Note to anyone here who uses their real name on Slowtwitch: just to throw this out here. You might get nabbed by the Master of Ceremonies, if he or she is a slowtwitch person. I’m just guessing that many of you meet each other, and might have an exchange like: “oh, on Slowtwitch you are…?” I’ll bet that happens.
I just did a tri sprint in Arkansas, and the MC quickly said as I came into the finish line I heard, something like: “he’ll have a funny story about this one I bet on the internet (slowtwitch) (I don’t post about triathlon anywhere else) .”
Nothing funny, unless it was having to take a crap, on the way back on the run. This actually improved my 5k time, because what are you going to do about it? You can’t just stop and suffer. You’ve got to haul, and haul it fast, and start hauling. I ran straight to the mens bathroom right through the finishing tape.
Thank god this year is over. I’m going to start over again, take a 2 month break and fire it up again.
There was one fellow, in the swim, who started hauling ass down the lake, running down the side of the lake, feet in the water, shallow part, after the start sound began. He got a good 30 yard head start, and then dove in, there. Is this legal?, in swims right on the banks of a lake? Everybody was cussing at him.
The whole taking a dump thing reminds me of a race I did a loooooong time ago where Scott Molina and Scott Tinley were duking it out up front on the run leg and Molina didn’t pull over to the side to “take care of business”. He just let loose all the while running as fast as he could to win first place. He owned up to it while collecting his first place money, and we could tell somebody had had an “accident” (deliberate, though), because the rest of us were running and swerving to avoid the sea pickles
Tells you how long I’ve been doing these events (off and on) as both Tinley and Molina were in their prime back then
Running in the water on thw swimcourse is ok. As long as you are at whatever the starting line is at the wave start, and then swim to the outside of all of the buoys, you’ve covered the course. I don’t know the layout of your race, but most RDs will set up the course start, finish, and in-between buoys so that something so obvious as running along the edge won’t help. That’s why the first buoy is usually straight out from the start.
It’s pretty common in places where the swim is in a current-prone area or one of those areas with a lot of knee deep (where you can’t really swim it, and can’t really run it either) water. Watch the first wave or two, see where they hit the bad spots, and sometimes it makes sense to do a nice 100 yard warm up jog to the east in order to avoid shallows or hit the current just right out of the start box.
Another old timer like me. I remember those guys racing the Bud Light USTS races when I was too. Though I remember in 1989 doing the Sprint nationals in Aventura, FL. Some 17 year old kid from TX smoked the men’s pro field. Victims included Mike Pigg, and Dave Scott. He wasn’t even mentioned in the program, and and had the most un-pro like bib #45.
I guess triathlons weren’t challenging enough for him so he started riding his bike instead.
Another old timer like me. I remember those guys racing the Bud Light USTS races when I was too. Though I remember in 1989 doing the Sprint nationals in Aventura, FL. Some 17 year old kid from TX smoked the men’s pro field. Victims included Mike Pigg, and Dave Scott. He wasn’t even mentioned in the program, and and had the most un-pro like bib #45.
I guess triathlons weren’t challenging enough for him so he started riding his bike instead.
How many of us would have to sign a petition to get this guy to compete in Kona? 500,000? 1,000,000? There must be some filthy rich triathletes among us. Maybe one of them, or a small group of them, could put up US$5,000,000, $10,000,000, 50,000,000? towards cancer research if he wins his debut.
Another old timer like me. I remember those guys racing the Bud Light USTS races when I was too. Though I remember in 1989 doing the Sprint nationals in Aventura, FL. Some 17 year old kid from TX smoked the men’s pro field. Victims included Mike Pigg, and Dave Scott. He wasn’t even mentioned in the program, and and had the most un-pro like bib #45.
I guess triathlons weren’t challenging enough for him so he started riding his bike instead.
Hey, don’t make me feel so old! I did that race too, first one here after coming down from Toronto, where I’d only done a few races and got hooked before the move. I still dine out on my ‘I raced with Lance’ story all these years later
