On another thread there was discussion about how to make triathlon spectator friendly. In the past XC skiing was a long drawn out affair with TT starts and done in a loop through the woods,which really was not that well packaged for spectators unless you are an athlete yourself and could relate to the TT start…
Now we have sprint racing. Check out coverage from the World Championships in Olso
Stadium course, lined with fans
Multiple rounds, each lasting barely 3 minutes
Lots of tactics, and action
Could we do it with tris? Set up a grandstand across from which you have a finish line, transition and water…400m swim 1000m run - 4000m bike, with multiple loops using a 1K course (use same course for bike and run). End with a bike sprint finish on each round (put the bike last and it would make all three sports meaningful)
Each round should take around 15 minutes.
Run an age group olympic tri in the morning and start the pro field at something like 11 am…3 rounds with 10 athletes per wave, top half advance.
It’s interesting because XC skiing is a way older sport than triathlon, yet XC skiing has been willing to try a ton of different formats. Triathlon appears stuck in rut and is having difficulty packaging the sport for spectators.
At least in Australia they’ve tried stuff like this in the past. Maybe some of the guys can comment. It would be a blast to watch vs watching paint dry in an Ironman or watching an ITU race boil down to the usual 5 suspects basically running a 1500m running race after 1:40 of attrition.
Triathlon does not need to always have the same old same old current ITU format in the Olympics…XC skiing has introduced a variety of formats over the past 5 Olympics and is not stuck in the past.
Indeed. Nordic skiing has been completely changed and revolutionized at the elite level over the last 15 - 20 years, first with the advent of skating, then with the introduction of the “sprint” races over much shorter distances of about 1500m.
On another thread there was discussion about how to make triathlon spectator friendly. In the past XC skiing was a long drawn out affair with TT starts and done in a loop through the woods,which really was not that well packaged for spectators unless you are an athlete yourself and could relate to the TT start…
Now we have sprint racing. Check out coverage from the World Championships in Olso
Stadium course, lined with fans
Multiple rounds, each lasting barely 3 minutes
Lots of tactics, and action
Could we do it with tris? Set up a grandstand across from which you have a finish line, transition and water…400m swim 4K 1000m run - 4000m bike, with multiple loops using a 1K course (use same course for bike and run). End with a bike sprint finish on each round (put the bike last and it would make all three sports meaningful)
Each round should take around 15 minutes.
Run an age group olympic tri in the morning and start the pro field at something like 11 am…3 rounds with 10 athletes per wave, top half advance.
It’s interesting because XC skiing is a way older sport than triathlon, yet XC skiing has been willing to try a ton of different formats. Triathlon appears stuck in rut and is having difficulty packaging the sport for spectators.
At least in Australia they’ve tried stuff like this in the past. Maybe some of the guys can comment. It would be a blast to watch vs watching paint dry in an Ironman or watching an ITU race boil down to the usual 5 suspects basically running a 1500m running race after 1:40 of attrition.
Triathlon does not need to always have the same old same old current ITU format in the Olympics…XC skiing has introduced a variety of formats over the past 5 Olympics and is not stuck in the past.
I’m all for super short draft legal events. I think a >1/2 sprint (300m swim, 7.5k bike, 1.5k run) would be great. That’s totally doable in 20 minutes for the faster guys, and you could have a tiny course for something like this. Most fun tri I ever did was an enduro format where it was two half sprints, one after the other.
It’s nice to not need a few days to recover before working out hard.
The sprint and relay formats for xc skiing are fantastic. It would be interesting to see triathlon’s try to do something like that. Wasn’t there talk of having triathlon mixed-relay teams?? I’d be all for it.
Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to have a weekly tri? you can’t do an ironman every week, let alone an olympic distance race. Having ~30 minute sprint events would be really easy in terms of logistics (ie small loop course, very few people to manage it) and dividing up different ability levels to get several competitive fields. Put a preem for sprint for the last bike lap into T2 (with enough extra distance for a safe dismount).
As it is triathlon is a participation ‘sport’ that basically requires as much equipment as you can afford. Shorter draft legal events require far less equipment and make it more accessible to all the fast xc runners and swimmers who can’t buy a fancy bike or train much for biking, but could easily do a sprint.
Additionally, triathlons nowadays are basically the same apart from ITU and Xterra. We don’t have F1 series or enduro tris anymore, so there is really very little variety apart from distance and bike course for the age groupers. Why can’t we have some more interesting stuff that requires tactics and balls out speed?
Frankly I’m surprised USAT doesn’t support short draft legal stuff on the local level as a way to recruit fast swimmers and runners.
At least in Australia they’ve tried stuff like this in the past. Maybe some of the guys can comment.
I can comment as an Australian, not as a competitor.
The Formula 1 series was enormously popular for a number of seasons, and put food on the table for a few dozen up and coming triathletes, some of whom went onto greater things. With it’s “made for TV” formats, it really was a mongrel sport inspired by triathlon, more than triathlon itself - not that there was anything wrong with that. There was triathlon on TV each week, races you could watch live at your local beach a few times a year, all good. (And it was almost cool to be a triathlete.)
In fact the development of the format owed more to the sport of surf ironman (combinations of surf swim, board paddle, surf ski and beach run of various distances) which had been successfully televised for years when F1 triathlon was developed. There were even a few races put together for the surf ironmen and the triathletes to compete head to head. (To this day, most Australians think “Ironman” is the event that surf lifesavers do to keep fit - it’s more than a century old, and has been called “ironman” since about the 1930s - suck on that, WTC).
It died off for lack of sponsorship, but could always come back. Surf ironman has also had a patchy history as a commercial/ pro sport, but keeps hanging in there. It’s driven by whether TV sufficiently compelling to the average slob (not fan) can be made more cheaply than the cricket/football/tennis/netball/motor racing etc etc that is already available. The high-octane, fast racing style certainly helps with that.
Dev,
I could not care less if tri reaches mass viewing popularity. Frankly, I HATE multiple loop courses. Hate them. Did I mention I hate them. If they are done out of road closure constraints, then so be it, but when they are done for “spectating purposes” then I lose my mind. I like nice, open swims, with simple bike courses without multiple loops. I avoided duathlon nationals in Richmond for just this reason after flying to Mason for three straight years. I just don’t like the idea of changing courses for spectators. I don’t understand this drive some folks have to make it interesting to viewers. It’s never going to be football or basketball that were practically made for TV, despite being invented a hundred years ago.
I’m not against different formats as long as it is intended to benefit the athlete.
Chad
Dev
I really miss being in Norway these days. On TV, either Swedish, Norwegian or Eurosport you will have hours after hours with xc-skiing. It is not true you need to change everything to make it popular, just take a look at today’s competition 15k. http://www.youtube.com/user/VmHolmenkollen2011#p/u/9/MOyh07PlH84
The weather was awful but people showed up no matter what. Several hundred people are camping in the woods close to the trail to watch the skiers, it is a tradition. The video is from last year when it was just a regular race, not a championship http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sAdgnCZ_iU
That stadium in Oslo was just awesome…so who is the Alpha males of XC skiing…Hellner or Northug…I just wish that Alex Harvey’s crazy breakaway would have stuck in the pursuit yesterday. Seriously, Nordic skiing has figured out how to package up their sport for spectating while the rest of us can keep being “participants”. Nice job by the Canadians Harvey and Kershaw, even though they got tangled up in the sprint semis.
Speaking of which, the fact that the sprint racing is part of world cups has trickled right down to the recreational level. Our club hosted a sprint race for all age groups from 10 up to Masters. I got to race four rounds of 1.1K sprinting on a twisty, turning track. Most fun and pain I had in years…quite the contrast from shuffling along at 10 min mile pace on the QueenK!
All kidding aside, I might at least try to put together a training sprint race on weeknight. something like 400m swim, 1K run from the water to bikes, and then a 4K course (2k out, 2 K back). We could do three rounds and just take the cumulative time for all three.
For those who have not clicked on this youtube video in my first post, please go. It is absolutely terrific. Pro triathlon racing for some events could look like this!.
Wow…that’s really an all star triathlon hall of fame lineup …this race is just a few months before Macca wins the ITU World’s …and everyone wearing a speedo…very cool seeing Spencer Smith leading out the run with Macca and Welchie tucked into the draft!
I hope some of you guys clicked on the XC ski link specifically 1:30 into the video…the the Vo2max power these guys have must be insane …I’d love to see a powermeter that aggregates power from the two ski boots and two poles and integrates into a single figure…
the first thought that was going through my head watching that ski video was, “my god . . . so much pain.”
as for the ITGP racing, it’s just so much fun. i’d love to see more of that - can you imagine whitfield, brownlee and gomez on a 2k run?!? at the very least i’d love it if the ITU would shuffle the formats a bit, sometimes. . .
Seriously…400m swim-1000m run-4000m bike…T1 is at the edge of the water, put on shoes, sprint 1K all out to the bikes…then 4x1000m ending in a sprint finish. I’m going to see if I can organize a few training races over this distance…heck, you could even do it at a local outdoor pool, putting 6 guys head to head.
Also Macca looks like he has way less bulk in 1997 than he does now…which of course is a natural progression over 14 years or do. …wow, that was really cool how Brad Bevan uses the surf to ride in before Mile Stewart who got trapped between giant waves!!!
