Just found this on wikipedia under triathlon formats.
‘Equilateral Triathlon: A triathlon, proposed by Wainer and De Veaux (1994), in which each leg would take an approximately equal time. For example, their “Olympic” triathlon, run as a relay, should take three world-record holders each about 28 minutes per leg: 2.7 km swim / 22.4 km bike / 10 km run.’
That would be an interesting event. Not with my dubious run leg though…
Not with my dubious run leg though…
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Why? It’s only the swim that is significantly different to a Standard course race. IF it were Alcatraz with the longer run I could understand your comment 
" . . . 'Equilateral Triathlon: A triathlon, proposed by Wainer and De Veaux (1994), in which each leg would take an approximately equal time."
I don’t know who Wainer and De Veaux might be, but they are hardly the progenitors of the “equilateral triathlon” idea. Fletcher Hanks produced an event called the Oxford Equilateral Triathlon - first one was in 1985, I believe. 5-mile swim, 20-mile run, 50-mile bike (in that order). Won the first year by Scott Molina, wearing a pink-and-grey Promotion wetsuit in the swim (the first time most of us had seen such equipment). Forgot who won the women’s race, but Molina and swim star Eney Jones swam the entire first leg together and had a huge lead going into the second leg.
The “Equilateral” was a companion to the Oxford International Triathlon (2.4-mile swim, 20-mile run, 50-mile bike), held on the eastern shore of Chesapeake Bay (Maryland) in the first week of June. The longer version lasted but two years and was cancelled for lack of interest. The shorter version survives as the “Blackwater Eagleman”, however, albeit with a more standard format and a somewhat different course.
In the same time frame, Tom Carmody did a race in a Boston suburb called the North Shore Equalizer": 4-mile swim, 60-mile bike, 15-mile run. But, for the same reason as the Maryland event, it too had a very short shelf life.
The longer swim would probably put people off I guess…
As for the short bike well, that would be enough to ruin my day !!!
I think this format of triathlons is a good idea and I’m surprised why there aren’t more of them. I guess it shows that triathletes really hate swimming and love biking!
I did the North Shore Challenge Equilateral triathlon a couple of times. If I remember correctly, it was a IMH qualifier. The race booklet had a page describing what the Ironman Hawaii was. The swim was in a cold pond with two rowboats a half mile apart. When rounding the boats, you yelled your number to the volunteers in the boat. Of course this was pre wetsuit so there were some decent swimmers there. It was old school with only gallons of water and cups on the ground along the run course. I begged a dollar off of a kid and bought a coke and powdered lollipop at a convenience store along the course. It was awesome. I still have the shirt.
In the equilateral triathlon is seems like a really good swimmer could open up a huge lead over average swimmers. I think that’s the biggest problem with the race. I’d guess most of the bike times in the shorter version would be within a few minutes of each other. Just my thought.
Adam
That would be great for me, I’m a swimmer and a runner and a pretty weak cyclist (now anyway)
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that is too bad. funny i had just been thinking there should be a race where the hour record of each sport (S,B,R) sets the distance for a long course race. it would be fun. i always feel bad for the good swimmers anyway, all that hard work / talent for a few minutes. it would mix things up from the current format, at least.
Lew,
I did one here in Waxhaw NC in the early '80s…I’d say maybe '83 or '84 that was something like a 2m swim, 18m bike and 7m run…so long ago that I really can’t remember the exact distances or order, just that I was in the 20-24 age group!