When Brian Ingle crossed the finish line of the Cayuga Lake Triathlon in upstate New York earlier this month, he was sweaty and tired, but proud. The 38-year-old actuary had finished seventh in his division with a time of two hours, 42 minutes.
But unlike most triathletes, Mr. Ingle didn’t need a week to recover. Not only were the distances in this race a fraction of those in “Ironman” competitions, he had help: His wife, Juliet, completed the one-mile swim while a friend tackled the 25-mile bike ride. All Mr. Ingle had to do was run six miles and join his teammates at a celebratory cookout to drink beer, smoke cigars and grill steaks. “We’re going to change the image of the triathlete,” he says.
Hold on to your stopwatches, fitness fans: The mighty triathlon, that macho emblem of athletic sadomasochism, is going soft. While grueling events like the legendary Ironman continue to grab most of the attention, the sport has quietly been expanding at the lower levels. The number of shorter “sprint” triathlons sanctioned by a national governing body has tripled in five years to 818…
Don’t see how Bekele has anything to do with this. I’m less irritated by the article than I am by the quote from the guy who did the run leg- “We’re going to change the image of triathon,” or whatever. To what? Some pretentious social prelude to cigar smoking, like golf?
jhc wrote: The point is, if the dude is smoking a cigar afterwards, it probably wasn’t a very hard 6 miles.
Not logical. If he smoked the cigar before and/or during the 6 miles, and wasn’t having any signs of breathing hard, maybe it wasn’t a very hard 6 miles. Smoking a cigar afterwards only indicates he is capable of holding a lit tobacco turd to his lips and sucking.
