I was a spectator at a sprint tri yesterday. The swim was to be in the gulf of mexico so no wetsuits allowed or needed. Before the start, I was hanging out just on the outside of transition talking to my BF who was racing. I notice a guy off to the side spraying something on a pair of shorts, like cooking spray. I look over, and he is pulling on what looks like neoprene shorts on over his roadie bike shorts. I said to him, “Did that used to be a wetsuit? Did you cut a wetsuit into a pair of shorts?” (obvious scissor marks). He said yes. I said “doesn’t that make your ass float higher in the water?” He hemmed and hawed, and said “well, I wear these as my bike shorts.” And I’m thinking, wait, I saw you put them on over your bike shorts. Does he think I’m a moron? Then he takes another pair of spandex/ lycra type shorts and pulls them on OVER the wetsuit shorts, so he now has 3 layers on. The last to presumably hide the wetsuit. I said “doesn’t that give you an advantage?” (knowing full well that it did) And my BF came right out with “you’re cheating, right? You’re a cheater.”
So Floatie-Pants comes out of the water in a pretty good time, proceeds to take off his 2 outer layers of shorts, and hops on his bike wearing his roadie bike shorts, just as I suspected. Crashes on the way out of transition at the mount line, then crashes in a spectacular fashion coming back in off the bike. Proceeds to run his way to 3rd place AG (and like 14th overall out of 500) and takes home a trophy. I have to say this is about the cheesiest thing I have ever seen at a race. The sad thing is that he is a good athlete, and this was such a short swim I don’t know if it would have made any difference at all if he was wearing his high-bouyancy diaper or not.
Luckily my BF took 2nd place, but I feel bad for the 4th place guy who should have had a trophy too.
Let’s just say it was in Florida. This post wasn’t meant to narc the guy out in front of his friends. I recognize his name as being a regular at my favorite LBS (friends of friends on facebook etc) and I don’t want to be the one who outed him to everyone he knows.
How much floatation do neoprane pants give someone? Even if multiple layers. I’m thinking very little to none. Besides, it is the floatation in the legs that helps someone swim faster. Keeping your butt up high, while still dragging your legs, won’t help.
That should be a DQ. Drafting is obviously cheating, but you can draft by accident or even by the fault of another, this is intentionally lining up and cheating (and placing at that).
Let’s just say it was in Florida. This post wasn’t meant to narc the guy out in front of his friends. I recognize his name as being a regular at my favorite LBS (friends of friends on facebook etc) and I don’t want to be the one who outed him to everyone he knows.
They are all over the place. At a local sprint duathlon yesterday a relatively large group of guys all wearing the same team kit had very similar combined 1’st run, T1 and bike times. They also went by me on the bike like I had a flat and was sitting on the side of the road. I’m sure they are very proud of their efforts.
How much floatation do neoprane pants give someone? Even if multiple layers. I’m thinking very little to none. Besides, it is the floatation in the legs that helps someone swim faster. Keeping your butt up high, while still dragging your legs, won’t help.
Agreed that whatever (if any) advantage he had was minimal, however he knew what he was doing was against the rules, lied about it, and had created a system to purposefully tried to hide it. That’s what I find cheesy.
Look on the bright side-it’s only 60-90s of an advantage. On the downside, if he’s in Florida and blatantly cheating, then he’s probably also getting a 5-10 minute advantage from visiting a “Life Clinic.”
When I saw that he was going to place high and take a podium spot from someone else, I did report it to a race official. He was called up on the PA system before awards were given out, and there was a discussion, but they gave him his award anyway. Not sure why.
For all the physicists out there wouldn’t all these extra suits slow him down similar to swimmers wearing 2 or 3 suits in the pool while training before a big race? If this is true I’m sure the little extra buoyancy in his hips would be offset by the extra drag and maybe slower if his legs were still dropping.
If this was such a major concern for you, you would’ve called attention to it at the start of the race vs just bitching about it on an internet forum, after the fact.
If this was such a major concern for you, you would’ve called attention to it at the start of the race vs just bitching about it on an internet forum, after the fact.
I didn’t just “bitch” about it, I reported it to the race director.
