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Triathlon
School Days
While not by any means a complete list, here
are a few trend lines, changes, and maturations the relatively young sport of
triathlon has experienced through the years. These observations are the
end-result of hours of demographic study, market analysis, and too much coffee.
As a result, they are purely subjective. Your actual results may
vary. As always, feel free to email any glaring omissions,
corrections, or refinements.
|
Old School |
Middle School |
Graduate School |
|
Honor system |
Race number
tear offs |
ChampionChip
Timing |
|
PB & J
sandwiches |
cookies |
Energy bars |
|
Fig bar |
Power bar |
Cliff Bar |
|
Foster Grant |
Oakley |
Rudy Project |
|
As long as
necessary |
18 1/2 hours |
17 hours |
|
Road drops |
Clip on aerobar |
One-piece bars |
|
Steel framed
road bike |
Aluminum tri
bike |
Carbon or Ti
tri bike |
|
Masochistic
fringe sport |
Extreme sport |
Olympic sport |
|
Novelty |
Trophies |
Cash / IM slot |
|
Oahu |
Hawaii |
Maui |
|
Stopwatch |
Timex Ironman
watch |
Timex GPS watch |
|
Grease |
QR |
Ironman / Orca |
|
Trial and error |
Training
partners |
Training
software |
|
Under-training |
Over-training |
Coached
training |
|
3 Scotts |
3 Germans |
3 DeBooms |
|
Julie |
Paula |
Natascha |
|
One line, 8D
sports page |
ABC Wide World
of Sports |
Webcast |
|
De-fizzed coke |
Gatorade |
Red Bull |
|
Sports
Illustrated |
Triathlete
magazine |
Ironmanlive.com |
|
12 hours |
9 hours |
8 hours |
|
Adidas |
Brooks |
Nike |
|
Schwinn/Huffy |
QR/Zipp/Softride/Kestrel |
Cervello/Felt/Merlin |
|
If you’ve got
time |
If you plan
ahead |
If you qualify |
|
Water bottle
cage |
Seat mounted
bladder |
Aero
fluid-reservoir |
|
Bud Light |
Timex/Gatorade/Mrs.T’s |
Any company
with cash |
|
Mavic |
Hed/Zipp |
Spinergy |
|
$100 bike |
$2500 bike |
$5000 bike |
|
Dozen pioneers |
Few thousand
extremists |
Iron fever |
|
Triathlon
|
Duathlon |
Adventure
Racing |
|
Adrenaline
|
Caffeine |
Ephedrine |
|
"the race,"
Hawaii IM |
IM Hawaii, "the
race" |
Hawaii IM,
still "the race" |
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