The boys at PTN reported talking to Casper after the race and according to them CS said he was swimming P4 “and just doing backstroke and being like, guys, are we not going to push the pace, like, what’s going on here? PTN also stated “..this was one of the slowest swims we’ve seen here in a while, actually 4 minutes slower than the course record held by Andy Potts”. It’s around the 18-minute mark of the most recent episode (267).
Except Andy Potts’ record swim is 21:27
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To monty’s point. That is the whole issue with talking about a swim “split”; it’s always what the gaps are that reveal how the race really unfolded (so many factors affect the actual true distance of the swim distance when talking about the actual swim split; hell the actual distance usually isn’t even correct, which by default is really really hard to do; thus why the actual split is meaningless for discussion points). Here is the last 10 years top swim split in OS (which I think has had 2 different swim venues I think between the beach and the bay I believe):
‘26- 22:24
‘25- 22:48
‘24- 22:58
‘23- 22:09
‘22- 22:27
‘21- 23:33
‘19- 21:35
‘18- 22:20
‘17- 23:40
‘16- 23:28
If you look at the splits from the race, the “front group” was basically 18-22 people depending on what you define as a sizeable enough gap to distinguish groups. Again in the LS video from a few weeks or month now, Dubrick basically said how he thinks the new 20m gaps work for him (not great). So he likely is only going to go hard enough to lead the swim, but not so hard that it blows up. Look at Geelong from a few weeks prior, 2 guys went off the front and came into T2 with a near 45s gap; that’s obviously swimmers going full gas and creating a sizeable gap. Now obviously variables will affect the swim ability within each swim and the class of athletes, so it’s not always apples to apples comparison, but in general sense you can still talk in general principles. So I do not think this swim was as full on as it could have been (regardless of what some are saying it was; 22 swimmers within 30s tells me it was not “full on”), but again Dubrick’s own preview basically suggested he doesn’t see the point of it being a “full on” swim anymore.
Either you heard this wrong, or their blathering was alcohol induced..Even if there has been a 18 minute swim somewhere, it was no where near the correct swim course for a half ironman. This time was right on par with some of the best swims, low 22’s is about what you get from the top guys wearing wetsuits in a proper swim
just to point out that 2023 he was 2 min behind kanute and west in the swim at oceanside and 2026 1.43 min. and I guess 1 second per 100 is still in the error bar. I am not saying he is not improving but I guess you want more data points. and oceanside tents to be a race where the weaker swimmers do well.
If you need more data points to determine if his swim is improving or not, that’s going to ultimately be up to you and any individual who wants to decide that. All I know is that ever since he’s done this swim coach thing, he’s probaly become much more efficient in the water, which in addition to debating if his swim has “improved” or not, also likely has a direct impact on his B and R abilities as well.
They got rid of the speed limit zone
That change is worth about 10-15 seconds…at most!
They did, although that maybe accounts for about 30 seconds tops. Funny story about the new “No Passing” zone and new road that replaced it. The road is straight and downhill, brand new and perfect. When I entered the “No Pass” area, there were two guys ahead of me. The one immediately in front of me rode up on the front guy and went right around him. I thought that was odd and an obvious violation. But then suddenly I was up on this same kid. So I rode alongside and told him it’s no longer a speed limited area, just no passing. He said he hated descending! We both laughed. I told him not to take it personally but I was going to go around and carry on, knowing that I wasn’t even going to finish the race anyway so a DQ was irrelevant. He did catch up and we briefly chatted, nice kid.
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Casper stones said the pace was pedestrian and could do backstroke in the lead pack and hold on. with 60 + guys you can hold onto a lot of guys and have a great swim or get caught behind a lot of guys and have a easy swim that’s slow for you.
I think we can all say SAM DID WELL!!! good for him. Will the next swim in Texas or (kona) if non wetsuit be as successful , time will tell.
I think guys are not wanting to be the swim leader for little to know reward anymore. ( teams working together maybe, solo for everyone else , not so much)
As always it will depend on what your strengths are. A guy like Laidlow who has one of the best S/B’s in the sport, he doesn’t mind pushing the pace in the swim and then going off the front on an iTT. Dubrick doesn’t have that bike strength, so stringing out the swim so that he only has a wheel or 2 doesn’t really help him if he’s then dropped and waiting for wheels to catch up to him.
Which is why I did laugh in the LS video when he was celebrating the 20m bike zone and Dubrick popped in and was like “nah doesn’t help me” (paraphrasing).
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So thinking about Texas, Cam Wurf, Matt Hanson, Leon Chevalier, and Robert Swan were about 3:10-3:20 back in Texas last year.
Last Year those guys were 1:08 (Swan) and 1:43 (Hanson) in Oceanside.
Not exactly sure what that tells us, but seems unlikely Sam will have a deficit starting with a 3. Arizona he just squeaked in with a 3:59 with a flat, cold swim. Texas will be warmer and has a pretty good chance of not being wetsuit, but it will have a very big group, his only chance of being under 4 is getting situated in the group. But just making random crap up as I’m wont to do, I’d put that at a 30% chance of happening.
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Texas is pretty much guaranteed to be a non-wetsuit swim for the Pro field. It’s usually borderline for us AG’ers. But, Sam does have a lot of flat road to gain ground on the bike.
actually, as someone who was living in the same house as Dubrick, I can verify that he did take the swim “super easy” - he said to swim another minute or two faster would cost more than a minute or two on the bike, so he’d rather swim slower and bike many minutes faster.
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Right but his “super easy” is still going to be a professional front leading swim effort. He’s likely always going to do enough to make sure he’s at the front of the swim, so whether that is a “hammer” effort or an “super easy” effort will then be dictated by what he needs to be successful overall.
Listen up age groupers !!! Do this !!! And on the bike too.
Not to be confused with the more common age grouper strategy of “not really practicing the swim”
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You will get lynched for making truthful swim training comments around here.
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interesting, over the past years i have seen AG reduce swim work a lot and put it more into the bike, at least those I follow on strava
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I see influencer coaches telling people not too focus on swimming cause it is only a small percentage of race day.
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