What is considered the most important portion of a triathlon?
Each stage is important but most might agree that tris seem to be won on the run. That’s the reason why I never get on the podium - my running sucks. The only time I’ve ever seen gold was as part of a team where I got to ride the bike and had a good runner with us.
If you can’t run, you can’t win.
Good to know, running seems to be my specialty at this point. How important is the swimming portion?
I would say the run. I do know this much, you can’t win a race on the swim, but you can definitely lose the race on the swim.
Mark
Well, my take is a bit different. Yes, the races can and are won on the run. BUT, you must be a good cyclist to stay in contention (non-drafting) AND to feel good enough to have a good run. SAME TOO, you must be able to swim good enough to put yourself in contention for the aforementioned bike. So, the most important is to put the three together in a way that you are in position to close with a successful run.
David is spot on. If you think about triathlon as three sports you just won’t hit your potential. Each leg builds on the last. Nutrition and pacing run through them all.
matt
To some degree, it depends on the distance of the race. For example, in an Oly. distance the swim is very important while in a half IM, the swim is not as important. Overall I would say the bike is the most important leg. You spend the most time on the bike and the bike leg has a big effect on how you will run. You can be a better runner than someone, but that person often will outrun you if they are a stronger biker or biked smarter than you did. I had this discussion w/ some friends once and we checked a bunch of results and found that the winner had the best bike split slightly more often than the best run or swim split. There is just more time to be gained or lost while on the bike.
In IM distance the run becomes more important, but as everyone knows, your marathon is **greatly **affected by how smartly you biked, so I might still say it is the most important leg. The stronger I get on the bike, the more my run splits go down.
I think the run often seems like the most important leg because it’s the last leg.
Good point about the bike being the longest, however, coming from a woman age-grouper who can swim well I would say the run…for the simple reason that the training you do on your runs makes the other legs of the race that much better cadio wise. I can swim well, bike ok, but I suck as a runner. All my friends who run well, race well.
that’s my two cents,
Trisha
At the risk of sounding a bit obtuse, I’d say that the most important event TO YOU is your WEAKEST event. Why? Since you are on this site, I’m making the assumption that you are a competitor, not a spectator. So I believe importance is relative to you. Your weakest event is where you need to focus your training and where you can make the most improvement to your race times. If, as you claim, your run is strong, then is it likely to make a difference in your race? No. It is simply the basis for your race time, I.E. something you can more or less count on. But if your bike is weak, then it is the most important event to you. It is the most important event to train for, and it is the most important to focuse and follow a good race plan for. If your bike and run are solid MOP but your swim leaves you BOP and gasping for air, then it is the most important to you. It is where you can make the strongest gains in importance. If you can not only cut the time, but come out of the water in better shape, the rest of your race is bound to be stronger.
In reality, all three events play off of each other as well as your hydration, nutrition, and preparation. And the longer the race, the more those last three count.
You've asked a bit of a loaded question. Hope I haven't strayed to far from the topic here. One could attack that question from many angles. Take one athlete, for instance. . .say. . .Steve Larsen. What do you suppose he would say is his most important event? The bike? Maybe. Its certainly the bedrock of his success. Maybe not. Perhaps he bikes too strongly and sets himself up for a poor run. Is it then important? Yes and no. Yes, because its important for him to ride a smart race. No, because his ability to run through pain then becomes the most important part of his race. Maybe his swim is the most important to him since a poor swim (thats relative to the other elites. I wish I could swim his speed!) wastes energy and places him at a time disadvantage right from the start, making him bike even harder since that's where he makes up his time. Maybe his running is his most important event, since he seems to always come out of T2 with the lead and tries to hang on through the run. A good run is certainly important if you want to stay ahead of a charging Deboom, Reid or LVL.
Once again my verbosity overfloweth. . .
Celebrating at the finish ;-).
Interesting question.
I belive it is the bike. The importance of the bike and decreased importance of the swim / run are accelerated as the distance goes up. 1/2 IM and beyond. A proper / efficent / fast bike is 1) a faster bike but also 2) make for a relaxed, efficent run. I believe the bike makes the run if all is done well. IF one does a Oly or Sprint then I believe there is proportinally a more even importance with the swim / bike /run. If you are competing for 1-5 in your Age Group in Oly then if one is too far out of wack then you are screwed. However in IM and 1/2 IM distances I have seen people smoke with “slower” 1:10 swims and pretty slow runs. The longer stuff is a race of attrition. The bike sets all that up. I would be interested to see what other think.
Where? Wherever it is, I’d like to train there more often. Can you give directions?
The answer to this question will vary depending on the length of the event in question. I think it is possible to swim yourself to the front in shorter distances and hold on for the win, but you still have to be a pretty good biker and runner to do this. Generally speaking, the winner of the race will be the one who can run the best off the bike. This is very different from simply being a good runner. There are lots of fast runners out there who can’t run off the bike, and there also lots of slower runners who are strong and steady enough to post a good split off the bike. The bike will set up the run, but you don’t necessarily have to be lightning fast on the bike. You need to be fast, steady and efficient so as to be able to run well.
Someone mentioned Larsen – take him for example. I think we would all agree that he’s a terrific rider, but against the best in the sport at the Iron distance, his bike prowess has not translated into wins. At Kona a couple of years ago, he was in great position after the bike but faded to tenth overall on the run. Tenth at Kona (or in any race for that matter) isn’t bad at all, but his skill on the bike didn’t translate into a win. Could he have saved a bit on the bike and had a better run? Probably, but I doubt he would have won no matter what he did. DeBoom, Brown, etc., are incredibly efficient runners off the bike, and they know just how hard to push it on the bike in order to have a strong run.
You need to be good in all three, and you must look at a triathlon as one event with three activities – not three events strung together. Each activity does build upon the one that follows it, and it takes talent at all three to be successful. However, generally speaking, the advantage goes to the competitor who can run the fastest off the bike.
Fleck has some interesting thoughts on this subject that he’s shared before. I’m sure he can add quite a bit to this discussion if he decides to chime in.
RP
There is no most important part. If you want to win you have to be solid at all three parts. Many seem to think that the run is the most important but you can be a very fast runner and it won’t make much difference if you’re spotting someone a monster lead. People say that Tim Deboom won ironman on his running ability and I would argue that he won it on his ironman ability. You don’t run like he does unless you are a very strong biker. Also, he has to be a super biker and swimmer to stay close enough to come through on the run. Last weekend I raced in Kingston at a long course race that was 2k-57k-15k and had the faster run split in the race by over a minute and finished 4th overall. However, since I “gave” away 4 minutes on the swim and 5 minutes on the bike to the overall winner, my speedy run didn’t threaten his position too much.
As others have mentioned, a lot depends on the distances of each leg. Next weekend, I’m racing a sprint that is 750m, 33k, 7km and the bikers have a decided advantage on that course, but again, you have to do all 3 well if you want to win.
I’m waiting for the fedex guy to arrive with some new bike gear, so I’ll add my 2 cents.
I’m in my first year and my finishes are all solidly mid-pack. In my race results, my swim and my run splits are typically in the top 20-30% of my AG, but my bike split is slower than half of the racers in my AG. If I had a sig for my posts, it would be “You can pass me on the bike but I can catch you on the run.”
In the race, I believe that your performance on the bike has the greatest impact on your overall performance. However, and the longer the race, the more important the run becomes. Some reasons:
1)You spend more time on the bike, so the same percentage improvement in speed has a greater impact on your results. For example, in a 1/2 Ironman, I’ll typically ride at 18 mph average speed, and run at an average of 7:20-7:30 mile pace. That means my bike split is 3:06, and my run split is around 1:38. If I improve my run pace by 15 seconds per mile, I can reduce my run split by 3 minutes. If I improve my bike speed by 1 mph, I can reduce my bike time by 10 minutes. I think the training effort involved for me to achieve those improvements will be about the same, although that may be because I’m lower on the bike curve than I am on the run curve.
2)Your strength on the bike dramatically affects your performance on the run, but strength or weakness on the swim doesn’t impact your bike or run split very much. When I get out of the water, I’m usually huffing and puffing and maybe a little dizzy from the effort. Five minutes into the bike, I’m at my normal exertion level for cycling, and many of the swimmers that I passed are now passing me on their bikes, curse them.
3)In a long race, there’s a hidden “nutrition” segment that doesn’t show up directly on your splits. That’s the race to get enough calories and water and electrolytes into your system before the run so you can make it through the run without bonking. Many of us have a tough time absorbing calories and water on the run, so if you do poorly on the nutrition on the bike you’re screwed. You’ll probably still have a good bike split, but your run time (and experience) will be hell. For me, I’m concentrating so hard on turning the cranks just to get a halfway decent bike split that I often forget about nutrition and hydration – which leaves me in poor shape on the run. I have to set the timer on my watch to go off every 15 minutes on the bike so I remember to do something – swig water or squeeze a gel. So if you’re a strong cyclist who can easily spend some effort on nutrition & hydration, the odds are good that you get off the bike not only with stronger legs, but also with higher glycogen stores and more water in your system, which will dramatically affect your run split.
4)The longer the run, the more opportunity a slower cyclist/faster runner has to catch up. This is true for me, as I catch many (well, some) of the speedy cyclists who passed me on the bike course. It was true in the Lifetime fitness Tri, where Craig Walton was the male leader on the swim and the bike, but was caught on the run by Whitfield and Bennet. My impression is that this also happens to Hellriegel often – he’s hell on wheels, but the faster runners catch him many times anyway. The theory about opening up a wide gap on the swim and bike to make up for a slower run seems not to work as often as one might think.
Lee
I’m still very much a Tri newbie and have been doing short sprint type events (1k/16k/5k type events) and the run is where it’s at. I’m very strong on the bike, pretty strong on the swim, but still weak on the run and I’m in the bottom half of the standings because of it. The bike part of it just isn’t long enough to make up any meaningful time, taking 2-3 minutes out of the bike side does nothing when those guys are 2-3 minutes a mile faster than me. This is also why I started running more during training. But my bike workouts have become more intense for speedwork and intervals as I don’t want to lose my strength. I will never be as strong of a runner as the top guys are, but I want to minimize my losses while I maximize my gains on the bike.
But no matter the distance I’d go so far as to say no one part is more important than the other, the race can be lost in any of the 3 pieces of the race. Granted I don’t think you can “win” the race on the swim portion, but I bet you can certainly lose it no matter the distance.
Andrew
This is actually pretty simple: as others have pointed out, do the math as regards the elapsed time in each segment. A 10% improvement in your swimming efficiency yields an X minute time gain, etc. So the answer is clearly the bike leg.
But if you mean “important” as in “important to focus on”, there’s another, less obvious reason that the bike leg comes to the fore. At least for the neophyte, it’s far, far easier to improve your bike split proportionally than your run split.
Technique, equipment, and (above all) position can make a massive difference in your average speed – even holding fitness and power output constant. Such simple things as learning proper cornering and braking technique, how to descend quickly and safely, and proper gearing and cadence have a huge, huge effect.
Can’t tell you how many otherwise excellent athletes have no clue as to how to ride a bike with maximum course-covering efficiency! If they were riding stationary bikes, they’d be world class performers. But on an actual course their technical deficiencies have a cumulative effect and kill 'em timewise.
Proper position alone is literally worth minutes*. *Why else would experienced pro cyclists with high 6 figure paychecks (even a 5-time TdF winner like Lance) spend hours in the wind tunnel perfecting it?
Yes I know there’s plenty of technique involved in running – and arguably even more in swimming. But the immediate time payback from nailing your bike split beats all of these.
PS: would also question the “work hardest on your weakest event” approach – at least as a hard and fast rule. There’s a lot to be said for concentrating on maximizing your natural strengths instead, and focusing more on cutting your losses in your weaker events.
Ajay, you are proof of my point. The athlete’s weakest event is the one that is most important. In your case, your run makes or breaks your race. Working on your run becomes the most important thing you can do to improve your performance.
Actually, he’s proof of mine 
A basic rule of sports – not to mention life itself – is to work on maximizing your strengths, and cutting your losses in your weaker areas. The company I work for (the Gallup Poll) has tons of empirical data, literally tens of thousands of employee interviews, that support this thesis (see the book First, Discover Your Strengths)
Whats’ that old joke? Something like “Never try to teach a pig to sing… it wastes your time, and annoys the pig!”
In all seriousness, as a general rule, the data show that the happiest – and most successful – people are those who concentrate on their strengths and put the bulk of their effort and focus where it yields the biggest return. So maybe work on the run a bit to cut your losses there, but don’t do so at the expense of further gains from any natural edge you possess on the bike.
I’d say the bike, the bike, the bike. Though I agree with working on your weaknesses…but most people recommend putting in twice as much bike as run and twice as much run as swim if you’re relatively competent at each. I think bike strength takes ton of time/miles - run less and swimming even less - esp. since you are fresh on the swim and how you feel after the bike is super important to your run. Take the following examples:
Great swimmer - add a little bike and run - won’t do well (I don’t know of any examples). Although many former swimmers have become great triathletes but they’ve trained a ton for the bike and run.
Biker - Larsen - with minimal run and swim training can compete with almost anyone - pretty darn close!
Kenyans - take strong runner - add swimming and biking - a few have tried this and not done super well - never can make up their swim/bike deficit with a strong run.
The bike is the longest leg - has a HUGE impact on your run. Many “poor runners” really are just not pacing well - you need to compare your stand-alone running times with tri split run times and see if you are pacing prooperly.
I think that for just about anybody - increasing biking pays the biggest dividends.