In an article just posted on the Inside Triathlon website, Kyle du Ford repeats an assertion by the founders of Xterra Maui that they “invented” the sport of off-road triathlon in 1996. I’m a bit skeptical about that claim, remembering
1991 & 1992. I produced an event at Addison Oaks Park (north of Detroit) called the Michigan Fat Tire Biathlon (2 mile trail run, 8 mile mtb, 2 mile trail run).
In August of 1993, the Grand Tri Off-Road Triathlon was slated for Grand Prairie, Texas. 0.4 mile swim, 10 mile bike, 5K run. Organizer: Mike Braught.
The FAST Triathlon Team (Detroit area) has produced an off-road triathlon for years in the Brighton Recreation Area. Seems to me that started while I still owned Triathlon Today magazine - and I sold the magazine to Inside Communications in 1993. Perhaps someone on this forum will be able to provide definitive information on this one.
Stuart Dorland who runs the very popular 24 Hours of Adrenaline MTB events across Canada and the US, started off producing off-road duathlons in the early to mid 90’s. They didn’t really take off so he switched to producing MTB only events. Not sure on the exact start-up dates for Stuart’s Off-road duathlons or if he was first, but they definatly proceeded the XTERRA series. It would be a bit of a stretch for the XTERRA folks to claim that they invented the concept.
Generally speaking when people talk about “inventing” a sport people come out of the woodwork with stories. My favorite is how Gary Fisher talks about inventing mountain bikes. Someone finally found a picture from an early California cyclocross race which showed Gary Fisher on a normal cross bike standing next to two nameless guys on modified clunkers with gears and bmx tires, taken about a year before he “invented” them.
Given the new history of tri you might narrow down something.
Just my opinion, if they want to claim the invention, let them. Maybe they thought of it on their own, without ever hearing of the races in Michigan. It’s possible for two people to invent the same thing independant of each other.
But the fact of the matter is that Xterra is the mac-daddy of offroad triathlon, hands down. They put on one heck of a race series, with 50+ races worldwide each year, unrivaled by any organization in my opinion. I have raced in nearly 20 over the past three years and can tell you that the race courses are tough, the events are very well-run, and the comraderie of the xterra athletes (there are lots and lots of “regulars”) is amazing. Each year, I’m consistently racing 5-6 times against the same group of guys in my age group. Not only have we all become fiercely competitive over points & qualifying for Nationals, we’ve become friends as well. This is completely due to Xterra’s success at developing & expanding the Points Series. Each year, participation in the races I have done has increased by at least 30%, which is remarkable.
I even think their “points-to-qualify” model should be emulated by USAT, as I think you’d see even more growth in the sport and interest in going to Nationals (I felt qualifying for USAT nationals was basically a joke this year - I qualified by placing 15th in an Olympic distance race, 4th in my age group for cripe sake.) Needless to say I didn’t go.
Im not sure who started the whole offroad tri thing but Scott Tinley has put them on for a while and Im pretty sure his races pre-date Xterra. I know here locally in Indiana we had a 3 race offroad du series for a number of years in the late 80’s and early to mid 90’s. Id like to see someone start another one here. Ive been threatening to start one myself. It seems the logistics would be easier than having to worry about traffic etc…
Lew, although the Al Gore comment by another posted is probably most likely, I recall doing an off-road triathlon in the early 90’s up at Kirkwood ski resort in California. The t-shirt is old and ratty, so it has to pre-date '96. I think Charlie Lincoln (of World’s Toughest Tri, Tahoe) was the RD. Tinely was there. Didn’t ST’s Dirty Triathlon series start in '96 or so? I’ll have to look at the date on the t-shirt over the weekend.
I was doing the Skyline Race Series in Reisterstown, MD in 1992 which was a 0.5 M Swim 11 Mile MTB and 2.5 Mile Trail Run. We’ve done a bunch of off road du’s and tri’s in the mid 90’s also.
“Maui is where Dave Nicholas, a.k.a. the “Big Kahuna,” first invented off-road triathlon in the form of Xterra for TEAM Unlimited,”
Lew:
I think that quote can be interpreted ways. One that XTERRA invented offroad tri’s, which they didn’t. Or they invented them “in the form of XTERRAs,” which often take racers off the normal trail for added technical challenges, e.g. river crossings, crazy stair climbs, etc. That’s probably an arguable claim as well, eh?
By the way, wasn’t your last Olive Garden off-road duathlon in '91? That was the first race I ever considered doing and it stirred my interest in the sport. In '92 I signed up for the MMBA mountain biking series.
On November 29, 2004, Boca Hawaii will present the 10th annual Mountain Man Traithlon at Kualoa ranch on the island of Oahu. The first race was held in rainy and muddy conditions in November 1995. Xterra ( than known as Aquaterra) was first held in 1996 on the island of Maui.
It’s similar to Gary Fisher being hailed as the father of mountain biking - don’t think he invented it, but he sure helped promote the sport.
The important thing is that off road triathlons are bringing people into the sport that may not otherwise participate - thanks to you and anyone who has organized one of these events.
I"m pretty sure the first edition of the race was in 1991, with yours truly as race director. By the next year, my business parter (Bill Zolkowski) and I had parted ways; I took the magazine and he took the races. He staged the race one more year (1992) and then it was gone.