Planning for 2005

Triathlon Forum
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I’m new to the sport, doing my base this winter and I’m looking for a few races to do in my area (or out a little ways) for next season. I’ve found a few well-known races that I’m planning into my calendar but I’ve also been checking Trifind.com for some smaller races but nothing for next year is listed. Does anyone know when a group starts posting dates for next year’s season? Or, are there other places I can look for sprints, minis, etc?

Thanks for your help.

Suzanne in DC

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Suzanne Hi, and welcome; unfortunately we (Metro DC) suffered a major loss recently when Triatlantic closed shop. Triatlantic put-on races throughout the mid-Atlantic with many in the DC metro region. Check out www.lin-mark.com and www.tricolumbia.org, both have already posted their 2005 schedules. If you have any other Q’s, please don’t hesitate to PM me using my user profile.

Dave from Northern VA

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Dave -

Thanks for the info and the welcome! I heard about Triatlantic and was sorry to see them go. Columbia is one I want to do, now I just have to sign up and kick my rear into gear! Do you know of any smaller races nearby?

Suzanne

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Nearby…humm…for me anything within a 3 hour drive is nearby. If your new to the sport you might want to consider a duathlon in the spring. The Virginia Duathlon in VA Beach is always in early April (www.triduo.com), there is a shorter Du in Richmond later in April (set-up inc.) and then Blackwater Duathlon is usually in early May. As for triathlons, in early June there are sprint distance tri’s in Norfolf (Breezy Point Tri) and a very small YMCA tri in Cumberland, MD (Rocky Gap). I recently heard that Spud in Indian Head, MD (very close to DC) will happen even without Triatlantic.

Good luck,

Dave from VA

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Powerman North Carolina is about 4 hours away. See setup-inc.com

http://www.angelfire.com/retro/355_rider/index.html

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Smith Mountain Lake puts on a fun sprint and oly every year (~ 3 hours from DC).

Up here in farm country, Lancaster Co. YMCA puts on a well run oly every year.

All of these are nice, smaller number of participant events, which I liked this year being my first attempt at tris. Didn’t feel so “lost” in the mad crowds!

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Goodtime and Amish John -

Thanks so much for the input, I really appreciate the help! Set-upinc.com had more tris than I expected, all within a decent drive from Northern Virginia.

Thanks again,

Suzanne

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Suzanne,

Check-out our TriAmerica Triathlon Series - Hampton, VA race on June 19. Both sprint and international distances are offered along with our Saturday TriAmerica Kids Triathlon.

You’ll find all the details at http://triamerica.com

Fred

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I’ll offer a slightly different answer and point you in the direction of a couple of local tri clubs. The first is in DC:

http://dctriclub.net/

Their website has a forum where you may get some different answers than those already posted.

The other club is based in Reston, VA:

http://www.trirats.net/

This club also has a Yahoo group which gets a lot of daily traffic.

My first race two years ago was a sprint down in Richmond around July. It’s run by Set-up. Clearly, I enjoyed it and now I’m hooked!

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Thanks, everyone, for all the great advice. This really gives me a starting place for next year’s planning!

Suzanne