I don’t think in every instance a swimming death is “their own fault”, but in some instances it is. There will always be a certain number of swimming deaths in a risky event such as a triathlon in open water with 1000-2000 participants. Every loss of life is sad, but at a certain point personal responsibility needs to factor into the equation.
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Personal responsibility isn’t factoring into the solution; it’s currently the de-facto solution w/ safety guidelines for the race organizer to help during a race. Which is why if your an race organization at some point you may have to protect yourself and the people who do your races if that personal responsilbilty continues to put yourself in a bad situation.
Side note but this story was on homepage of USAToday, 3rd-from-top in list of headlines. Story is getting major mainstream attention.
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I think that one of the better solutions that the race organizations could do is to ease their withdrawl policy. That would not negatively affect all of the other participants to spare 1 in 100,000 or whatever the fatality rate is for triathlons. However, in the end, it is on the individual to make the call to withdraw…
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Deferral with a Doctors note would be a nice thing.
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It may not be far fetched, but a stipulation that people wanting to ‘do’ a triathlon would be required to have (and pay for) such a medical check first would significantly reduce participation (and IRONMAN revenue).
Such additional requirement would have an effect like the mandatory helmet law in Australia: people would be deterred from activity.
Let’s be rational: far more athletes are dying during the course of running a marathon. Should they all have a medical before being allowed to enter?
ALARP
I know you have to take shots at any post I say on this site, but suggesting medical screening is as rational as any other suggestion. But I get it, you love being cute with replies to me.
Waaaaay back in the day ,when thrre were only 7 Ironman’s on earth we did have to get a doctor to sign off on us as part of the race entry.
IMC 1991 for sure and I think 1993 as well,after that it wasn’t required. I just got a local Tri-geek doctor in Cairns to do mine.
We needed doctors certificates and blood tests for the International Ultra Tri Series up until the mid- 2000’s
The swim run races where your shoes stay on require them between your legs. Smaller fields, but it’s a proof of concept.
I agree: an entirely ‘rational’ suggestion. How about “let’s try and match mitigation measures to the risk to achieve ALARP”? Would that be better (but “rational” is way less words)? Sorry my usage triggered para-you. And what do you think about my other observations?
As for “taking shots at any post [you] say on this site” given your stream of consciousness plethora of shared opinions I try to be self disciplined when I quote you and comment. Any rational person could not judge my comment a “shot”.
Is this factually correct (AKA ‘true’)?
Excellent and as previously noted above from NT some countries require some* level of medical screening to participate. So it’s certainly worth discussing and evaluating as any other solution has been. I certainly don’t think 3k tow bouys is a solution; some type of fixed pb or short would be a better solution imo.
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Solution for what exactly?
People dying in our sport. If you think it’s all on person accountability cool. Some others see these issues as likely only rising in our sport.
Are swim deaths in triathlon increasing as a percentage of participant levels…?
None of those things you mentioned would lessen people dying in our sport, but if you think so that’s cool too..
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I have no clue all I know this “influencer’s” death has been covered by media that I’ve never seen covering the dad of 3 or 78 year old who died. So it it’s nothing to see here, 100% personal responsibility- cool.
So, you can claim things that you haven’t the foggiest idea if they are indeed factual…cool….
But by your logic of it being personal responsibility the percentages will never matter cus it’s your fault you died.
Nice use of deflection there when you try to make unsubstantiated claims…
Why does their have to be fault? Certainly in hindsight there are reasons, but not sure why you have to blame someone for what are usually accidents..
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