage that? It's an un-resolvable drafting issue right from the start line, followed by an inundated T1. Silly

 




did everyone skip my post as how i think the mass start should be?

they delay of picking up your bike and clipping in should suffice. For that matter, I see no problems at the start of crit races. You all are assuming all of a sudden this will be a 2000 person event? big duathlons struggle to get into the triple digits of participants

I still can't find it?

You said a "runner biking to the run start as warm up". What does that mean? I presumed you meant leg 1 is on the bike, followed by a run and then another bike leg since what you actually wrote is undecipherable. I mean duathletes aren't runners, running isn't cycling and warm-ups aren't part of the race so....?

No we, didn't skip your post.

Like it or not, crit races have a highly self-selected group of COMPETITIVE riders (even the new ones) who are committed to racing and learning about racing. You NEVER get newb bike riders in criteriums. Like people who just bought their first bike a month ago and aren't even sure they will bike for more than a month.

In contast, reverse duathlons will definitely attract a fair number of true newbies-cyclists who have barely ridden a bike for more than 10 miles at a time, and may have only started riding again several weeks prior, and are totally sketchy on the bike.

The noob-cyclist level at duathlon will be high, whereas the criterium level, it's close to zero. Add a mass sprint start, and the chaos level will be high. I'm not saying it's not doable by any means, but for any RD, the crash risk is multiplefold higher than the RBR format.

Unless that "quick sprint" to pick up your bike is at least a few K, you're still going to have a large pack and/or several moderate sized packs right from the start. A 50-100 yard dash like most alley cat starts I've seen doesn't break things up very much...

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"I'm thinking of a number between 1 and 10, and I don't know why!"