Actually, I prefer the snake swims to heat swims. The triathlon I did recently used heat swims and it took ~2.5 hours to run all of the heats and that was swimming 2 per lane. If they would've done a snake swim with someone leaving every 5 seconds, the time between first and last swimmer start would have been about 10 minutes. The only problem is that it was a 6 lane, 25 yard pool so the swim would have been only 300 yards instead of 500.

I meant "stupid" in so far as it compares to an open water swim. Knuckleheads ahead of you who can't come within a minute and a half of their projected time in a 400 meter swim are just aggravating. It's nearly impossible to pass when three of them get in a row.

Tyson

Go under them...seriously.

Under out of the turn is the best way. still frustrating though when a few are packed together

how do you swim more than 150m in a snake swim? You run back to the beginning?

In a snake swim, you swim 2 lengths in each lane of the pool. For the first length, you stay on the wall half of the lane and on the second length, you swim on the other side of the lane. After you swim two lengths in one lane, you duck under the lane rope and start swimming in the next lane. Continue until you're on the other side of the pool in the last lane. So in a 6-lane, 25-yard pool, a snake swim would be 300 yards. In an 8-lane, 50m-pool, it could be up to 800m.

The key to having a good snake swim as Tyson pointed out, is to have everybody accurately seed themselves. I've had very good luck with this and have had no traffic problems in the 2 snake swims I have done.

I couldn't predict that. I can't imagine what I'd go for an 800m right now. It's a horrid thought. Do all people overpredict and so should I to be fair? Or is it not appreciated? Do all people starting get the same time? Different times? What ever happened to keeping to one lane and swimming in circles?

Swim your best time in the distance at least once before the race and put that as your time. DO NOT guess that the heat of battle will cause you to go faster. It isn't going to happen and you will be in the way.

Tyson

Okay - in an attempt to keep this thread going, I thought I'd post about my little 5K trail run this morning, even though it's not multi-sport. It was beautiful and really fun, but very hilly. It was an out-and-back with the first 3/4 mile being almost entirely downhill which meant the last 3/4 mile was entirely uphill. And I mean UPHILL. Anyway, I got 1st in my age group (30-39) and 3rd for women, 16th overall. I should add there were only 320 participants...) But sadly, I was beaten by a 9 year old girl. Sigh. My time was 26.59. But it was really FUN anyway!

Possiblities Series, 6th place overall in the age group...

It's ok, just a few warm-up races at teh start of the season; I need more interval work...

Very good for a "warm-up" race!
Good luck with the rest of your season.

Did my first Triathlon ever, The Rookie in San Marcus (300m, 11.1 miles, 2 miles). Links to results are below, here's the lowdown....

I was 37th out of 486 overall, and 5th out of 23 in my age group. My times were, 5:39, 2:08, 34:38, 1:15, 11:35 (Swim, T1, Bike, T2, Run), total was 55:09.

Man, open water swimming is disorienting....I would have done that so much faster if I hadn't gone way off course and kept stopping and looking up for bouys and people. Sad days, guess for next time I should actually practice the open water aspect.

Overall results:
https://www.doitsports.com/newresults...2993_2005.html

Looks like you did really well and that you buried a lot of people on the run! Nice job.

Dear Native:

Gee! Nice job. BUT, there is NO excuse not to practice the open water swim when you live in Austin: you guys have BARTON SPRINGS! Year round open-water swim paradise!

Tyson
UT Law '90

just got back from Galena, first tri of the season, a longish sprint over near the illinois/iowa border...wow that hurt, can't say i placed well or did close to my estimated times...came in at 1:54:00 mid pack for pretty much the whole day (overall and age group), was hoping for sub 100

times were 12:14/58:59/38:01, the swim was in sub 60 deg water, ride was 17 miles over some of the toughest hills i've ever ridden in a race and then the first mile of the 4.5 mile run was straight up a 7% grade.

it hurt, but boy I can't wait to get back there next year, and yes today I am smiling

Here's my short report for the Macon Triathlon I completed yesterday. It was 800 yard swim, 20 mile bike, 3 mile run. My goals were 16 minutes for the swim, 90 minutes for the bike and sub 44 minutes for the run so I would finish in under 2 1/2 hours. My swim was a little slow at 17:44, bike a little fast at 1:20 and run/walk right on and I finished in 2:28.54 which was good enough for 131 out of 137 finishers.

The long version can be found here Macon Triathlon Race Report

Zach, nice job on meeting your time. I read your detailed report...

Glad to hear that you took an H20 bottle with you on the ride. You should really be consuming a few ounces every 15 minutes. I've found that transitions often include runs of up to 1/4 mile so you should try to factor that in. I recall when I did the Palm Springs tri in April you mentioned that I should speed up my transitions but the time included a 1/8 mile run so I thought I was OK

As for your 1/2 IM on June 5th...wow. It seems that you and I are pretty close with respect to fitness levels, I would probably even say that I'm a bit ahead of you at this point...I personally don't think I could complete a 1/2 IM yet. I wouldn't have any problem with the swim and the bike (those are standard workouts for me every week) but I could not complete the run. My feet hurt very badly after the 10K in the Int'l Tri in April to the point that I had trouble walking for the next 24 hours.

I don't want to discourage you but I also don't want you to injure yourself to the point that you will get set back from your goals. I have my sights set on a half IM on June 5, 2006 and I think I will need a good part of that year to get ready for it.

Whatever you decide, I'm sure all of us on the board are pulling for you. Use your best judgement.

I did my second triathlon ever today - the "Tri for Fun" in Pleasanton, CA. This is the same tri I did last year at this time and was pretty excited to see how the last three months of training would pay off - especially on the run. It's an untimed event (the splits at least), but I took my own times on my watch:

400yd swim: 6:07
T1: 2:23
11 mile bike: 33:23
T2: 1:04
5k run: 31:00

Total 1hr 14min - this was almost a 9 minute improvement over last year! I think most of the improvement was on the bike and some on the run, although not as much as I had hoped. Most importantly though, I achieved my goal of running the entire 5k which was awesome since 3 months ago I was doing the 2 min run/1 min walk routine. Woo hoo!

Finally kicked off my race season yesterday at the inaugural 5430 Sprint Tri in Boulder, CO. The bike leg on this one was a little longer than the typical sprint, so I knew my time wouldn’t be directly comparable to prior years’ sprint races. I had loosely estimated a finish around 1:35 or so, especially since I trained through this race and didn’t taper. Anyway. I shocked myself, with 9th place in my age group (out of 97), and 213th overall (out of 934). My run time blows me away…I’ve never even run a straight up 5k that fast…I guess speedwork really does help.

Split times:

.5 mi Swim: 14:05
T1: 1:27
17 mi Bike: 48:34
T2: 1:07
3.1 mi Run: 24:00

This is exactly what I needed to see to stay motivated at this point in the season.

Happy racing fellow tri-geeks!

Just finished my second triathlon ever yesterday, the Charlottesville Sprint Triathlon. My goals were to finish and improve after my previous triathlon, which I thought would be problematic to judge given the difficulty in comparing two completely different courses of varying lengths. This turned out not to be the case as my overall times were almost the same and this second triathlon was both longer and over more difficult terrain. I'm looking forward to finishing another in July (and hopefully improving at the same time).

-hg

Finished my 8th sprint on Saturday

S-750m
B-20km
R-5km

Swim-12:34
T1-00:57
Bike-34:43 (average 34.6kmh)
T2-00:35
Run-25:25

I was 48th/386 overall, and 6/16 in my age group.

I definatley need to work on my run, I didnt spin enough on the last bit of my bike so my calves were cramping on the begining of my run, i figure that caused the extra 5 minutes...

This was a trial for my new bike setup, DuraAce 10speed, and a Renn 575 Disk. Also, I met a guy that is interning with Cervelo for the summer in their R&D department. He helped me make some fine tuning in my fit. Plus we raced together, the guy is insane on a bike.

Going to try and get this thread going again.

Just finished my 2nd tri of this season...too much working not enough playing

It was the Cayuga Lake Tri in Trumansburg, NY. Had a great time going up there from Austin, TX. Drove up there! It was a 1/2m swim, 14m bike, 5K run. I finished in about 1:23:15. I was 29th out of around 300ish and 4th in my age group. Just missed getting third by less than 2 minutes.

Hope everyone's having a productive season!

Did the Brewhouse Triathlon this weekend long course. It was a .8 mile swim, 20.9 mile bike and 5 mile run. The swim was in two waves for the long course and I tried starting in front and just got beat up for the first 200 meters. Once I settled in I was all right, until we took the second turn to start coming back and I ended up going about 50 meters off course, and then coming back on course about 6 people back and I just never settled. Came out of the water in about 25th for males with a 23:30 swim. Jumped on bike and due to some guy passing me my testosterone kicked in and I didn't drop under 25 for about 5 miles. The first lap I averaged 24 mph on a somewhat hilly, somewhat windy course. The second I was down around 22.5 cause of my ridiculous start. I ended up around 50 mins and up to 7th place(7th bike split, overall). Came out of T1 and ran myself into t1 in about 1/2 mile and then it was just for time. I ended up hauling on the run with a 26:58 5 mile run.

Definately some things learned for my A race in two weeks. A, I won my age group and could have been top 3 with a decent swim. B, still no problem running off the bike. C, I have to control how I start my legs. All in all a real good time.

I'm having a disappointing summer tri-wise, as I have been injured for the entire summer. But since I am new to the forum, I figured I could post my first two tri's from last summer. A little late, I know, but next summer I am going to be training a lot more, and hopefully improving...

Mystic River Valley Tri: .5mi. swim, 14.4 mi. bike, 5 mile run

1:40:15: 102- 20:30 99- 02:46 47- 0:43:46 114- 02:23 9- 0:30:50

First tri ever, and won my age group, granted I was the only one in it at the age of 19. Transitions...well, I could have had a cup of tea I was there so long. Anyhow, had a blast and now I am hooked.

Pfizer Triathlon .35mi swim, 12.6 mi bike, 3.25 run

1:10:07: 59- 13:00 16- 0:37:08 5- 0:19:59 184

Codl and windy as hell, but still had a good time, was 9th overall out of about 70. Anyhow, looking forward to getting back into the tri's again next year.

well just getting over sunday's accenture

touch and go as to whether i was going to participate as i had been ill with summer cold come stomach flu come general nastiness for most of the week prior, ran 2 miles friday night which opened me up a bit and felt good so decided to race on sunday.

what can i say?

swim

I've done three smaller tri's this year and all of my swims have shown a lot of improvement, but then i came crashing down to reality on sunday. I don't think i'll ever get used to the boiling pot that is the accenture start. I seeded myself down the field, but never got into my rhythm + i just couldn't get any air into my lungs with the remnants of the bug in me.

bike

the fast forward seatpost really helped + the level of wind was pretty low on lake shore drive in Chicago. managed to average about 21mph for the 40K, took on a bottle of water and one of gatorade plus one gel and came in feelgin pretty good.

run

the first 3K felt great, my legs felt fresh (theres that seatpost and new fit working again i thought) and it looked as thought the years speed training was really helping and then it happened. Pain in my stomach like I have never experienced for the next 7K. It stopped me in my tracks about six times to let it subside, so i basically started a run - walk -run routine. As i entered the last 1000m some girl on the outbound leg shouted at me 'what are you doing dig deep, nearly there' i picked up the pace and trotted over the line promptly to (quite ungracefully) get very ill over some of the race staff who were cutting off the timing chips (thats the polite version at least

rule 1: maybe you shouldn't race when ill?

final time 231 for the international distance 1.4/40/10

swim 37.50 (ouch) T1 2.30 (ish) bike 1:12.30 T2 1.46 run 55.30 (or something around there)

Maybe i'll sign up for lake geneva in two weeks? i really wanted to break 2:40

have fun guys