What is it about triathletes? There's something different about them, isn't there? Iron Man and Half Iron Man I think are the extremes, their sport a little like Test Cricket; potentially engaging, but really, why so long? I was at a Half Iron Man distance triathlon yesterday. The winner was some 10 minutes ahead of the next guy, so that was that, really. The remainder of the event was spent watching people who were simply happy to have finished. I was happy for them. A little sooner and we'd have been happier still!
5 hours, then 6 since the starting horn, still they limped home over the finish line. In fact I was competing also, but in a relay team as a runner, and therefore with fresh legs. On the run, I was passing many. It felt good, but cheap. Make your own analogies! But there was competition in the relay teams and racing to be done. Towards the end many were walking, this game of self punishment they play, drawing to a close. The course, in Tjorn, Sweden, was tough. 4 laps hills, twists and turns with crowds all the way.
No where to hide, no chance to get a rhythm going. Tough for us...great for the spectators. I'm not sure if it was cheer or ridicule, but it made for interaction and hence actually, a great feeling to the event. Sweden was kind to us, delivering sunshine, blue skies and a sense of cultural patriotism that many could learn from. And the organisers and marshals demonstrated a level of enthusiasm I could get used to. I think there's a future in having the finishing line laced with gyrating hips and beckoning 'come hither' waves to draw you to the line.
Music to match and a shout out with your name...for each and every one. Nice! I was given a finishers T shirt. Smiles all round. Then I read the inscription. 'Tjorn Triathlon 2013 Swim Bike Run Finisher'. Except I hadn't. I had merely run. What kind of effort was that? Looking at those collapsing on the floor around me, I'd say my task had been somewhat minimal. And then there were the guys who use prosthetics we'd brought here who'd done the full distance. Our team, we'd had fun, put in the effort, but somehow felt unworthy.
Then this morning, a different perspective of this sport. The 'Twenty Twenty' of Triathlon, The Sprint. I don't know about Cricket, so don't really know what Twenty Twenty means, other than it's a full 4 days shorter than a Test Match, and even the highlights are almost worth watching. This is more like it, an event to watch from start to finish and hold your attention until the winner comes home and beyond. And racing, position changes, a sense of outright urgency, yes this is better. A spectacle.
Fat blokes on expensive carbon bikes, scrawny wiry types on iron mountain bikes, girls on bikes with baskets on the front, wardrobe malfunctions, strategy failures; meaning I guess the idea of attaching your shoes to your bike is not meant to end in a face plant just outside T1 resulting in a tasty bike being launched into the bushes amidst a volley of Swedish profanities...funny though. And then some quite spectacular racing and demonstration of skill and ability. It was brilliant.
This again is when my inner swimmer is stirred, followed by a crushing sense of failure as the painful and humiliating memories of my recent swimming lessons come flooding (literally) back. Should I try again, and to what aim? Certainly not to beat myself up on those longer distance events, and absolutely not to strut about in recreational/social Lycra with that pasty gaunt hollow look of the middle aged, middle class obsessive (not you, Pete). There's just something about it that looks, well...fun.
And thats the thing with these sports. There's spectating and then there's doing. I'm not a great spectator of this thing I do. I really don't get it, while I do appreciate those who do come to watch and cheer. I don't feel the need to excel or entertain for their benefit. But what I saw in the faces of those soles who were dragging their arse round and round this course, is that they were lost. Lost in their thoughts, somewhere deep, thinking things that could never really be explained, but I kind of get that. And it was a pretty spectacular place to lose yourself to. Excellent.
