I had my first experience with the (1)TT-ish/Individual swim start at a super-sprint triathlon on Sunday (small 250 person race). I wasn’t sure how I’d like it, since I was used to the mass choas of the wave style start (I’m a clydesdale, so we REALLY churn up the water). Turns out I loved it. Found my stroke right away with no in-the-water contact. I easily could move around slower swimmers as I passed them by.
I just found out that my next race has switched to the individual start format as well (a bigger race with 600 racers).
A) What do people think of this format?
B) Why all the changes recently (is this a local or national trend)?
C) Do you see bigger races changing to this format as well?
Mark
(1) The individual swim start has all race participants line up by either projected swim time (fastest first) or by race number. The first person crosses the timing mat and the next person starts 3-5 seconds later. Your time doesn’t start (from the chips persepective) until you cross the mat, so each person is time tracked individually. No crowed wave start, but it can take a while to get through all race participants.
Memphis in May is Time Trial start and I beleive it always has been. It can really create an almost river like current and if you start back in the pack you can really turn in some fast times.
I prefer mass starts or wave starts for AG categories. TT swim starts turns the entire race into a TT - you have no idea where others in your AG are throughout the bike/run.
One point that a lot of people seem to get wrong is that a TT start takes more time to get everyone going, but that’s not necessarily true. I think you can get more people started with less congestion using a TT start.
For example, at Memphis in May one racer starts every 3 seconds, so that’s 20/min. Which is 100 every 5 mins. I think a wave start that sent 100 people off every 5 minutes would feel much more crowded.
Having said all that, When I was less experienced I like the TT start because there was much less thrashing and contact. Once I became a better racer I really like the idea of hanging with a group and knowing where I was in relation to others in my age group. I can see why some races that use the the TT start have the elites do a mass start.