Just wanted to get some opinions from some people who are probably more trisavvy than I am. I did a sprint tri at Newport Beach, CA today and there were a number of things that perplexed me.
First, my wave (Men 25-29 & the Relays) was started last with the group in front of us being the Athenas and older women and the group in front of them being the older men. Now I have no misperception that I am some super-athlete or anything and I know some of the people in those groups could very well have beat me, however on average our group was much faster than the two groups started just in front of us. This made for quite a meley (sp?) in the water as our phase tried to make our way through the high number of slower people in the groups directly in front of us. I know this was not enjoyable for me, and it certainly must have diminished the experience for those who were run over!
Second, the people on the bike were all over the place! For safety reasons, I took the biking rules that I read on this website seriously. Stay on the right unless passing. Needless to say, as I was passing a certain gentleman who was continuing to drift farther and farther towards the left (forcing me into the concrete gutter next to the curb) I called out “passing on your left.” He immediately looked to his left, directly at me, and rode directly where he was looking. He crashed his front tire directly into my leg and took himself out… luckily I did not fall.
Anyways, the real questions are why would a race be set up with seemingly faster groups directly behind seemingly much slower groups? It seems to make it more unpleasant for both. And why can’t a sign or something be put up reminding people to stay left except when passing? There - It is off my chest now and I can keep smilin’ until the next race
I was there, same age group as you. Horrible swim. Once we hit the slow moving mass of orange swim caps, it got ugly. I couldn’t count how many people I swam “over”. I know I freaked out a couple ladies as I attempted to make my way past them. VERY stupid decision on the race directors part starting the 25-29 age group last. Not to mention the muddy mess getting out of the water… a simple wooden ramp would’ve been the solution.
The bike portion was another mess. I was that guy attempting to politely remind people to ride on the right… which can get difficult if you’re moving at twice the speed they are… scares the shit outta me we I have to zig-zag at high speeds to avoid eating someones rear end.
They’ll NEVER get my money again… $90, ridiculous price for such a low caliber race. Did I mention they also raped us on parking.
AND WHY AREN’T THE SPILT TIMES UP YET??? I expect at least that for my $90, not some stinking T-shirt I’ll never wear.
i wasn’t at the race, so i can’t comment on the execution of it. but there is a theoretical justification for starting faster waves behind slower ones, and it’s traffic patterns. not this past year, but last year, ralph’s half-im got a bad review from people for the same sort of thing. there was a need to get the people to a certain point on the course in a certain period of time. but when you do that you bunch up the field.
that’s the give and take of it. sometimes, from an RD’s point of view, you have no good option, depending on what the local law enforcement demands.
there are a lot of things you can blame an RD for, but people failing to ride on the right is not one of them. again i say the same thing, have announcers, or officials, give the 30-second pre-race rules talk to each wave just before they head into the water.
I spoke to the director of our largest local race about this same situation. She basically told me that it was a decision based on trying to minimize how long the roads would be closed. If all the slowest waves started last, roads would be closed longer, more cost to pay off-duty police, more locals/tourists mad because they had to wait for riders to go by. So basically, it is a trade-off. If we get the general populace too mad about closing roads, eventually race directors will not be able to get permits to hold races. This has already happened here, where a race had to be held a month later because the bridge authority got too many complaints from tourists and wouldn’t issue a permit until after Labor Day.
Well, I still question the wisdom of creating so much “bunching” of the racers to save 3-9 minutes by starting some of the potentially slower groups 1-3 phases later. And as for the comment about newer racers, I am a newer racer, this was my second tri and that has very little to do with knowing and following the rules that are set for that event. The basics rules are not rocket science ya know!
Are there any options for smaller (fewer people) sprint or olympics tris anywhere near southern cal?
I must be missing something obvious - if the traffic flow problem is the reason for the odd order of a wave start then why not have a mass start. At least then quite a few would self-seed themselves anyway (I know I would) and the chaos would sort itself out earlier. Is this not done because of the physical limitations of the swim start area?
I wasn’t at this race, but I would like to offer another way to look at things. If you look at results, the younger age groups are not as a group all that much faster than the older age groups. As an old timer, I can tell you that I pass plenty of people half my age from earlier waves, and I am just about average in my age group on a good day.
On the other hand I am tired of always being in one of the last waves. Why can’t my group have a turn somewhere near the front on occasion? No, we go to the end of the pack, and we don’t complain about it. Well, we don’t complain enough anyway.
At least you will probably be in an early wave in your next event. That won’t happen for me. One reason I think I like IM events so much is the mass start. At least when you pass someone, you have passed someone. For me, when I pass someone on the bike it is a stragler from an earlier wave. When someone passes me, it is my losing yet another position on my age group. I could whine about this, but it occurs to me that perhaps I would more profitably concentrate on developing a better bike split.
Think about taking this in good humor and as a harbinger of what to look forward to when you are an old man like me.
Try being a Master’s WOMAN. Whether I race in the Athena category or in my AG, we are ALWAYS last.
Race yesterday: I had a crap swim and a great bike, so I was passing lots of folks on the bike. The RD had signs up for runners to stay to the right as the first 2.5 miles of the bike had both runners and cyclists. No problem, except for the fact that many cyclists took the “runners stay right” to mean that cyclists should ride as far LEFT as possible. I spent A LOT of time calling out “coming up on your left” and then “you need to stay as far right as possible, there are people coming up on you” as I passed them.
The other thing I almost flipped over was mother and son (who were racing) BOTH STOPPED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ROAD on the one short, but quite steep hill, pretty much effectively blocking 90% of the lane. This was an open course, with the other lane blind to oncoming cars over the hill. I told them “DON’T MOVE” as I rode past them and another guy told them the same. We also told them they really needed to get over to the far right to walk their bikes up the hill.
I’m beginning to think that on the course education (done nicely as you go by) is the best, as people don’t read what is sent out pre-race.
Art, I agree with you. I am a late starter being in the way older than you group. Every once in a while I love to start earlier to be on the run in the cooler portion of the day. I also swim over some 25-29 agers when I start in the back. I also see this age group on the bike on out an back courses and they also include some of the packs and flagrant rule breakers of the “older” people. You also don’t see many rants from the females, who not only usually start in the back, but also have some of the faster overall swims in every triathlon I have entered or seen the results.
i did the boulder peak tri last year, and they did the same thing. my wave, 25-29, went off last–actually second to last, the elites went off something like 40 minutes behind us. there weren’t too many problems. i actually enjoyed it since i passed quite a few people on each leg. made me feel much faster than i actually was. there weren’t any safety concerns nor real bunching problems that i noticed–and there were a couple of potential bottlenecks for certain…
The swim is notorious for the filth you have to wade through entering and exiting the water. It was disgusting.
The merging of bikers and runners on the 2/3 mile stretch of Back Bay was dangerous.The bikers needed to stay to the left here because they were about to filter left to T2 whereas the runners needed to stay to the right in order to filter right to the finishing shute.
As the road meandered in, out and around the bluffs however, the shagged out runners took the shortest route home, cutting the corners. I walked back along the course and saw many near misses.
There was only one marshall on that stretch shouting “Bikers to the left, runners to the right”. They needed at least 4 more.
$90 is a ripoff and they still haven’t posted the results. But why should they care? They can gross $50,000 + every year. We’ll pay it !
<I wasn’t at this race, but I would like to offer another way to look at things. If you look at results, the younger age groups are not as a group all that much faster than the older age groups. As an old timer, I can tell you that I pass plenty of people half my age from earlier waves, and I am just about average in my age group on a good day.
On the other hand I am tired of always being in one of the last waves. Why can’t my group have a turn somewhere near the front on occasion? No, we go to the end of the pack, and we don’t complain about it. Well, we don’t complain enough anyway. >
This is why I like the idea of either mass starts or waves based on swim times. There must be a reason the latter is not practiced more. Is it logistically more complicated? The races I do up here that use swim time based waves are limited to 300 entrants tops.
I did the race yesterday. I was lucky enough to be in the 2nd wave, so I did not have to deal with to much traffic on the bike course. However, I and several others almost got hit by bikes during the final miles of the run. The swim was quite disgusting and the race is overpriced for what you get But, I will probably be a knuckle head and sign up again next year. I just don’t learn.
I still feel dirty from the swim. I went in the first wave, it was all I could do not to puke from the smell to the first buoy. I can’t imagine how mucked up that got after a couple of waves went through. I can’t believe they didn’t have some buckets or hoses on the lead in to T1. Someone said they were going to have them, but I never saw them.
As far as the race price, if you google back to last year on the r.s.t. newsgroup you’ll see a lot of rants about Pacific Sports, they also put on LA, Long Beach and Catalina. I think with PS, if you want to do the race and have the money, then just go without having high expectations.
Reply to: Are there any options for smaller (fewer people) sprint or olympics tris anywhere near southern cal?
I’m doing the Camp Pendleton International Triathlon for the first time this year. It’s limited to 800 entrants. www.camppendletonraces.com.
I return year after year to San Dimas for the www.trievents.com races. They don’t have all the bells and whistles, but they’re reasonably priced and not overcrowded.
I second the LA Tri Series at San Dimas. Not too many people and a very nice venue. $70 for a USAT member and a decent start time - 8:00. The next time I do the Newport Beach Tri I’m going to check to see if the tide is in. Getting out of the water was unbelievable and if I don’t come down with some kind of intestinal disaster I’ll be really surprised.
I did the race yesterday. It was my first ever, so I don’t have anything to compare it to… That said, I think there is quite a bit of whining going on. These are triathlons, right? They aren’t supposed to be a trip through the pre-school playground with nanny holding your hand; at least that’s how I understand it. Unless you are complaining about racers not following common sense rules of the road, you just sound like you are complaining.
I was in the last wave, I swam through all those orange caps that were backstroking and breastroking, I got muddy, I had to call out “on your left!” the whole ride; and I had a great time. I’ll definitely be back next year.
No one is saying that it was supposed to be easy. It’s safety that we are concerned about. And, yes, many “racers” do not follow common sense rules of the road. In fact, they don’t know there are any rules of the road. Wait till you’re motoring past someone riding in the middle of the road and they decide to swerve right in front of you because they didn’t think anyone could be going faster than they were. It’s happened to all of us. If you wipe out clipped into your bike, just wearing a bathing suit you’re going to be really pissed. There are rules, everyone should know them. Try doing a few other races and then compare them to this one. I too will be back next year.
USAT card holders were assigned into a category based on their age group placings or # of races completed? Nothing as robust as the USCF system, just a simple “beginner and veteran” delineation. Or, like the USCF, what if all single-day license holders were considered “beginners” (might as well get something for being a USAT card holder, right?)?
The beginners in all age groups are relegated to the last waves.
Waves for both beginner and advanced are grouped according to age and size of field in each division (for example, 30-34 and 35-39 may start in the same wave). If a race director uses his or her head, there shouldn’t be any more waves than already exist.
"That said, I think there is quite a bit of whining going on. These are triathlons, right? They aren’t supposed to be a trip through the pre-school playground "
Some of it might be winning, however when you do enough tris and see the difference you tend to expect to get something for what you pay for. If these events were free I’d agree with you, but as costs continue to go up so do expectations. I had to shell out over $1100 in entry fees this year and I also have to look at room and board, travel, and misc. costs that all add up to more than $3000 for me in 2003. It also baffles me how some races can be less expensive yet put on such a better production. A lot of it has to do with getting the community involved and doing your homework and/or some leg work, things Pacific Sports LLC are behind the curve on compared to other races in the area for equal or leesor costs.
Even though I feel this way about PS, I’ll probably continue to do their races (I’ll only do NB again if it’s high-tide) because I can afford it and I like to race in my area as much as possible.
That being said, when it comes to safety, there is no excuse. Not having more people at the cross-over point at the end of the bike/run was dangerous.
