I think he did extremely well. He was completely alone riding against a pack of some of the strongest athletes in the world. The tracker was showing a group of at least 20 (didn’t show more) in less than 40" and he wasn’t even losing a minute. Drafting (legal or not) must have been huge and it’s also mentally tough to go all out and see you’re not making up time with all of them packed.
Certainly needs to improve his swimming to be competitive but he chose a 5 star level race to start.
Do you have a photo by any chance? You can actually measure the distance using highway paint stripes as they have a measured length and spacing, but most of the time when fans are complaining about this they don’t realize that they are misjudging the distance based on the view angle. The marshals can provide instruction and warnings like they did to Bogen at 70.3 worlds, so it’s not fair for you to say they simply let the whole group cheat without providing any evidence.
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And more importantly, if he didn’t see the red lights flashing then there wasn’t illegal drafting. Race Ranger is used to take any question out of the zones. Red- drafting, orange- maybe yoyoing or overtaking so get a move on correcting, blue all good. This information isnt just visual, it is also sent live to official’s so they can still give out a penalty without having to be there to witness the offense.
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Exactly…RR knows exactly who is drafting and for how long during the race. Everything is recorded and can be scrutinized
@8.08
“Sal Smith” must be extremely thankful RR switched the competitors real names. But I worry there is a Sal Smith IRL on Strava or IG getting some nasty messages right now as I figure some folks missed the part that the names were changed.
1:01:37 in Valencia 1/2 Marathon today. 7 seconds behind Yee. 1:01:30. 20th and 17th places.
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Thanks for the update, so for official half times I guess we can say he is the 3rd fastest runner in triathlon(half marathon distance) Do we know how his swimming is going?
Holy smokes!
Bonkers fast, especially considering what I imagine he’s able to do on the bike, but did he even race triathlons this year?
Not really. He’s been injured.
Injury preventing from bike training meant lack of motivation to swim as well apparently. Thought it would have been a great occasion to do a big swim block and focus, but he decided instead to do what he loves and that’s running.
He raced geelong earlier in the year. 35th out of water, came in with the women. Had 27th fastest bike and 20th run, ended finishing 19th pro, around 13 mins behind the front of race. I believe it was a rude awakening for him, riding fast after a hard swim hits different. He somehow talked himself into a heap of sponsorships that other Aussie pros struggle to get and a pro license before ever starting a race. If he hasn’t been working hard on his swim he might as well become a runner.
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Just watched his youtube recap of the race - funny to see him right in the group at one point with Yee and then finish right behind him - yet obviously feeling much fresher by the looks of it. Says afterwards that he reckoned he could have gone much faster.
Interesting to see if he sticks with running or continues with Triathlon, looks like he could be very competitive at both!