Dan's IMF View

Triathlon Forum
1

Dan,

Thanks for your thought provoking piece on the drafting penalties at IMF. Interesting stuff.

What is hard to tell from your piece is how many of those calls were of the “inadvertant type” and where the callls came. As you know “prime-time” at any Ironman is several minutes after one hour mark. It seems just about anyone can swim 1:10 or less. What you get for the next 10 - 20 k out on the bike course, is too many cyclists, on too narrow a road in too short a period of time. Who’s fault is that? Is it the athletes? Is it the people who put on the race? Is it the rules themselves? Hard to say. Remember the bike leg in a triathlon is kinda-sorta-like-a time trial, but there are so many cyclists on the road at this point all moving at the same speed( compounded even more at IMF with the dead flat course) that it’s hard to adhere exactly to that paradigm or the no-drafting rules as they are written.

I have been of this opinion for some time that the rules are asking the athletes do do somthing, that at times on the course is physically impossible to do - essentially ride single file with 10 m in front to the cyclists ahead and 10 m behind to the cyclist arrears. Good luck trying to do this in the first 20K or more on the bike if you swim 1:02 in an IM and are a 5:30 or under rider.

2

Good point Fleck about too many riders on the course and the rules as they are written.

I have a friend who did IMF Saturday and was dinged for a 4 minute penalty. He has no idea of when he might have gotten it but guesses it was early when he was careful to try to ride legal, but there were a lot of people on the course. He swam a 1:09 and rode in the low 5 hours.

This will continue to be a problem in races that have too many people for the course. Case in point–the Treasure Island tri was more like a crit than a time trial, even with wave starts.

3

Interesing observations indeed. I was thinking along the same lines at IMF when I witnessed some flagrant rule violations and noticed names that likely where people of foreign origin (yes, gross over-generalization, especially considering I’m of Cuban origin). I had a slow swim, but fast bike, so came up to many pelotons as I was working my way through the field. I passed one peloton with over 25 bikes. No shit. They continued to sit there even with an official riding parallel. Couldn’t figure it out and didn’t want to waste time trying. Midway through the bike two spaniards starting drafting off of me and each other. I braked hard, cursed a few times, they didn’t care. They were even passing things back and forth to each other, gel here, enduro cap there. I finally broke away on a downhill where I built up momentum and held 25+ for a couple miles. Of course those bastards caught and passed me on the run. Both of their run splits were 45 minutes faster than mine. I thought it unfortunate that I only saw one official during my entire ride. I wonder whether penalty times should be increased. I see how one can be inadvertent, and thus would not recommend DQ on the second, but perhaps 10 minutes, first, 15 minutes second, DQ third. That would hurt. Overall, by the way, very well organized event.

4

there were 235 penalties of the 4 minute variety, and 33 that were 12 minutes, which i take it to mean these 33 people were given 2 penalties. there were also 10 DQs, which either meant a single DQ infraction (i.e., certain centerline infractions) or, if not, then at least 3 position penalties.

so there were 278 penalties given to the 1920 who finished the bike, which meant almost 15% of everyone got a penalty. when you amortize out the multiple penalties, probably 17 penalties were given per 100 riders.

yes, there was a lot of drafting, from what i hear from people who were there. i heard that there was one pack with upwards of 90 people in it (i heard that from one person).

yes, it was frustrating for those who were racing. but they can take some solace in the fact that a lot of penalties were given out.

yes, 2000 people on a flat course in a competitive event like an IM begs for drafting to occur.

but, knock on wood, i’ve never been called, and if you ride with a good knowledge for the rules and a healthy respect for them, your chances of getting dinged become much more remote. however, if you draft the whole way and go 5:10 on a course in which you rode 6 hours the year before (apparently this sort of thing did happen) then what’s a 4 minute penalty, or even a 12-minute one?

perhaps someone will go through and do an entire analysis of the 1900 finishers and see who got penalties, from which countries. i wonder which of the foreigners just didn’t understand how we call penalies here in the U.S. basically, when you race in the southeast, you’re in crawford country. if i was a german, i’d think seriously before i submitted my race before charlie and his crew. if you draft, you’re going to get popped. from what i understand, charlie’s group was rather reserved. a lot more than 2% of the field should’ve got a multiple-penalty call. this was a test case for strict enforcement. sometimes i get on charlie’s back. he was obviously very much needed in florida.

5

I think it’s “just” a matter of consistency. It’s like basketball, where you have American guys coming to Europe and being called for travelling every other play until they realize that here you almost gotta dribble before moving your non pivot foot. Once they get adjusted to it, it’s a piece of cake. The problem with IM racing is twofold in my opinion: 1) there are way too few races to get adjusted to the different set of rules, plus people do maybe max 2 o 3 IM on a given year; 2) there’s no consistency across the same continent either, at least not here in Europe. So it’s not like that if you know how they apply the rules in Klagenfurt (drafttown Europe) you’re well off in Zurich or Lanzarote. Nope!
I think there should be a universally accepted set of rules, with officials applying them as uniformally as possible. I think that it could be done since there are not too many m dot races yet, although I’m aware of the fact that it will be nearly impossible given the amateurial nature of our sport (i.e. there’s no money to properly school these people, who are mostly volunteers).
What I’m gonna do is follow Dan’s suggestion and never sign up again for another m dot race in the US, because at IM Utah in 2002, I was given a blocking penalty (for failing to pass a guy who started speeding up while I was passing him, in the official 20 secs) after 3 miles. Man I rode scared and stressed the whole bike leg. Not a good way to spend 1,500+ bucks.
Filippo

6

“I think there should be a universally accepted set of rules, with officials applying them as uniformally as possible.”

i visited roth in 1992. the packs were so bad, after each of the three laps i knew before they rode by which was “paula’s” pack, which was “fernanda’s” pack," and “thea sybesma’s” pack, etc. there were no lone riders. each of the women pros were in their own packs of german male age groupers who’d glommed on. there was no possible movement from one pack to another if you were a pro woman or a good AG man.

then david yates came over – 1993 i think it was – and put the hammer down on the race organization. the race was thereafter much cleaner.

but the rules didn’t change. the enforcement did. who ought to make the enforcement more uniform across europe? obviously a private organization like the WTC is able to do it, but only for their races. it ought to be a job for the ITU, but this presupposes that they care about AG racing AT ALL except as a funding source for pro racing, where they obviously aren’t fans of no-draft racing. or there’s the ETU, which could make it a priority and thereby demonstrate their relevance.

but that’s europe’s problem. in the U.S. i’m happy to say we (unlike in basketball, ice hockey, boxing and i’m sure any number of sports) teach and maintain adherence to fundamentals in triathlon, with a special emphasis on rules. it’s not hard to ride without fear in the U.S. yes, you might get unfairly dinged. but not frequently. how much worse is it to get unfairly dinged in europe, where one set of german or spanish officials decide to actually enforce the rules for once in a blue moon?

7

how much worse is it to get unfairly dinged in europe, where one set of german or spanish officials decide to actually enforce the rules for once in a blue moon?

I totally agree with you. Rules exist, it’s “just” a matter of enforcing them and being consistent, and Americans are more prone to do both. However, both in the US and in Europe I’ve seen inconsistent behavior by the officials in the same race.

I also agree that in Europe there’s a “looser” interpretation of some rules, and sometimes they are simply ignored and not even mentioned, which leads to ugly scenes like those I saw this year in Zurich, while in the US athletes tend (overall) to stick to rules no matter what. The problem IMHO is that sometimes, especially at the beginning of the bike leg and in multiple laps courses there’s a constant problem that neither approach is going to solve (I’m not sure what’s worse, whether having anal officials handing out penalties by the dozen or seeing packs of assholes riding in TT formation). What could solve part of the problem is to come up with tougher, single lap courses and/or to limit the number of participants; I’m aware though that these are all financially dumb measures.
Is there really a solution? I don’t know man, what I know is that I’ll stick to those courses where there are not a zillion of participants, and where good cycling skills do indeed make a difference.

One last thing: thanks to you all for sharing your views. I know I’ve learnt more about the sport reading this forum than from coaches, friends, magazines, etc…combined.
Filippo

8

As we all know, M-dot has turned into an event like Mardi Gras, the NY Marathon. There are 500 to 1000 going out to either break 12 hours(a subjective respectible time), get a podium spot, or a Kona spot. My suggestion is to have a competitive wave and a non-competitive wave(event wave, finishing photo wave, “you’re an ironman” wave or whatever you want to call it). You start the competive wave 15 or more minutes ahead and concentrate your officials in that wave. This way you still have two mass starts, supposedly one of the great things about IM’s. You also supply your officials with digital voice recorders and possibly digital video cameras which can be reviewed by the head official when the motorcycles return. With the cash being poured into USAT, this would only be a drop the the bucket to finance.
Another thing that can be done is not only dq a 3 time violator but also suspend the license for six months for the first time and 1 year for the next time. This will make some people think about drafting. To quote one Bobo, the guru, Anderson, “you always benefit from drafting, you don’t know whether drugs will do anything for you when you’re taking them.”
By the way, there were more penalties this year than last because of the elimination of the 3 minute standdown rule.
Bob Sigerson

9

Just finished Ironman Florida. It was easy not to draft and the marshalls use good sense . I saw a lot of drafting , some was husband and wife staying together, some were people side by side talking for a min. and some were cheating for an advantage. It was easy to tell the difference. I swim slow so I passed MANY people. I had no problem and everyone i passed dropped back. If I came upon a large group (6-8) I passed all as fast as possible and went on or dropped back until I had the energy to do so. I ahd to drop back a couple of times when I came upon someone and my heartrate was to high to pass and stay where I wanted . I dropped back to a legal distance and passed when I could.

10

“Is there really a solution?”

here’s where i think RDs fall down, and they’re as bad in the U.S. as anywhere. it’s all well and good to have rules, and to enforce them, but the most efficient way to keep drafting down is through course construction, broad-interval wave starts, and course limits. of course in florida you don’t have the option to make your course hillier, but there are other things you can do.

from what i understand, WTC is vehemently against wave starts for IM races. i think one way to fix a lot of problems is to have women leave early. it’s fairly easy to tell a man from a woman, so you don’t really have confusion among contestants, media and spectators by having a separate women’s start. if the women leave an hour before the men:

  1. you thin out the field nicely;
  2. women don’t get beat up in the swim, and the good women’s swimmers don’t get an unfair advantage by drafting male swimmers;
  3. the women’s race is cleanly separate, you don’t have AG men trying to duke it out with pro women.
  4. for once in their lives, women have a chance to race clearly in front, and both men and women have a chance to see what the front looks like in their respective races.

it’s that they do in many races in multisport, and also in the NY marathon. why can’t it work in an IM? makes good sense to me. i believe graham could push this through, he’s got a lot of pull with WTC and he could institute this if he wanted, i believe. when you consider just how many women are coming into triathlon, it would do a lot to lessen course congestion. the field is not 15% women any longer, more like double that. so this past weekend’s 2000-person event in florida would look more like a 1300-person event, from a drafting point of view.

11

Dan,

A number of the pro women that I have spoken to are all for this.

It may also have an impact on the outcome of the race. Many of the top women are caught up in the main group of top age-group men. This has to have an impact on how they ride, even if they are riding legal. Not to accuse, here, just saying that when you are riding with other cyclists all around you it’s a different dynamic, than when they next woman is completely out of sight and two minutes up the road and you are completely on your own.

I suspect that the new staggering rule for the pro women in big IM races frees them up a bit.

Not sure if it will solve ALL of the problems of the early miles of the bike even with “only” 1300 -1400 men going off together. I am guessing that at prime time (1:00 - 1:10) you will have over 100 athletes a minute or more going out on the bike course and again, at times, there will be too many cyclists, on too narrow a road, in too short a period of time. The no drafting rules, to the letter of the law, will be asking athletes to do something that is next to impossible to do.

12

Being one of the participants at IMF that fell within Dan’s sampling range, I do not believe having a seperate woman’s start would reduce the drafting. I swam a 1:12 (sorry fleck i am on of the people who cannot swim a 1:10 yet). and then had a 5:07 bike split.

I think separating the woman would not have had a major impact. The majority of groups or drafters riding were not woman, as a matter of fact I did not see one woman blatantly drafting during the race. It may have been that my swim was too slow to be exposed to it, but also the number of woman that I saw on the bike were not riding in groups. I do not see how this would significantly change the drafting that did occur.

Additionally, there are waves at other flat races like eagleman, and the drafting at eagleman was far worse then the drafting I saw at IMF. In part that is due to the shorter swim. However, I think a larger part has to do with the # of officials on Saturday.

Given the Florida course it is extrememly difficult to develop alternatives to reduce drafting. In the spirit of not criticising unless you can offer an alternatives, I would suggest the following:

  1. Ban mirrors on bikes and helmets. Several of the groups that I saw blatantly drafting had mirrors to see refs as they were coming.

  2. Have officials in inconspicuous cars or on bikes riding to determine drafting. With all the races filling up so fast, I bet you could recruit & train volunteers to ref on bicycle. You would need to demonstrate you are capable of riding a solid IM bike distance to qualify as this type of ref. In return you are compensated with an entry to a closed out IM race.

  3. Have the time penalty more punative. Increase the time, make the person swim again, run 1/2 mile. something along those lines.

I do not know how serious or practical those suggestions are, but my point is we need to get creative to solve this issue.

Overall, I think the refs did a good job at IMF. Yes 280 penalties is excessive but it could have easily have been 500 penalties. The refs that I saw were fairly aggressive, but showed good judgement. In the first 10-15 miles it was so crowded that it was almost impossible to stay 3 bike lengths apart. During that period the refs I saw were riding by quickly and I do not believe gave out many drafting penalties during the first 10- 15 miles of the race.

Rockfish
aka Greg Sheehan

13

“I think separating the woman would not have had a major impact.”

i bet it would for the women. of course they don’t matter much, not being able to vote or own property or anything, but at least it’s something.

14

OK Point well taken. When I mean “major impact” I mean impact on reducing the the overall amount of drafting in a race. I interpreted the thread to directed towards that.

GS

15

I don’t think separating the women and men is necessarily a bad idea but it bothers me that the dynamic that seems most likely to bring this change about is pro women complaining about getting “beaten up” on the swim. Here’s an idea girls: learn to swim. There is plenty of clear water if you swim 54:00 which still isn’t all that fast. If you are turning in 59:00+ Ironman swim splits and are making your living in the sport, you have no room to complain about anything.

When the Wendy Ingrahams and Joanna Zeigers of the world start complaining, I will have a little more sympathy. I could actually see this happening since they would probably rather not see Lori, Heather, Natascha et al. eat up the lead they earned in the water on the wheels of the age group men who got out between them but they tend not to be the ones we hear pushing for this.

17

"2. Have officials in inconspicuous cars or on bikes riding to determine drafting. With all the races filling up so fast, I bet you could recruit & train volunteers to ref on bicycle. You would need to demonstrate you are capable of riding a solid IM bike distance to qualify as this type of ref. In return you are compensated with an entry to a closed out IM race. "

That’s an excellent idea. I think they could also have “speed traps” with volunteers on the side of the road taking pcitures of drafters. Or they could radio on up to an official on a motorcycle or in a car to go bust the violators. There are lots of things they could do.

I also like Dan’s idea of separating the women. It would not be 100% effective, but it would help.

But as long as you have prize money and/or IMH slots on the line, you are always going to have cheaters. I’ve seen more wheelsuckers at a single May Day Biathlon (that offers cash) than I have seen in 4 non-WTC ironmans COMBINED. People can be pretty sleazy. But, as a buddy of mine likes to say: “There are no drafters in heaven”.

18

I may be misinterpreting your post, but is it that you have sympathy for fast swimmers but you don’t have for slow ones? Triathlon is not about who is the best at any individual sport. It is about who can accomplish the 3 legs in the least amount of time. It would be nice to have a system that allows fairness during the whole race. It seems to me like separating the men and women would solve more problems than it would create.

19

“Here’s an idea girls: learn to swim.”

in my experience, you’ve got it backwards. it’s the men who don’t know how to swim. it’s the same way in marathons. what men DO know how to do is SPRINT at the start of a distance event. what they DON’T know how to do is seed themselves according to their speeds and start at a pace that’s something like the pace they’ll do for the entire distance.

maybe wendy ingraham doesn’t complain, but she’s also a 50-minute kona swimmer. very few of those around (even among the men). but the greatest all-distance woman in the history of triathlon quite racing kona over this very issue. i don’t see why RDs can’t oblige this reasonable request, either a separate wave, or a separate lane.

further, i believe your premise is wrong. i followed the pro women’s issues for some years as a significant other of a top pro woman, and i can tell you that MUCH more of a concern in OUR camp was a pro woman being led through the race by an AG man whose job it was to swim/ride or ride/run alongside a top woman. i’m not naming anyone, but that goes on today as well. just take a close enough look at race results and splits and you’ll see it.

20

I like Dan will not name people - or the race I was at…BUT

I saw with no question - a pro male - pacing and helping a pro female win a race. The pro woman was on the ground laying there and the pro male STOPPED, gave the female his calories, his fluids and a message (I was walking so I had time to watch). During this time another Pro male (who was NOT in the race) that was pacing the Pro woman stopped the MTN bike he was on and offered even more help. The woman then got up (later after I had passed) and won the womens race. As she was running she had the very same pro male, and other pro male on a MTN bike pace her all but the last mile or so…

Now, if someone had stopped for me I would get a DQ - no question. I am not 100% sure about if one competitor is allowed to help another…but I do know 100% for sure that on the course I am not allowed to accept assistance from anyone who is not an aid station person or in someway related to the race (once I almost got a penalty for taking a napkin from a man to clean off my glasses). From that time on I never looked at this woman pro with the same level of respect as I am sure she had aid that the other women in the race did not have available to them.

there, I am done ranting.

21

“I think separating the woman would not have had a major impact.”

i bet it would for the women. of course they don’t matter much, not being able to vote or own property or anything, but at least it’s something.

…or smoke or drive.

They do matter a lot to me.