I'd like to teach catherine how to swim. She'll come to me, right?
She'll swim to you, Ben. Or else.
Hey so is that a full triathlon? Because, you know, if you're scared of doing a marathon, maybe doing an event where a marathon is one of the legs is maybe not the way to go.
Don't confuse a "full" triathlon with an Ironman event, tweets.
Okay. What's the difference, that I might avoid confusing them?
Full doesn't mean anything.
There are sprint, Olympic, and Ironman length triathlons.
Okay, good.
What's the difference?
Au contraire: I think "full" is pregnant with meaning. But there are, as you say, triathlons of various distances.
Sprints are shorter. And only crazy people do Ironmans.
But there are, as you say, triathlons of various distances.
I see!
And what might those distances be?
Okay I'm killing you both. After the swimming leg.
sprint usually has a bike ride of about 5-10km
olympic has 40km
ironman has 180km
wikipedia, im sure, has more detailed info.
Indeed it does:
Because "Ironman Triathlon" is a registered trademark of the World Triathlon Corporation (WTC), only races licensed by the WTC may be called "Ironman" or "Iron". As a result, other races of the same distances are called "full" or "long" distance.
Fuckers.
Damn I could almost do a Sprint triathlon. In, like, several hours, but still.
Most likely it is an "olympic" at 1.5K swim, 40K bike, 10K run. Key helper for non-swimmer swimmers—a good wetsuit.
They should change the order for a sprint triathlon. You run ahead for 200 meters, jump onto a bike for 1000 meters ending in a pool and then swim for 50 meters. It could all be done in a straight line.
Key helper for non-cyclist cyclists: Buy a Cervelo P4 or a Trek TTX and a Zipp disc.
Dunno, there are a LOT of sprint-length tris out there.
Sprint appears to have a longer bike ride than reported by Willy, at least according to wikipedia:
Sprint
Swim: 750 m (0.47 mi)
Bike: 20 km (12.4 mi)
Run: 5 km (3.1 mi)
Why are you mad at me? I said that "full" was pregnant with meaning. Wait, is it because I called you "tweets"? That was just a bit of bonhomie; I won't do it again.
yes, i was just guessing the sprint bike length.
20: because your slavish adherence to the Ironman™ Triathlon's legalistic distinctions in 4 left me confused and whimpering.
21: you own eight thousand dollars worth of racing bicycles? Why?
Man I'm kind of tempted to do a Sprint triathlon now. I wonder if I could make up for the fact that I run incredibly slowly?
No need to capitalize the "s" in "sprint". Unless the event is sponsored by the telecom company. What? I'm just saying.
Sprint triathlon
Sprint is a registered trademark, etc. etc.
Now you're in for it, eb. You don't want to cross tweets.
Unless you need to get to the other side!
Ooh, apparently a Super Sprint triathlon is even wussier!
Super Sprint
Swim: 400 m (0.25 mi)
Bike: 10 km (6.2 mi)
Run: 2.5 km (1.5 mi)
It's deprecated to be one's own straight man, isn't it? Probably not as deprecated as it is to be so unfunny.
Biking 10 km is the kind of thing that one could easily do by accident.
Yeah I very nearly bike 10km riding to school and back.
Not swimming worth a crap is my problem with triathlons as well. Which I solve by not signing up for triathlons.
Saying "Full triathlon" is like saying "Big-boned triathlon".
What are you trying to say, Gonerill?
Best application of Fermat's Principle I ever saw was at a triathlon at Solano Beach north of San Diego. The first leg of the course took off from the beach at about a 45° angle and you only had to stay "outside" of the buoys marking the triangular course at the waterline and in the water. Some of the group of top athletes who started ahead of everyone else took off running down the beach rather than diving straight in, and only going in the water when they reached what looked to be a pretty good approximation of the appropriate critical angle (velocity ratio ~ 4:1, so a fair distance down the beach towards the first vertex). The announcer was chastising them the whole time (and well after}, explaining that that was *not* the official course.
If you had a race that added canoeing to the traditional events of the triathlon, wouldn't you call it a tetrathlon rather than "the only four-event triathlon in the U.S"?
Incidentally, that's the only triathlon tetrathlon race of its kind I've ever done. Some friends and I did it as a team, and there'd been a hard freeze the night before, so the canoeists had to run their leg carrying the canoe. We were narrowly edged out for third place by Beth Heiden's team. Fucking Olympians.
36: triathletes may not be reflective sorts, but they are refractive.
It's deprecated to be one's own straight man
Straight Man Triathlon
- Ask Questions During the Monologue.
- Deadpan Conversational Response.
- Falling Out with the Famous One.
35: I like that he had to leave the Big Boy to go to the fast food place next door "for the first time in a very long time". Hey, we understand it was an emergency, your Big Boy foodie credentials are intact with us.
Fucking Olympians.
Apparently so. The one we met said the Olympic villiage was ankle deep in used rubbers.
Not that I have any cred in the food arena.
Sometimes it's better to live without goals, not just relationships.
40: It is longstanding Unfogged wisdom that having sex with a woman is the gayest thing a man can do.
As noted before, we did this one two or three times in the 80s.
"The traditional Peaks to Prairie route involves an 8.8 mile run leg, a 43 mile bicycle leg, and a 23 mile paddling leg, in that order."
You get to have teams. In fact, now they have a site the collects teams looking for someone with people looking for a team: Looking for that missing link to complete your team?
Simply email me and I'll add your information to this page. Please include your name, age, gender, which leg you're looking for help on, and some contact information. You may also inlcude any other details that might help people evaluate your team as a potential match (i.e. "We're really serious about doing well", "We're just in it for some fun", or "We promise not to bite"... stuff like that.)
Promises not to bite may not be enforceable.
46: That one sounds very nice (and also rather early in the season for the location. Is that to assure good water flow?). I had the unlikely privilege of traveling Yellowstone to Billings via the Beartooth Highway in the back of a pickup truck as a 13-year-old. Magnificent and never to be forgotten.
Most people doing triathlons cannot swim very well.
49: Do people set up triathlons with varying proportions -- longer swim, shorter bike, whatever? I could see it being interesting messing with the race to give different specialists the advantage. (That is, I have the impression that standard triathlons are won by fast runners who are pretty sure not to actually drown, and can ride a bike without falling over -- it'd be fun to mix it up so there were triathlons that advantaged swimmers or bikers.)(When I say, 'fun', I mean fun in the sense that I wouldn't be personally involved in any such thing, of course.)
Most people doing triathlons cannot swim very well.
We all know what you're really trying to say, will.
The mutton chops slow you down, Stanley.
9: hey! i'm only half crazy (but yes, i did a "full" or "ultra" or "iron" distance tri)
49: totally agree. even as a FOP/MOP guy, my swims are not fast (last night's workout: 3x500 with a target of 7:05 - ended up doing 7:30 for each one).
50: yeah, there are some tris out there like that.
17: You got either of those bikes on teh cheap? Like teh really cheap?
54: there's a gym with a pool in the basement of my office building in tyson's corner.
swimming by yourself? ouch. That is painful.
I am impressed that you can push yourself that way.
My job is such that I cannot easily make any group anythings. Part of the reason I am looking to get out. I did all of my IM training last year solo. As for swimming solo, my workouts are typically only 1 hour or less, so it's not that bad at all.
50: I have seen them vary in relative distance, but from what I believe most are as you describe. When I did them (years ago) and worked with some relative non-swimmers on their training, the goal we set was generally to survive the swim while not using far too much energy (goal 1 was to get past the typical thrash and relax). And the best strategy even for most good swimmers is to pretty much cruise out to a nice cushion at a comfortable pace, but the energy expenditure for "pushing it" is generally not worth it given the relative distances.
I could hold off most folks on the bike leg, but as legions of skiny running Nazis passed me on the last leg, I would spend my time mentally composing On Being a Thunder Lizard in an Age of Gazelles. The best triathlon I ever did for me (a freestyle sprinter) was one in Texas with a pool-based staggered start which used a multiplier on the swim time since they only had room for a 150 yard swim, led to me actually winning my age group in that one. Swimming last would be another way to advantage swimmers, at greatly increased safety risk.
48 -- Chas Kuralt said it was the best drive in the US.
I suppose the River really is the main factor on the date. Enough water to make the race, but not so much that it's really dangerous. (My Yellowstone River rescue story -- I've told it, I'm sure -- is Mothers Day.)
I think I remember there being a swimming leg in the John Colter run -- I never did it, but they really ought to have swimming -- but I can't find any sign of it. Looking at last year's times, there were a number of men in their 20s and 30s who lost to the 82 year old. I could probably lose a running race to an 82 year old, but it would be a little disheartening.
I wonder if I could make up for the fact that I run incredibly slowly?
I'm pretty sure they call that walking, Sifu.
60: nono, you should see me. It's like the six million dollar man when he runs in slow motion. Arms all flying around, legs going up in the air. There's just very little forward progress involved.
Most people doing triathlons cannot swim very well.
That's funny. A cyclist I know say that most people doing triathlons cannot bicycle very well.
61: Is there a rope involved? I suspect Sifu might be mistaking jumping rope for running.
62: there is a common theme, here.
Yes, good swimmers do not have an advantage in a triathalon. It's usually an open water swim, which would cut down on an experienced swimmer's advantage of dive start, turns, etc. It's a giant thrash in crappy water, and given the length of the race, an amazing time advantage in a swim (say, beating other people by 1-2 minutes) completely gets eaten by the bike and the run. It _would_ make more sense to do the swim last, but people would totally drown. As it was, the last time I did a sprint-distance tri, they were fishing people out of the water on the swim. Runners and bikers do have the advantage.
there is a common theme, here.
PICK UP COMMON THEME.
The common theme burns yours hands as if it is on fire.
OH NO YOU DID NOT.