Very sad indeed. Maybe putting both the 70.3 and the full Ironman on the same day was not a super smart idea…
Initially, I heard the crash happened close to the T1/T2. The two races / courses coincide as they have change the 70.3 to be on the same stretch as the full IM course.
https://tri-today.com/...nman-70-3-barcelona/
As you say, it is so sad these things keep happening.
But what is pathetic that this Tri-Today website keeps posting these messages from IM races while they do not for their ‘own’ races.
Tri-Today is more-or-less a daughter company of the Challenge Group.
And there was no news at the amount of crashes we had during the World Triathlon EU championship LD race in Almere.
Literally dozens and dozens of crashes on a stretch of 5 km which is so bad with craters in the road surface people are blown of their bikes.
I think we are about to get to the point to what is acceptable in terms of safety and what you can expect, you may expect and what you should expect from any professional race organisation.
And we call them organisations, but we should call them business’, which they are. Regardless of the brand name is Ironman, Challenge, Clash or any other.
They organise races, ask entry fees which are high. I don’t have a problem with high entry fees, people can choose for themselves if they want to spend that money or not.
What I do expect is that courses are suitable for triathlon bikes ridden in aerobar so the road surface need to be in a state that allows this.
Or the number of people on course, what is certainly the case in Barcelona and maybe is a reason for this terrible ‘accident’.
To be honest, I’m not sure of you can still call this an accident.
It was not a question if this at one point was going to happen, it was more a question of when…
Or enough hydration, sponges etc on courses when the weather is hot, etc.
It looks simple but at the race in Almere 3 weeks ago it was until 7 or 8 km in the race when there was an aid station with sponges, and we had brutal hot weather all week long especially for what we are use to have in September. There was no ice aid stations, the water served was warm and we had no wind that day, very uncommon in that area.
Race organizers need to get their act together before more deaths happen.
It is already absolute shit that deaths happens during the swimming part of the race, I have ‘lost’ 2 customers over the last 5-6 years at IM swim’s.
But if we now get deaths during the cycling portion due to factors that could have been influenced by the organisation that is an absolute disaster leaving families without their loved one.
I have spoken to some of our coached athletes and they told us the cycling portion at some points was so bad, riders over taking other riders that were already over taken riders and pieces of road so small impossible to have that many riders on course. And riders also need to ride with their head and keep it safe, they all think they are Frodo…
Where does it stop and Ironman and all other race companies see that they are playing with peoples lives if they put on courses not suitable to handle the amount of riders and their equipment.
Jeroen