How do we determine the worth of a triathlete?

Triathlon Forum
1

I was thinking about this over the weekend as I considered which criteria we use to determine a person’s worth in general. By worth I mean what kind of people we are – good, bad, etc. After pondering that for a moment, I started thinking about how we figure out whether or not we are “good” or “bad” triathletes. (How I segued into that I don’t know.) Do we use race results, the kind of bikes we ride, the kind of race kit we wear, or how we balance our triathlon habit with the rest of our lives? Do we use different criteria for pros and age groupers?

Is someone who posts fast race times necessarily a good triathlete? Are slower athletes worse than fast ones or is there more to it than that?

RP

2

They should be judged by how good of hugs they give.

Oh and by how crapy of equipment they ride - of course the crappier the better the athlete.

3

  1. How long their message board posts are. Long = good. Short = not so good.

  2. Where you start vs. where you finish. In other words, how much you improve and how close you come to your potential.

#2 is only for those that would consider themselves “triathletes”, not just “someone that does triathlons”. What the difference between those 2 terms is likely how serious each person takes the sport (as compared with other things that take up time). If you do them for fun, and not to compete, then there’s different criteria.

When this (my tri career) is all over, I want you to ask 2 questions about me:

Did he make significant progress over the years?

Did he leave the sport in better condition than when he found it?

I didn’t necessarily get into this sport to make friends (i.e., #1 priority was to compete in something productive), but if you show good dedication and are a friendly/helpful person, you can’t help but make a few, and make your sport better.

Okay forget all that … I just want to make people laugh as I pass them on my bike, acting like I’m whipping a racehorse ,yelling “Yah! Yah! Yee-Haw! Giddy Up!!!”.

If the answers to questions 1 and 2 are “Yes”, then I judge myself as being a good triathlete and a good rep for the sport. How others see me will depend on their perspective. I can’t account for that.

4

Uh oh. You’ve gone into deeper water.

This is kind of like peeling a layer off the gear discussion. The mettle of a person cannot often be determined simply by the outward appearance of that person. One very successful, very athletic person may be cruising along based on the gifts they were born with, while another person may work hard for every single thing they have, yet still only achieve moderate success in life and in sports. We were not all given the same talents, intelligence, skill, or birth status when we got here, so we cannot assume a level playing field and thus apply a standard measure.

To my mind, what somebody puts into the things they care about is at least as important as the results, because for a person to strive, to persevere, and to achieve is more a testament to their worth than a simple comparison of their achievements to those of other people.

The difficult thing is determining how much of a person’s achievement is based on natural ability, and how much of it is hard work.

5
  1. How long their message board post are. Long = good. Short = not so good.

My interpretation differs somewhat:

Long, rambling, self-indulgent = not good.

Concise, helpful/ humourous = good.

A caveat for my interpretation= worth is not quantifiable.

6

That’s kind of what I’m trying to get at. Some people (not everyone, I know – I just Frank’s response on bunnyman’s thread) are very judgmental, and make opinions of their fellow competitors based on external factors – things like equipment, the car they drive to the race in, even race results.

I guess the point I have arrived at is that none of that matters. We really can’t form any kind of significant opinion of our fellow competitors based on what we see at races. It takes much more than that. How we choose to race, and on what we choose to race, is inconsequential. What is important is that we are enjoying the sport, and whatever it takes for us to enjoy the sport is all that matters. If a BOP’er wants to ride a $5K bike, so what? If a FOP’er wants to ride a $500 Giant, that’s fine, too.

Another point to the discussion is do we isolate triathlon from the total lifestyle or do we include it? For example, is the triathlete who trains all the time, sacrificing family, friends, maybe even his/her job, to post good race results “better” than the guy who gives up training time for family, etc.? Is the aforementioned FOP’er a better triathlete but less of a father and husband, or is the triathlon habit a sign of a obsessive, compulsive, selfish person in general? I don’t know if this makes any sense or not, just something I was considering earlier today.

RP

7

Why do you need to categorize? Even if you change good/bad to successful/not successful, there will be a range. For Tim DeBoom, I’d guess successful is winning IMH. For me, successful will be breaking 7 hours in the half.

Triathlon is like the rest of society. You will find some assholes at all levels–pro to the back of the back. You will also find some of the finest people (aside from triathletes) at all levels in the sport.

Or maybe I didn’t get your question?

clm

8

I think that you have to include all things. Just as someone may be a good person, except for their alcohol problem, which is destroying their life, someone who is so totally consumed by triathlon, or anything else, that it negatively affects other aspects of their lives, has a problem that needs to be dealt with. If they really don’t care about anything except triathlon, that’s fine, but part of being a good person is taking responsibility for your actions and how they affect your family, community, and career.

We recently discussed finding balance in life. For me, I am constantly trying to balance training with other aspects of my personal life. Before triathlon, I took my wife out for dinner a couple of nights a week, and we went out on weekends more often. Realistically, since I started training, we both drink less, weigh less, and get more sleep than before. But I still worry that we aren’t doing as much “going out” stuff, even though we are both healthier for doing it less.

I’d rather be a healthy, happy MOP racer with a content family, good friends to spend time with, and a nice house to live in than win the race and go home to an empty apartment. If I had to make that choice.

Ultimately, I think the real measure is whether or not you make things better for others, and the world at large, by whatever means are at your disposal. Sadly, all I have to offer is my sardonic wit.

9

Sadly, all I have to offer is my sardonic wit.
Keep it coming Jeff. Like your website musings too.

10

trigeeks are worth no more and no less than other people. (99 cents a pound in the markets)

you heard it here first.

TriDork

11

I think we’re asking a lot of a triathlete. maybe too much.

I think it’s possible to be a good triathlete and a crappy employee … or a crappy father … or a not-as-good-as-they-should-be husband, etc.

There are probably some people that put more effort into being a good triathlete than they do being a good employee/friend/husband/etc … what’s worse is they hang out with those that buy expensive equipment to look cool. That’s convenient, b/c now we can mock 2 groups of people in the same location … it makes us more efficient mockers, and as we know in triathloning, “energy saved is energy earned”. no, that’s not it. Something about conserving energy would apply here. (sometimes when one tries to be funny, it comes out stupid. I think that’s what has happened in this paragraph)

On a serious note … when evaluating the “success” (as oppossed to saying good or bad) of a triathlete, I wouldn’t bring in outside non-triathlon factors like the quality of their parenting, whether or not they are a huggy person, how intimate they are with their spouse, their level of faith in God, whether they drive a navigator when a Civic will do, whether their big truck w/ Kansas plates emits exhaust, whether they buy expensive stuff just to look cool, whether they eat fast food every day, whether they eat Count Chocula or Lucky Charms (no wrong decision there), whether they want the government to pay for the stuff they are not willing to sacrifice for, whether they equate the loss of a bike with being next to death in the heirarchy of tragedy, whether they make long, self-indulging posts or not, amongst other things. I started off this paragraph by saying … “on a serious note”. Who am I fooling?

The success of a triathlete is a very narrow (in comparison with success of the person) focus in the gand scheme of things. While everything you say would make for the ideal triathlete, I don’t think it’s a requirement.

Last I checked the USAT never elected me DWT (Determiner of Worth of Triathletes), and even if they did, the election was likely rigged or illegally ran … so i won’t hold office for very long.

Later folks, enjoy the sarcasm, it’s overflowing in this post. It’s some of my finest work.

12

After pondering that for a moment, I started thinking about how we figure out whether or not we are “good” or “bad” triathletes.
Is someone who posts fast race times necessarily a good triathlete? Yes. Are slower athletes worse than fast ones worse triathletes, not necessarily worse people or is there more to it than that? No I don’t think there is more to it, unless you truly meant to ask a slightly different question; I think you did :slight_smile:

This seems like a very simple question. If a 35 year old female does an Olympic tri in 2:20 and another 35 yr. old woman does it in 3:07, then the 1st is a better triathlete. Why are we making triathletes out to be more special than other athletes? A quarterback who has a 75% completion rate and a 4 -1 touchdown/interception ratio is a good quarterback. A QB who throws as many int’s as completions is a bad quarterback. Let’s assume Kobe is guilty(please, please, please, lets not turn this into a Kobe/Katelyn thread- I don’t know either of them and have NO opinion whether or not he did it). If Kobe did it, he’s still a great basketball player, just a shit human being. Whether or not a person is a dedicated father or is nice to puppies has nothing to do with it.

With triathlon, I also tend to add a small experience component to the equation. Also, the speed and experience of the person who is asking the question has something to do with it. If a newbie is asking about a MOP, I’ll say “yes, he/she’s pretty good.” If a FOP asks about someone who is MOP, I’ll say “He’s ok. He needs to work on the swim and run.”

Obviously there’s different criteria for pros and amatuers. If someone asked me if a MLB picher with a 6.70 ERA was good, I’d say he’s horrible, even though he’d still be one of the best pitchers in the world.

For triathlon, I’d probably judge against that person’s age group.

13

Damn, I hadn’t read Triple’s post before posting mine. Most of it seems redundant now.

14

We all categorize, whether we mean to or not. I’m as guilty of it as the next person. But my attitude over the last three or four years has changed. I used to laugh at the guy on the $5K bike with full USPS team kit no matter how fast he rode. Then I just laughed at the fat guy with the $5K bike with full USPS kit who rode at 15 mph. Then I realized that it doesn’t matter what a person wears, what they ride, or even how well they do in races.

When it comes to triathlon, I try very hard not to categorize people on any external factors. Triathletes are a special breed of people, and there are only a few of us in the country. So by getting out and training just enough to finish a sprint race puts a person in special company.

Some people do seem to be very concerned with passing judgments on their fellow athletes using a variety of different methods. I guess my question should have been how do each of us individually determine our worth as a triathletes. I don’t care what other people wear, what they ride, what they drive to the race. I don’t even care where they place. I have too much stuff I need to work on in my life to worry about judging others.

That being said, I like for people to have P3’s w/909’s, 'cause I only get to see pictures of them in magazines. I like to finally be able to see one in person in the transition areas.

I guess the “perfect” triathlete would be the one who balances his training with the rest of his life, spends on equipment judiciously, and maximizes his training time in order to race as fast as possible within these parameters. And even this would be up for discussion (i.e., what would constitute “judicious spending” and “maximizing training time”, etc.?).

So I guess it comes down to this: We should probably just train and race, worry about ourselves and not others. But human nature won’t allow us to do that, will it?

RP

15

“So I guess it comes down to this: We should probably just train and race, worry about ourselves and not others. But human nature won’t allow us to do that, will it?”

I agree, but I think it is still something to strive for. Whether you call it enlightenment, spiritual fulfillment, or just contentedness, learning to be happy with yourself as you are, while still seeking to always do your best, is a worthwhile goal. Trying to tune out the incessant voices in your head(making those judgments and forming opinions), and the petty shallowness of the world around us, what with the commercials, and the stereotypes, and the lowest common denominator TV programming, is all a part of that.

For me, life is all about hope and perseverance.

16

Some people do seem to be very concerned with passing judgments on their fellow athletes using a variety of different methods.

Sometimes I think people just say what’s on their mind, hereas in reali life we are always having to bite our tongue or hold back anything that remotely controversial or strike anyone as remotely offensive.

For example, if I see a 75-year old guy driving a Viper, I might think “what a waste of a good viper”. On the internet, I might even type that. Now, I don’t mean that the guy has no right to buy what he wants, and I don’t mean I don’t like the guy. I"m only stating that “I’m suspect that he drives that baby like she needs to be driven”. The assumption is wrong on many levels, but it can also be just a flippant remark on a quirky situation.

I think the judgement interpretation is the perception of the reader. That is one downfall of the internet. I think folks sometimes get themselves in trouble by making off the cuff remarks, that get read by someone else who doesn’t see it that way, and then a 3-day thread breaks out (sound familiar).

I guess I’m trying to reach the difference between “judging” and “discrimination”. we all make judgements. But, wh choose not to discriminate on those judgements. For example we might think to ourselves that a 400-pound guy doesn’t need a $4K bike, but we certainly wouldn’t discriminate against him and tell him he has no right to buy it.

17

Yes, but what if a 35 year old Triathlete does 2.20 while drafting when not allowed, and another 35 year old Triathlete does 2.25, not drafting. Then in my opinion, the second one is a better Triathlete (close in terms of performance, but much better in terms of love and respect for the sport).

And then the list just goes on, which makes it impossible to judge such a thing.