Why does triathlon allow a 10% deviation in distance in the course?

Sure, pros like looking at the "numbers" but there is a ton of noise in the numbers (wind, elevation gains, temperature, how hard one did the prior leg(s), water current and waves, wetsuit legal, drafting on the bike, biking surface, etc) so having the distances being slightly off just adds to the noise and isn't a big deal. All of them have computers on their bikes and many (most?) have power meters so they have a ton of data from the bike. Why would it matter if the bike is 40.5K if you have a garmin with power and can review very specific data from the bike afterward? It's not like that extra 500M means you can't analyze the data.

So, in that regard, triathlons are not like running. Hunter Kemper simply does not care if the "10K" really is 9.9K. However, he likely would care if it were 9K or 11K, but was marketed as 10K, because being off by 1000M would be a big surprise. I am not aware of any major triathlons that are off by anything close to 10% of their stated distances.

Still would annoy the hell out of me if I couldn't evaluate my speed due to unknown distance (I'm old school and don't think gps equals a properly measured course)... To me, I see it as race directors half-assing things.

I would love to see some awesome run splits from triathlons, and know what I'm looking at. Someone goes sub 29 in a triathlon 10k, I WANT TO BE IMPRESSED BY IT!

Also, I'm sure a lot of tri guys (like runners) don't muck around with watches and such for shorter races, and would like to rely on the race's official timing system for performance evaluation afterwards. Like everyone in every race, you take account of the variables that affect performance, but if you don't know something as basic and controllable as distance... That is a HUGE variable, and IMO it is a shame it is not addressed properly.

I'll chalk it up to different personality types, some of us are a little crazier than others! Peace, thx for insight.

clown question wrote:

prince C wrote:

Why does triathlon allow a 10% deviation in distance in the course?

What percentage of 5K and 10K road races are certified?

A lot of the clowns on this thread who spout their PRs have done so on a course that was not certified.

That may be true. But why in the world would it not matter to rather serious runners that the course is inaccurate??? Nearly, all runners do not expect to win he race! So they are running for time over a particular distance.

Why do you think any distance you run is that distance? If you run a 5k or 10k on a track, do you consider that you won't always be on the inside of the inside lane? What happens if you run a lap in lane 2 or God forbid 2 laps. Or when you are on a road the way you take the corners and tangents can change the length of the run. You never in fact know exactly how far you run. You can't continue to try to use this as a valid excuse.

tri harder wrote:I am not aware of any major triathlons that are off by anything close to 10% of their stated distances.

I may be confusing race venues, but I believe it is pretty well established that the Ironman Roth and Ironman Austria courses are short. Roth routinely comes in at around 109+ miles for the bike. I know that's not 10%, but 7-10 minutes is not immaterial. Austria's run course, Peter Reid ran 2:36 there, 9 minutes faster than he ever ran at any other Ironman (and 12-18 minutes faster than most of his races around that time). That may not be 10% short but it's probably at least 3k short. He was also about 20 minutes faster on the bike in Austria than any other Ironman distance race in those years.

Ironman UK in 2011 the run was 24-24.5 miles.

Any/all of these races may have changed their courses since these times were happening.

Good God... An actual Ironman course being short??? Reading this thread I was under the impression that they don't screw around with an Ironman, and get it right, because it's the friggin' Ironman! If I did an Ironman, and found out the course was short after, I would be so upset...

I ran my one and only marathon this past year (there won't be a second) and I've put it to bed, but if I were to subsequently find out the thing was in the least bit short, I'd have to run another one since I didn't do one the first time. Just how I look at it.

For crying out loud, MAKE THE THING LONGER if it's not going to be accurate!!! < 2.5 swim, 112 bike, 26.2 run, and it's NOT an Ironman.

And yes, nobody ever knows EXACTLY how far they ran, but you can know that you ran a certain MINIMUM distance. Is it really THAT hard to get this right??? What the &*%$#@ is wrong with people who run races like this? Over-the-top rant over.

smakdab wrote:

Good God... An actual Ironman course being short??? Reading this thread I was under the impression that they don't screw around with an Ironman, and get it right, because it's the friggin' Ironman! If I did an Ironman, and found out the course was short after, I would be so upset...

Part of this has got to be the sheer number of events WTC puts on under the Ironman brand and all the different places around the globe that they take place. Their website currently shows 88 events on the calendar for 2013. The only race production company that I can think of that comes close to this kind of schedule is RnR, and almost all RnR races are held in the US. I think that gives RnR the ability to control things like "accurate course" a lot better. With Ironman, part of the allure of some of the out of the way races is the adventure of doing a race in say Los Cabos or Lanzarote. If I'm going to someplace like that to do an Ironman I'm ok if the course isn't exactly 2.4/112/26.2. Even if it's 2.2/105/25.5 it's still going to take me a huge chunk of time.

It's kind of the same thing, to me, when I think of ultra trail races. Is Western States or Leadville exactly 100 miles? I have no idea, and the ability to accurately measure a course like that to USATF standards does not exist. If in the future we find some way to accurately measure courses like that and find out WS is 98 or 99 miles to me it doesn't detract at all from the accomplishments of those who have raced there.

I don't disagree with you that triathlon would have a lot more credibility to outsiders, especially those of us who come from running backgrounds, if they made a little more effort to have accurate courses, or to advertise the actual distances when they are known. I've mentioned above some of the stuff that bugs me about tri courses, one other thing I'll add is when you have an out-and-back course with a random turn around point (i.e. not at a dead end, not at a town line, not just short of a busy street, and not in the middle or at the end of a big downhill (on the bike)) and you end up with an inaccurate course. To me that is about the height of not caring at all to get your course distance right.

Funny how triathlons are often short but never long.

Clearly it's made so they can compare their running splits to real Marathons and Half Marathons and point out how well they did, especially since they also swim and rode.

Yawn.

voiceofreason wrote:

Why do you think any distance you run is that distance? If you run a 5k or 10k on a track, do you consider that you won't always be on the inside of the inside lane? What happens if you run a lap in lane 2 or God forbid 2 laps. Or when you are on a road the way you take the corners and tangents can change the length of the run. You never in fact know exactly how far you run. You can't continue to try to use this as a valid excuse.

The funniest part about the fact he doesn't give a damn about distance? He doesn't actually have the balls to enter a race! He's a hobby jogger.

If the course is certified you'd expect it to be close. But there's always human error. I think most athletes consider their PRs and want to improve on them to a point. Otherwise what fun is training? And who pays money for an event to just do it?

It's all about getting the 140.6 sticker in only 126.54 miles.

I read on a tri board that IAAF Technical Director David Katz London OG Marathon Measurer, also measured the London Triathlon running portion any truth to this comment? If so are the rules different than those under the IAAF?

I know he posts here but I think it is when someone e-mails to alert him .

http://forum.slowtwitch.com/forum/Slowtwitch_Forums_C1/Triathlon_Forum_F1/Alistair_Brownlee_to_race_10k_in_America_P4448625/

voiceofreason wrote:

Again, why does this matter?

irony is beautiful wrote:

The WTC has specified that an Ironman is a 2.4-mile (3.86 km) swim, a 112-mile (180.25 km) bike, and marathon 26.2-mile (42.2 km) run. There are standardized mandatory time cut offs for each leg of the event.

The WTC also created the Ironman 70.3 race series, consisting of a 1.2-mile (1.9 km) swim, 56-mile (90 km) bike ride, and 13.1-mile (21.1 km) run. They even specifically named these events "Ironman 70.3 (insert location)."

They have also trademarked the use of "140.6" and "70.3," and actively market and protect these symbols.

Triathletes from all over the globe proudly display these specific distance symbols via stickers, t-shirts, and even tattoos.

Yet the sport's governing bodies specifically permit a 10% deviation from these trademarked distances by rule? Nice.

It matters because it is false advertising.

David Katz's e-mail answer-

Tom

I did not measure the Olympic Tri 10k but Hugh Jones did.

I believe he told me that it was measured to the same standards as our road racing courses.

Only in the past year did I hear of the acceptable tolerance for tri courses- blew me away. I made sure that the few "run" segments of the multi events I was involved were accurate.

David

Some triathlon swim legs involve participants getting out of the water, running back to where they started, jumping back in again and repeating the loop. Is this included in the overall distance? Also, are the transitions certified distances?

If it doesn't matter to a triathlete, why should it matter to you?