JUN-A-9
A REPORT OF ANOTHER KIND OF
TRIATHALON EXPERIENCE,
AND A DISASTER TO CONTRAST WITH THE PLEASANT EAGLEMAN TRIATHALON
EXPERIENCE IN CAMBRIDGE, MD
From: "Biery, Thomas" <trbiery@bechtel.com>
To: <mcrun@mcrrc.org>
Date: 6/10/02 11:01AM
Subject: L@@k at the FIASCO in Utha this weekend...
For the triathletes out there... L@@k at this early report off the net about
what happened in Utha this weekend...
Just back from Utah. I only aim for one IM a year, and with all
the investments I made, I'm not taking this IM Utah fiasco that well.
First of all, it is unforgivable that a man, a dedicated athlete,
should loose his life for the unpreparedness of others in a long
sought after event which should only be cause for celebration and not
grief.
The swim should have been called off ‑‑‑ 3‑5 ft crest‑to‑through
swells of muck coming right at you is plain dangerous if you have to
swim 2.4 mi! Bobbing up and down waiting for the gun to go off, you
could barely see the buoys, and only one at a time if you were
lucky. The last buoys were in fact being seeded minutes before the
start ‑‑ at all the other triathlons I recall, they were already in
place when you got to the shore. So, it felt ominous when the buoy
just in front of the gate started drifting away 20 min before the
start, chased by one of the athletes warming up in the water.
Meanwhile, also the second buoy, which should have delimited the
starting field, must have have drifted some, because we started off
way spread out across from the pier.
I'm not a good swimmer, I start in the back, but I finish in my
honest 1.5 hr. Yet I struggled all the 40 min I was in the water: no
way I could find my rithm for more than a few strokes with the
unpredictability of the waves' period. I and others kept aiming for
that elusive first buoy (which must have also been drifting) when
somebody close to me pointed at a boat down wind and said they were
picking up swimmers and that the swim had been called off. OK, let's
swim for the boat then. But the boat is sideways to the waves, and
goes downwind faster than most of us in that sector can swim. And
swimming downwind, with the waves rolling over you, it's not any
easier than against the waves. Meanwhile, the 'copter is making
passes here and there, and somewhere over to the side we hear shouts
for help, but I cannot see the guy over the waves. One of the guys
in my view says it's a cramp, swims off to the rescue, and disappears
behind a crest.
It's funny: when you get in the water determined to swim 2.4 mi, you
would take on anything, placing your faith in the decisions of the
race officials that the swim is doable. But when you see people
being plucked out of the water or shouting for help, your mind
quickly switches from race mode to survival mode ‑‑ get on the damn
boat and quick! Obviously, there weren't enough boats to sweep out
1500 people in one pass, so I was the last one to climb aboard my
boat, soon after one of the crew jumped in the muck clutching several
life jackets, and off we were towards the other side of the pier. On
the boat, we were told nobody would be DQ'd for the swim, and were
let off in a few feet of water, walking the last stretch of mud to
the pier. Psichologically, with the aborted swim and the
settling uncertainty, your whole race is screwed.
Meanwhile, instead of abating as previously announced, the wind was
blowing strong at 15‑20 knots when we got to shore. On a
loudspeaker, all athletes were being asked to go and step over the
swim‑bike transition electronic mat to get accounted for. After about
an hour, there were still three people missing, I don't recall if
John Boland was among those called.
The wind is chilling. Space blankets are distributed, most athletes
don them, those who don't shiver heroically towards hypothermia. A
two hours delay is announced for a possible bike start.
At the "athletes' meeting", after apologizing for the turn of events,
the race director (?) simply notifies us that it has been decided
that the IM will be replaced by a duathlon (65mi B / 13.1 mi R) due
to "emotional distress" of many athletes ‑‑ I didn't see any
distressed faces, though. No mention is made of anybody either
missing or dead.
So off we go on our bikes into a wind which is against you most of
the time, with the new idea that you are on a training ride for some
other IM. You have to adapt to the new situation: you can and must go
faster, since it's "only" 65 mi! But after all the strategic
planning for the IM, it's not automatic to think "Half Iron".
Anyway, the 65 mi bike course (going south of Utah Lake and back) is
quite flat, but with the wind it would have made for a tough 112 mi.
The transition was well organized. On the run, I enjoyed talking to
the volunteers and exchanging high fives with their little kids, who
also eagerly helped freshening us up along the way. The race
organizers are not on par with these incredible volunteers, standing
there for hours in the sun, often without even a nod or a word of
thanks from the athletes.
I don't know of any precedent IM turned out like this, but since a
Half Iron costs less than half of an Ironman, it would be beneficial
to the badly tarnished image of IM Utah if all the athletes received
a $200 reimbursement for the "halved" race.
In conclusion, I set off for an IM, and instead came home with a
shirt, a hat, a medal and a finish picture with stamped on a false
"Ironman Utah" ‑‑ I don't know yet what I'll do with the whole lot.
Roberto