- What's up trainiacs?
Welcome to this week's triathlon news day Tuesday,
in this week's edition of news day it's a good one,
I was actually just saying that it's a good one,
because Ironman makes two really big announcements,
a huge acquisition happens in triathlon,
a book that we've all been waiting for comes out,
and doping. Doping enters our sport.
Drama. And Petey's tail wags in the corner as per usual.
(fast-paced music)
So welcome to this week's triathalon
news day Tuesday where every single Tuesday,
as long as I'm not traveling
and there is news to talk about,
we talk about the news that's going on
all around the triathlon world.
Make sure you stick around to the end where,
as always, we will share everyone's favorite
part of triathlon news day, that's a story
from the trianiac community.
And as always, full links to everything we talk about
will be in the description below!
To start off with, Ironman has released two
semi-large pieces of news out there.
First one being that for the 2021
Half Ironman World Championships,
we have two cities that are named as finalists.
The first one being Chattanooga, Tennessee,
the second one being Saint George, Utah.
So we know that it is coming back to the United States
and we have a chance that it's either going to be
a fairly hard or a fairly easy racecourse.
The second bit of news that they
dribbled out over the course of a few days
is first off that the Ironman Live,
these are the livestreams of races
from all around the world that occur
on Facebook has been renewed.
Results were so good from it last year,
not shockingly, that they are going to
cover 17 events from the upcoming race season.
Now there are, of course,
the standard ones that happened last year,
Frankfurt, Lake Placid, Half Ironman World Championships,
Full Ironman World Championships,
but one very interesting addition that caught my eye is that
the North American Ironman Championship
in Texas is going to be covered.
Now this is really interesting because last year it was just
surrounded with drama with drafting packs happening,
combined with the winners Matt Hanson and Mel Hauschildt
setting new Ironman distance course records.
You see that? That I said it?
I said it right? That's right, thank you.
And now with all of this being covered,
we are maybe gonna see a bunch of drafting packs,
or we're maybe gonna see a bunch of people
that don't want to be caught on
Facebook Live with tens of thousands
of people watching them draft, break up.
So, I find that fairly cool. Hauschildt, Hauschildt.
Next in cycling news, well this is fairly big
even though it's not triathlon related,
because Team Sky, the most dominant cycling team
in the world over the past decade,
having won six of the last seven
general classifications for the Tour de France,
they have sold the rights for the team
to London chemical maker Ineos.
Now this is further interesting because Team Sky
has been known for being basically synonymous
with high performance in cycling, changing the game.
What is also very significant about it is that
when there is this amount of money changing hands,
you start wondering if budgets are going to change.
Team Sky is known for having a budget
of around 43 million dollars, twice that
of the average world tour cycling team,
and Ineos has said that the budget won't change.
So, we can expect more domination.
Now this news kind of was quietly announced,
and it was actually sent to me by
a pro triathlete who will go unnamed who found
the news release that a German doctor
was accused of blood transfusing
21 different athletes on multiple
different occasions amounting to
the triple digits for the total
number of transfusions that they had done.
Now what's very interesting as it relates
to our sport is that this doctor was associated
with multiple locations around
the world in multiple different sports.
One of those locations being Hawaii,
and one of those sports being triathlon.
What this doesn't say is that it was specifically
the Ironman World Triathlon Championship in Kona.
There are dozens of different triathlons
in the state of Hawaii, so do we know
for sure that it is Kona? Not necessarily.
Do we know with reasonable certainty
that it is likely Kona because that is where
basically all chips are on the line? Yes.
Do we have any idea who it is?
No, so we don't really know how
this affects our sport, if at all.
But if it does come out that there are
blood transfusions and doping going on
in pro triathlon, in Ironman racing?
I think that is going to have massive
repercussions for the sport. Some good, some bad.
Because personally, this is not necessarily news
this is a little bit editorial having been
in Kona in 2013, as you would expect,
most endurance athletes being thin,
wispy little things, and then compare that to 2018
where everyone's a bunch of frickin' gorillas,
makes me wonder if there's a little bit more doping,
and a little bit more testosterone replacement
therapy for older gentlemen, which apparently is
fairly easy to come by in some countries.
So I think it's probably more pervasive than we think.
In race news, Super League Triathlon
held an event in Bali.
Now this wasn't one of their premiere events,
so it didn't draw the big names,
the Brownlees, the Vincent Luis,
the Richard Murrays, the Katie Zaferes,
and it wasn't a three day event,
it was a two day event but still,
Super League put it on and it was a good show.
Ryan Fisher won both the first and second day events,
and Suzanne Dodet did the same thing,
winning both days' events, the enduro and the eliminator.
Ironman races are starting to heat up,
where we're seeing more and more stiff
competition showing up to the same races.
We had Davao and Taiwan, which actually took me
quite a while into the weekend to realize
that they were separate races,
but we had people like Caroline Steffen, Craig Alexander,
Beth and Luke McKenzie, Tim Reed,
and eventual winners, Radke Kahlefeldt and
Marcus Rolli winning Half Ironman Davao.
Where pals Sarah Crowley and Bradley Weiss
won Half Ironman Taiwan.
Congratulations to all competitors out there.
Got an interesting update on the podcast,
we just released the podcast with Mike Reilly,
he is our first three time guest on the podcast
that we've had, and we did that because he
released his long-awaited book
that is now available at MikeReilly.net.
We brought him onto the podcast where he talks
about some of his favorite stories and we didn't accept
"well they're all my favorite stories,"
we got him to talk about which ones are his favorite.
So go listen to that podcast, and go check out
his book which is now available at MikeReilly.net.
Now, let's wrap it up with everyone's favorite part,
the trainiac story of the week.
It is a shorty and a goodie, and it goes like this:
"Hi Taren, my name is Adam, and I'm graduating
from college this spring with a finance degree."
Sounds similar, yes Adam. "I began racing triathlons
with my sister in 2016, and loved them immediately.
After hearing David Goggins' story,
the ex-Navy Seal who published the book
Living with a Seal," it's fantastic I recommend it,
"and how he competed in the 10 hardest races
in the world to raise money for the families
of fallen Navy Seals, I was inspired
to sign up for my first Ironman. This September,
I will be completing Ironman Madison to raise
money for World Vision, a nonprofit that
provides clean water to children in Africa.
By racing the Ironman through World Vision,
I'm able to combine my passions for triathlon
and providing clean water to children in Africa
with triathlon and endurance sports.
I have set a fundraising goal of $10,000
to provide clean water to 200 kids in need
it is amazing that triathlon can be used to make
a positive impact on the world."
Short, good, and awesome to hear. Congratulations to Adam.
Whether it is supporting loved ones,
whether it is getting over your own
addictions or struggles or medical issues,
or it's like Adam and you're perfectly healthy,
and you are just doing it to support other people,
or if you're even doing it for yourself,
like I say, there are so many good reasons
to do triathlon that I wanted to highlight
one of these that isn't our typical
overcoming weightloss or sickness or addiction,
or whatever it is, just good things
happen when you take up triathlon.
So thank you for sending that in, Adam.
And if you want to get your story shared here
on triathlon news day, I think we only
might have one left, so odds are very good
that if you send it in it will get featured.
Send in your story and some pictures
to Taren@triathlontaren.com and if you aren't
yet subscribed and you like these news days,
hit the subscribe button below. Later, trainiacs.
Today's a win. I said Mel Hauschildt right. Total win.