2011-0203 Lava Magazine

EYE TO EYE: ANDI AND MICHI RAELERT SET SIGHTS ON KONA 速

FEBRUARY/MARCH 2011 : ISSUE 04

SERIOUS TRIATHLON

速

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006 : LINEUP

LAVA publisher JOHN DUKE

johnduke@ironman.com

heathergordon@ironman.com

:

:

associate publisher HEATHER GORDON

editor BRAD CULP

bradculp@ironman.com

:

senior editor

JAY PRASUHN jayprasuhn@ironman.com : features editor SUSAN GRANT-LEGACKI susanlegacki@ironman.com art director ERICA KRYSTEK ericakrystek@ironman.com : senior photographer DONALD MIRALLE donald@donaldmiralle.com : photo editor SAMMY TILLERY sammytillery@ironman.com : online editor JENNIFER WARD BARBER jenniferward@ironman.com : account executive SEAN WATKINS seanwatkins@ironman.com : account executive KIRK BAUSCH kirkbausch@ironman.com account executive LAURA AGCAOILI lauraagcaoili@ironman.com Phone 858.366.4444 : Fax 858.504.7062 : Subscriptions & Customer Service 800.839.4537; lavamag@pcspublink.com Circulation Inquiries heathergordon@ironman.com : Editorial Inquiries bradculp@ironman.com : Web Site www.lavamagazine.com

LAVA: (ISSN 2155-1081), 514 Via de la Valle, Suite 300, Solana Beach, CA 92075-2718, is published bi-monthly. The entire contents of LAVA are copywrited and may not be reproduced, either in whole or in part, without written consent. LAVA速 and Serious Triathlon速 are trademarks of World Triathlon Corporation. Basic subscription rate is $19.95, Canadian remit $30.45 in US funds (includes GST); other international mail $47.95 in US funds only. Application to mail at Periodicals Postage Prices is Pending at Solana Beach, CA. and at Additional Mailing Offices.

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008 : LAVA FLOW

FEBRUARY : MARCH, 2011

ISSUE 04 RESOLUTIONS

features

welcome 010 : EDITOR’S NOTE 012 : CONTRIBUTORS 016 : SEEN & HEARD

TRAINING T

042 : THICKER THAN WATER

100 : COACH’S COUNSEL

Andreas and Michael Raelert are poised to go head-to-head next year in Kona, and if it was up to them there’s only one way it will go down

Sleeping on empty: Is going to bed calorie-free really a safe way to lose weight?

By Jay Prasuhn

018 : iTRI

104 : SIDELINED

058 : A CLEAN SLATE

Director of sales and business development at Watkins Glen International race track and triathlete Ryan Tolley

Austrian Olympian Michael Weiss is taking the triathlon world by storm—but he’s got a dark cloud over him he just can’t shake

By Don Norcross

By Susan Grant-Legacki

The relocation of 70.3 Worlds from Clearwater, Fla., to Las Vegas has changed the game in more ways than one

020 : GEAR SECTION OPENER

By Brad Culp

042

By Jay Prasuhn

By Wolfgang Oswald, PT, OCS and Nathan Koch, PT, ATC

Open-water drafting: How’s that work?

By Jim Gourley

122 : TO YOUR HEALTH

022 : ON DISPLAY Argon 18 E-80 and Scott Plasma Premium

The triathlete body imbalance: Injuryproof your off-season

114 : THE FULL SPECTRUM

070 : EXTREME MAKEOVER FOR 70.3 WORLDS

GEAR G

By Troy Jacobson

Pill Popping 101: When you take supplements is as important as which ones you take

By Ben Greenfield

026 : PRO FILE

130 : COMPETITIVE EDGE

Leanda Cave’s Pinarello FT3

A planned attack: How to organize your race calendar the right way

028 : REVIEWED

By Mark Allen

Rotor’s 3D Crankset and Q-rings

By Jay Prasuhn

RACING R

030 : WORKBENCH High and tight: Jump on the bib bandwagon and enjoy the long ride

142 : RACING SECTION OPENER

By Mark Deterline

146 : IN FOCUS

Ford Ironman Arizona, Noosa Triathlon and SunSmart Ironman Western Australia

036 : RAPP REPORT Happy feet: Understanding footwear tech in order to find your best fit

By Jordan Rapp

152 : BOARDING PASS

TRAINING T

The “other” down under: Ironman Asia-Pacific 70.3 Championship in Laguna Phuket, Thailand

By Ben Greenfield

082 : TRAINING SECTION OPENER

160 : THE LAST WORD

084 : THE HYPE

Chrissie Wellington vs. Leanda Cave

By Erik Seedhouse

092 : THE HYPE Viva la résistance!: How to lift weights without looking like Popeye lavamagazine.com

DONALD MIRALLE

The über Triathlete: Science is busy stretching the limits of human endurance

ON THE COVER: Team Raelert: triathlon’s super-brothers duo Andreas and Michael Raelert.

PHOTO by DONALD MIRALLE

CHRISSIE WELLINGTON 3X WORLD IRONMAN CHAMPION

LEARN FROM YESTERDAY, LIVE FOR TODAY, NEVER GIVE UP.

QUARTZ HELMET WORN BY CHRISSIE WELLINGTON AT IRONMAN ARIZONA 2010 WHERE SHE BROKE THE WORLD IRONMAN RECORD BY 11 MINUTES

PATENTED

010 : EDITOR’S NOTE

ThE FRIENDly RIvalRy

I

hated Jason Dews for three years in high school. I was one year ahead of Jason, and before he came to my school, I was the top butterflyer in town. After my first time racing against him during my sophomore season, I realized I was doomed to be Fenwick High School’s second-best flyer until my graduation. Jason could kick my ass, and he definitely had a good time doing it.

For three seasons, Jason and I trained side by side, and as the only two butterflyers on our team, we had our own lane and spent most of practice doing our own thing. We grew to become good friends—you have to if you’re going to share a The Raelert brothers. lane with someone twice a day, almost everyday, for three years—but the rivalry that was stirred up when he first arrived never went away.

When it came time to race, the rivalry that remained mostly jovial during practice turned into something slightly more malicious. I’m not saying we ever came close to exchanging punches, but we didn’t talk at all during meets, and just before we raced, he’d shoot me a cocky little smirk—his way of reminding me that nine times out of 10, he got to the wall first.

In the three years we trained together I shaved nine seconds off of my time in the 100-yard butterfly. Dropping three seconds per year in a 100-yard race almost never happens in competitive swimming, especially not for three years in a row. That’d be like a miler running 20 seconds faster every season for three years. You can’t do something like that on your own.

If you follow triathlon closely, chances are you’ve heard of the two brothers featured in this issue’s cover story.

What started as a friendly rivalry between two brothers from Rostock, Germany has turned into a budding dynas-

ty with the potential to rewrite triathlon’s history books.

Andreas and Michael Raelert appear to have an extra gear that the rest of triathlon’s elite can’t match, and it’s one that has been honed and refined during a decade of pushing each other to the absolute brink while training along the Baltic Sea. In the past two seasons the Brothers Raelert have racked up two Ironman 70.3 world titles (credit younger brother Michael) and a pair of podium finishes at the Hawaii Ironman (credit older bro Andreas), and the general consensus is that they’re just getting warmed up.

2011 will be the first year that both Raelert brothers have set their sights on Kona, and already tri geeks worldwide are dreaming of the possibilities. Andreas has the wisdom of two years of racing the world’s best on the Big Island; Michael has raw talent and naivete reminiscent of Chrissie Wellington before her debut. The question doesn’t seem to be if a Raelert will win Kona, but how soon will it happen and which brother will it be?

It’s a lot to live up to, but neither brother seems bothered by the hype. In “Thicker than water,” beginning on Page 42, Michael tells us that he believes he can become the first man to finish Kona in under eight hours. It may sound like German bravado from a Kona rookie, but after two years of sheer dominance on the Ironman 70.3 circuit, no one’s ready to call his bluff just yet.

As for Andreas; his Kona dream involves finishing side by side with his brother, in first place, both without their timing chips so nobody knows whose foot was first to cross the line. The goal is perhaps even loftier than his younger brother’s, but he knows that neither would be having dreams of winning Kona if it weren’t for the other, and he couldn’t imagine winning any other way.

LAVA

Train safe,

Brad Culp Our reader feedback system has gone green. Skip the snail mail and e-mail your comments, criticisms and praises to bradculp@ironman.com lavamagazine.com

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012 : CONTRIBUTORS

Ben Greenfield (“Pill popping 101”, Page 122 & “The ‘other’ down under”, Page 152) is a sports nutritionist and triathlon coach at Pacific Elite Fitness.

He offers a free blog and podcast with cutting edge fitness and diet advice at Bengreenfieldfitness.com, and coaches both amateur and elite athletes from around the world through his online training site Rock Star Triathlete Academy (Rockstartriathlete.com).

With more than 30 international awards for his work, donald Miralle (“Thicker than water”, Page 42) is recognized as one of the premier editorial and commercial sports photographers worldwide. He has covered nearly every major sporting event, including six Winter and Summer Olympic Games, eight Super Bowls, three Pan-American Games, The World Series, The Masters and the Indianapolis 500.

BEN GREENFIELD

DONALD MIRALLE

MARK ALLEN

WOLFGANG OSWALD

Mark allen (“A planned attack”, Page 130), is one of only two men to win the Hawaii Ironman on six separate occasions. He offers coaching to athletes of all levels and race distances online at MarkAllenOnline.com. Mark is also an awardwinning author of the book that he co-authored with Brant Secunda titled Fit Soul, Fit Body: 9 Keys to

a Healthier, Happier You.

lavamagazine.com

WolfGanG osWald (“The triathlete body imbalance”, Page 104) earned his physical therapy degree from Northern Illinois University in 2000, and was board certified by the American Physical Therapy Association as an Orthopedic Certified Specialist physical therapist in 2005 (OCS). Wolfgang’s clinical interests include orthopedic manual therapy and sports medicine.

Lava_AD1_2011_alt:AthLounge

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Page 1

014 : THE BUZZ

Oregon’s best-stocked triathlon store

I

wanted to comment on the use of the words “ass and “badass” in articles entitled “Better than TV” and “Oakley Split Jacket”, respectively, in the last issue (Dec/Jan 2011). The writing staff at LAVA, I am sure, works very hard to make certain that what is written represents the excitement and energy of the topic being covered. It seems this magazine, for good reason, is being well received among those from many different backgrounds. For that reason, I ask that more careful consideration be made to exactly when colorful language is used. It seems unnecessary to employ potentially offensive words when the English language is filled with so many other choices that can make the same point. I wish LAVA continued success and look forward to many more informative issues. Like so many, this is the first magazine I truly enjoy reading.

—John Kaddis Norwalk, Calif

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Editor’s note: We apologize to any readers who may have been offended by the aforementioned words and we will do our best to only use colorful language when it is truly warranted. Sometimes we at LAVA get a little too excited when writing about tri. We won’t lie: You’ll find a couple of dirty words in this issue, but it’s far from excessive.

I

First off, I love your magazine. Secondly, thank you for all that you do for the sport of triathlon. I have gone from a coach potato to a two-time Ironman finisher since 2007, including Kona as my first.

Why not start at the top, right? Your magazine has been a cornerstone of my development throughout the past few months and I’ll continue to be a fan of LAVA for many years to come!

—Dan McDonald Naples, Fla.

CORRECTIONS: On the list of available sizes for the Kestrel 4000 (“On Display, Page 30, Dec/Jan 2011), the 59.5cm frame option was omitted. The article also noted that the bike’s rear stays are too narrow for many race wheels, but the stays have been designed to accommodate most any standard race wheel.

get there fa s ter!

In the Kona Bike Count (printed on page 38, Dec/Jan 2011), a number of Kiwami’s race tops and bottoms were counted with the rest of the “custom” apparel, including the 35 Mark Allen Online athletes who raced in Kiwami tops and bottoms.

2600 NW Vaughn St. Portland, OR 97210 503-477-5906 www.athleteslounge.com lavamagazine.com

exclusive distributor

Please give us your thoughts on our magazine by emailing the editor at bradculp@ironman.com.

Whether it’s tequila or a sports drink, chugging is never a good idea, as American Amanda Stevens demonstrated after winning Ironman 70.3 Cancun last year.

016 : SEEN

lavamagazine.com

HEARD : 017

.75, 16, 5.5

the distance (in kilometers) of the swim, bike and run legs of the blue lake triathlon in rotorua, new Zealand. seven-time tour de France

67: The number of people per square mile in the

champion lance armstrong announced (via twitter) that he will make his

Guanacaste region of

triathlon re-debut at the January 30 event. Source: Usatoday.com

Costa Rica, which will host the first-ever Rev3 Costa Rica triathlon on

5:09:00

February 19-20. Guanacaste is one of the most sparsely populated

Canadian Jim Finlayson’s best time For the beer mile, whiCh aCCording to beermile.Com, is the world reCord For drinking Four beers and running Four laps around a traCk.

and unspoiled areas of Central America.

Source: State.gov

Source: Beermile.com

61° 33’ / 149° 52’ W

The location of the northernmost triathlon in the world in Big Lake, Alaska. The Big Lake Triathlon is less than one degree farther north than Norway’s Norseman and Bergen Triathlons. Source: Google Maps

10

40 SECONDS:

The number of collegiate triathlon conferences sanctioned by USA Triathlon. The largest conference, the West Coast Collegiate Triathlon Conference, has 22 member schools. Source: Usatriathlon.org

The total cost of building the Emirates Palace, host hotel of the Abu Dhabi International Triathlon. The Palace was usurped as the most expensive hotel in the world when the $5.95 billion Marina Bay Sands Hotel opened in Singapore last year. The 2011 Abu Dhabi International Triathlon will take place on March 12. Source: Luxurylaunches.com

time saved using an aero helmet versus a standard vented helmet over a 40 kilometer course. Source: Giro.com

6

minutes. 42 seconds.

The fastest women’s beer mile of all time, belonging to another Canadian, Seanna Robinson.

Source: Beermile.com

$3.8 billion lavamagazine.com

018 : iTRI

RYAN TOLLEY Age: 35 | Resides: Canandaigua, N.Y. | Profession: Director of sales and business development at Watkins Glen International race track, which hosts a stop on the NASCAR circuit | Accomplishments: Returned to triathlon racing in 2009. Plans to step up to the 70.3 distance this year. basement with a treadmill and stationary trainer. I work out to music more than anything. The faster the tempo, the better.

I played basketball in high school and college (Division III Nazareth College in Rochester, N.Y.) At 30, I was still playing in year-round rec leagues and just started breaking down. You just don’t jump as high. You’re slower to react. I realized I was getting too many sprained ankles. It was time to do something else to keep my body healthy.

My favorite workout is a long ride, which gives you a chance to really get inside your head. It’s like this Zen moment. There’s nothing going on but you and your pedaling. I like how still everything else is no matter how fast you’re going. That, and the fact your legs can be on fire while you have this sense of peace around you.

I watched the NBC telecast of the Hawaii Ironman a few years back when they featured the story of Dick and Rick Hoyt. Talk about a father’s love. I knew that was something I had to be a part of.

Believe it or not, there are a lot of parallels between triathlon and NASCAR. You would think they’d be opposite demographics, but both sports cater to a consumer with an outrageous median lavamagazine.com

Riding your bike on the track is amazing. You’ve got this big, wide track and you don’t have to think about cars. You don’t have to look over your shoulder. You just ride. You get into this zone, you’re cruising. And it’s challenging. You have these elevation changes and tight turns. I go out by myself sometimes and ride the course.

BIll BAuMAN

I raced two sprints in 2006, but that was the same time I took my job at Watkins Glen. I was commuting about 80 miles each way. I threw myself into the job, stopped racing and got away from taking care of myself.

It was Mother’s Day 2009. We took my mother out to dinner and took this picture on a deck overlooking a lake. When I looked at the picture, I wasn’t myself. I weighed 230 pounds. (At 6 feet 2 inches, Tolley weighed 185 when he competed in 2006). I was completely out of shape. My face was fat. That was the moment I knew something had to change. I started training and racing again. By September I was down to 190 pounds.

Watkins Glen is a 3.5-mile road course. We host a duathlon on the track once a year. We’re working to host the 2013 and 2014 USAT Duathlon Nationals. I want to bring a triathlon to the track. Lake Seneca is only about five miles away.

income. There are more Fortune 500 sponsors in NASCAR than any other sport.

I don’t like the cold. I don’t start training outside until March or April. I’ve got my pain cave in the

Are NASCAR drivers athletes?

I’m going to say yes. When you see them outside the car, they’re all fit. They have to be. There’s a lot of endurance involved inside those cockpits. Their mental acuity is high, and they’re incredibly coordinated. They might not be able to beat you in a sprint, but with what they do under pressure, I think they’re definitely athletes.

— Don Norcross LAVA

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Chrissie Wellington, 3x Ironman® Champion

CytoSport™ products complement a healthful eating and hydration plan that, when combined with a balanced exercise program, may contribute to healthy weight management and recovery from exercise. ©2011 CytoSport, Inc. Benicia, CA 94510 USA musclemilk.com

JAY PRASUHN

021 : GEAR : G 020

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GEAR G

G : GEAR : 021

022

on display 026

pro file 028

reviewed 030

workbench 036

rapp report

Offering its pro triathletes full custom colors for major events from the Olympic Games to the Hawaii Ironman, Oakley now provides the option to consumers as part of its online custom program.

lavamagazine.com

022 : ON DISPLAY :

ARGON 18 E-80

$3,600 with SRAM Force and SRAM S80 clincher Argon18Bike.com

By Jay Prasuhn SIZES: XS, S, M, L COMPONENTS AS TESTED: SRAM Force groupset, 12–23 cassette, SRAM S80 clincher wheelset; Argon 18 saddle

✓ ROLL IT: If you’re seeking a

budget-based racer with aggressive frame geometry and race-worthy parts that won’t need upgrading.

✗ RACK IT: You only speak carbon fiber and your bike requires a wind tunnel birth certificate.

COLORS: Nude carbon, red/nude carbon, blue/nude carbon

B

SAMMY TILLERY

ike editors often throw around that buzz phrase “trickledown technology” a bit flippantly, like it ought to mean value is imminent. But that’s not always the case, certainly not if you get a heavier bike with shamefully mismatched components.

When Argon 18 created the E-80, the Canadian bike builder wanted to make the value obvious. No, this isn’t carbon, but it still has the features of its carbon brethren (the E-112 and E-114) that give it that trickle-down moniker. Sinclair Imports recently picked up Argon 18 as a client, allowing you to buy bikes complete instead of as a frameset, and this is where Sinclair’s experience in spec’ing bikes shines.

The frame itself is where the biggest bit of savings comes from. Indeed, aluminum is a tough sell in a carbon-crazy market, but by going with aluminum, you manage to get a bike with light, triplebutted aero shapes equal to that of the carbon E-112 (save for at the seat tube), the exact same geometry, the same stiffness and roughly the same weight, for a whole lot less coin.

Few bikes

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under four grand need no upgrade, but the E-80 comes set with a proven SRAM Force group and a clincher race wheelset strong enough for daily training but fast enough for race day with the SRAM S80s.

The E-80 doesn’t have the tunnel pedigree of its competitors, but the company isn’t interested in that battle. Instead, aggressive design and smart parts is where Argon 18 placed its focus. There are few bikes in this price range with a reversible 76- or 78-degree carbon post, an internal cable run and a behind-blade front brake. These extras, along with a low, fairly long design (it has the exact same stack and reach numbers as Argon 18’s top shelf E-114) make the E-80 capable of a low aero fit.

Since it shares the same geometry as the E-114 and E-112, it was no surprise that the bike handled similarly. With an adjustable Profile Design cockpit, it climbed, descended and cornered with the precision of its pricier kin, and was only slightly more resonant on rough roads than Argon’s carbon models.

LAVA

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024 : ON DISPLAY :

SCOTT PLASMA PREMIUM $8,499: with SRAM Red groupset and Zipp 808/1080 tubulars Scott-sports.com

By Jay Prasuhn

SIZES: 52, 54, 56 cm COMPONENTS AS TESTED: SRAM red groupset, 11-23 cassette, Zipp 808/1080 tubulars wheelset, Fi’zi:k Arione Tri 2 saddle.

✓ ROLL IT: You want an out-of-

box, race-ready scythe with the data to prove it’s among the best on the block.

✗ RACK IT: It’s too rich for your blood. This new frame design is only available in its top-shelf, Zipp and SRAM Red-adorned iteration (or as a frameset at $4,599).

COLORS: Matte black/matte gray

SAMMY TILLERY

T

he fully redesigned Plasma Premium, gaining accolades for a look that merits submission in I.D. Annual Design Review awards— is certainly more than a pretty face. Yet while fashion is king, function still rules in tri, where the motto is “In God we trust, all others bring data.”

The creation of the Scott Aero Science Group-with wind tunnel assist from noted aerodynamicist Simon Smart—meant that a genuine mix of tunnel design and testing went into this new iteration of the Plasma. While improving aerodynamics was key, so too was real-world function—something you could easily pack into a bike box. Gone is the seat mast, replaced by a standard post. And despite its integrated stem, (a beautiful aero update with a unique bottom-mount faceplate) it’ll be easy as always to unbolt for travel.

The Plasma Premium still borrows verified aero calling cards from its older model, including the narrow Twin Turbo chain stays and a

LAVAMAGAZINE.COM

1-inch sculpted head tube leading edge.

Another new feature is seat stays that rise past the seat tube cowling and terminate at a hard angle, which increases stiffness and surface area airflow off the seat tube.

The post provides an effective seat tube range from 73 to 80 degrees, and the frame’s stack remains similar to its previous versions—the reach shortened up just slightly through the size range.

A new frame-integrated stem (with a size range of 70 to 90mm in zero or 20-degree rise) takes care of the adjust, and it all mates neatly to a Profile Design Prosvet aerobar.

Scott opted to license a Felt technology and place a Shimano 6700 rear brake in an alcove above the bottom bracket. That OEM brake isn’t deserving of the bike it’s on, but it works.

While that alcove would indicate potential torsional weakness, Scott’s proprietary IMP build process leaves the frame bonding points well away from the bottom bracket. We focused on this area on test, looking for flex on steep climbs, but it exhibited no chain stay rub—this thing is stiff. Yet it’s most at home motoring on long, flat straights at max race tempo: It tore up the coastal portion of the Oceanside 70.3 course, breaking necks along the way.

LAVA

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026 : PRO FILE : 027

SADDLE: ISM ADAMO RACING

HYDRATION: XLAB CARBON WING WITH SPECIALIZED RIB CAGE, REYNOLDS CARBON CAGE (ON DOWN TUBE)

NAME: Leanda Cave

WHEELS: EASTON EC90 AERO FRONT TUBULAR, EASTON EC90TT REAR TUBULAR

BIRTHDATE: 3/9/78 AGE: 32 HEIGHT: 5’11 WEIGHT: 130 lbs.

RESIDENCE: Tucson, Ariz. & Swansea, Wales, U.K. WEAPON: Pinarello FT3, 57.5cm LAST SEEN: 9:13:50, 3rd place, Ironman Arizona (PR 4:59:55 bike split)

CASSETTE: SHIMANO DURA-ACE, 11-23

GROUPSET: SHIMANO DI2 DURA-ACE

WEAPON LOGISTICS: After taking 10th in Kona aboard her FT3, the former ITU World Champion used LAVAMAGAZINE.COM

: PRO FILE : 027

COCKPIT: EASTON ATTACK TT AEROBAR, EASTON EA90 STEM 110MM ZERO RISE, SHIMANO DI2 DURA-ACE SHIFTERS AND BRAKE LEVERS/SHIFTERS

PEDALS: LOOK KEO CARBON, TITANIUM SPINDLES

CRANKSET: SHIMANO DURA-ACE 7900, 53/39, 172.5MM

TIRES: CONTINENTAL GRAND PRIX 4000 700 X 22MM TUBULARS

it to finish strong in 2010, taking second at Ironman 70.3 Worlds and third at Ironman Arizona.

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028 : REVIEWED :

ROTOR’S 3D CRANKSET AND Q-RINGS

Rotor’s 3D Crankset retails for $400 and the Q-Rings retail for $265.

RotorbikeUSA.com

By Jay Prasuhn

R

otor Q-Rings were initially a poor man’s version of Rotor’s RS4X articulating crankset, built for athletes curious about elliptical chainrings, but hesitant to take the financial hit and one-pound weight penalty that came with the RS4X. But after several independent physiology and performance studies validated Rotor’s claim for power increases (measured at 3 percent in a Spanish study at the University of Valladolid) with the rings, interest grew.

We tested Rotor’s pinned and ramped TT chainring set (a solid aero version of their standard rings) on Rotor’s aluminum 3D crankset. Rotor claims that on its 53-tooth outer ring, the elliptical shape presents an effectively smaller gear (they say a 51-tooth) when the crankarm is in the “dead spot” from 7 to 12 o’clock, and then grows to a 56-tooth in the power position from 1 to 4 o’clock. QRings also provide five bolt position settings, allowing the rider to set the pitch of that low point and start of the power point. We selected the neutral “3” setting.

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With three longitudinal boreholes down the length of the crankarm, the 3D crankset was stiff enough to withstand Thor Hushovd’s sprint torque, yet was light at 486 grams with a ti axle. To this point, the stiffest crankset we’ve come across (which also had excellent aerodynamics) is Zipp’s VumaChrono. Unfortunately we didn’t have a deflection gauge to measure just how closely the 3D compares, it appears to be on par— and possibly stiffer. The rings themselves don’t upshift with the swiftness of a DuraAce ring, but we didn’t drop the chain under any load position.

Our experience is that you can’t feel the increase and decrease of the gear size— which is desirable, as pedaling action re-

mains fluid and normal. If you’re acutely aware of your ride sensations, however, you may be able to sense that you’re putting power to the chain at a slightly greater rate. In that case, bingo—there’s your 3 percent.

A more palpable sensation is the reduced knee stress. With gear size at the 9 to 12 o’clock position reduced, the knee—which is well off its leverage point in that position— can get past 12 o’clock with decreased focal stress. Athletes with knee issues—especially those who have problems using aerobars in a potentially more acute knee angle—should find Q-Rings beneficial.

As fitness increases, the user can tweak ring pitch, the point at which the rings create a high point for more power. We’ve played with this and believe that with a power meter or a CompuTrainer, a Rotor user can truly “personalize” their pedal stroke for greater power, over a greater range of the stroke. At $265, it’s a safe, inexpensive way to try and find that extra 3 percent.

LAVA

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HIGH & TIGHT Don’t sell yourself short by training in your tri shorts. Jump on the bib bandwagon before your next long ride.

By Mark Deterline

JAY PRASUHN

More and more cyclists and triathletes are recognizing the comfort and performance benefits of cycling bibs.

EVERYBODY’S DOING IT.

It’s always easy to find humor in the clothing and customs of an unfamiliar sport. Somehow cowboys and downhill skiers get away with their getups. Cyclists aren’t so lucky—skinny people in Lycra make the perfect butt of a joke.

Then there’s the pad inside cycling shorts.

Skeptics and the uninitiated sometimes refer

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to the typical chamois as a diaper, though it generally only takes one long ride to convince a budding cyclist that the chamois is a decades-long standard for a reason. Training in tri shorts is no way to spend any significant amount of time on a bike.

Ironically, overcoming one’s initial fear of Lycra and a chamois is only the beginning.

Sooner or later it comes time to talk about what often proves an even bigger psychological hurdle: graduating to bib shorts. The good news is that most reputable manufacturers offer excellent men’s and women’s models, and more and more cyclists are recognizing the comfort and performance benefits of bibs.

CHECK MATE

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Don’t Go Half Way. Bibs are the builtin, suspender-like shoulder straps—usually made of breathable mesh fabric—that are sewn into the top panels of Lycra shorts. They are designed to keep cycling bottoms where they belong: pulled up high and tight against your

a CHamOis iNsERt is dEsigNEd tO sNug agaiNst yOuR mOst dEliCatE CONtOuRs. if CyCliNg sHORts slip aNd slidE agaiNst yOuR sKiN, tHEy aRE NOt WORKiNg as iNtENdEd.

crotch. A chamois insert is designed to snug against your most delicate contours in order to serve as a second padded skin. If cycling shorts slip and slide against your skin, they are not working as intended.

Bike saddle manufacturers have made huge strides in the ergonomic nature of their products over the last several years, as have cycling clothlavamagazine.com

ing brands in the design of their paneling and inserts. One technical feature of high-end bottoms that seems to trump all others in performance circles is the bib, as it is the only way to ensure that cycling shorts serve as a frictionless second skin and keep a chamois insert in place.

Keeping it high and tight is crucial for comfort across genders because when you get out of the saddle to accelerate or hammer up a climb, snagging the back or inner-thigh panels of cycling shorts becomes a big nuisance.

over or UnDer tHe fence? A major consideration for both men and women is the ability to pee without getting undressed. Shorts wearers, especially women, like to emphasize that even if bibs represent potential comfort and performance benefits, there is a downside.

It’s not as big a deal for dudes. Some of the bibs we photographed and road tested are designed with a front bib section that can be pulled down pretty far so that men can go “over the fence”. Sometimes it requires guys to lean over a bit, but especially Capo’s Padrone bibs are stretchy enough, and cut sufficiently low, as to make it pretty easy.

Women don’t have it as easy, though manufacturers are making progress.

evolUtion is tHe revolUtion.

Since women actually represent a faster-growing consumer group for manufacturers, many brands are not only offering female-specific chamois inserts, they are designing bib straps better suited for a woman’s chest. The straps themselves are contoured differently, and some are adjustable or fully detachable.

Pearl Izumi offers a plastic buckle to pull straps narrower between the breasts, but our female tester found it more comfortable just to leave the buckle undone. Capo turns the bib portion of their Cipressa model into a fullon baselayer tank, which our tester did find comfortable, though too hot in summer riding conditions.

Hincapie (via a buckle) and ASSOS (via a loop and hook system) allow girls to undo one side of the bib system at the waist, yet both solutions still represent a fair amount of work; the freed end still needs to be pulled out and then threaded back into a jersey.

Our female tester liked several of the femalespecific chamois inserts. The ASSOS chamois, as well as the overall fit of the Mille model she tried was very comfortable, but she noted that the ASSOS chamois is much more comfortable when used with chamois cream.

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COMFORT FIRST

Still training in tri shorts? Time to move to bibs, with a unique ride that’ll renew your faith in day-long cycling comfort.

By Jay Prasuhn

SAMMY TILLERY

2XU Sublimated Cycle Bib Short $160; 2XU.com The company—one of the first to add compression to bibs— eschews it in this basic mens piece, but cuts no corners with a comfy, variable-density Fusion Pro chamois.

Louis Garneau Mondo Women’s Bib $170; Louisgarneau.com Bringing distance training comfort to the ladies, this 10-panel womens bib features Lycra panels for muscle support, with exceptionally breathable Carbon-X panels.

Pearl Izumi P.R.O. Octane $275; Pearlizumi.com Designed with the anatomical shape of the body as the driving factor, the Italian-made Octane sports a pre-formed chamois with four-way stretch and retains a very form-fitted cut, resulting in a remarkable second-skin feel.

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Hincapie Metric Women’s Bibshort $190; Hincapiesports.com A unique bib design and back closure buckle makes for an optimized women’s fit across the chest, while Hincapie’s elastic Gel Gripper keep those legs openings in place.

Castelli BodyPaint $250; Castelli-cycling.com This beautifully minimalistic Rosso Corsa level bib features minimal seams, seamless shoulder straps and fabric-knitted leg grippers.

It’s finished with a four-way stretch Progetto X chamois.

Assos T F1.Mille_S5 $259; Assos.com Named after the storied Italian Mille Miglia auto rally race, the Swiss-based company’s flagship bib is earmarked for distance riding, with its comfort-focused cut and world-renowned F1.

Mille_S5 chamois as the short’s signature calling cards.

GOmez

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HAPPy fEET Making sense of recent advances in footwear tech to find the shoe that’s built for you.

By Jordan Rapp

PHOTO cOurTesy NeWTON

Newton places four “lugs” at the bottom of the sole to encourage what it deems is a more natural, forefoot-first running style.

I

nitially, I was quite daunted by the prospect of writing an article on technology in footwear. Unlike a wheel or a bike frame, you can’t put a shoe in a wind tunnel to see if it’s fast. Shoes reside in the nebulous world of human perception. Most often, the best shoe for someone is the one that meets that requirement which gives all engineers nightmares—it “feels” the best; as the old adage goes, “if the shoe fits, wear it.” But it takes more than a rouslavamagazine.com

ing chorus of “Kumbaya” to make a shoe feel good, and the really clever folks in the shoe business realize that many seemingly qualitative measures of feeling have strong quantitative roots. In the simplest case, shoes feel light because they are. But what about shoes that feel “springy,” or “stable” or “supportive?”

In each case, these concepts are grounded in the technology and design of the shoe. Of course, a “supportive” shoe might be true love

to one runner, while the same shoe is odious to someone with the same build, foot structure and fitness. Every company will acknowledge that when it comes to a single shoe, you can’t please all of the people all of the time. And even an overarching approach to design might rub some people the wrong way, both literally and figuratively. But the variety of approaches makes for fascinating discussions about what technology (or technologies) a given manufac-

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photo courtesy NIKe

Nike’s popular (and light) Lunar Racer+ 2 has been a hit with long-distance athletes looking to shed a few extra ounces.

turer chooses to use and prioritize, and how and where they are willing to compromise.

According to Dave Jewell, Director of Footwear for Zoot, triathlon gives shoe designers a world “without baggage. There are no rules with triathlon. You can put anything into the market and see if it works.” For Jewell, the approach to shoe design is very much footcentric: Zoot’s most fundamental rule is that the shoe must “fit the foot.” The shape of the foot, tactile comfort and the idea that a shoe is, fundamentally, very much like a piece of technical clothing all mesh to define Zoot’s signature BareFit technology. BareFit eliminates seams inside the shoe and uses asymmetrical lacing, or no lacing at all, to envelop the natural contour of the foot. It’s an approach that makes a lot of sense for a company that got its start in the clothing business. According to Jewell, Zoot is an “ego-less” company, and the shoes have benefited from the expertise of the in-house clothing and wetsuit teams, who have taught the footwear team how to make better-fitting and lighter uppers, sew seams with less thread, and make the shoes fit more like a sock itself than something that a sockclad foot goes into. However, Zoot’s technology doesn’t only encompass what touches the foot: lavamagazine.com

what touches the ground and how it does so are also important. Every triathlete knows the stiff-legged sensation of running off the bike, a phenomenon Zoot graciously dubs “Tri-OMechanics.” The leaf spring–like CarbonSpan+ is designed to provide both left-right and foreaft stability, while the 10mm heel-toe drop of most of Zoot’s shoes, a slight departure from the 12mm drop that Jewell, who cut his teeth with Adidas Running in Germany, says is industry standard, helps support the way people actually run in transition. Jewell believes that you “don’t try to train mechanics,” and instead argues that the key is to provide a “better experience” for the runner. Making shoes that feel good without socks, that are comfortable to run in after cycling and that stand up to having sports drink and cola spilled all over them is more important and more feasible than trying to force someone to run a certain way.

Standing in stark contrast, at least on the topic of mechanics, is Newton Running. Newton wears its technological focus like a badge of honor, boasting over 13 worldwide and nine US patents on their shoes, shoes that cofounder Danny Abshire explicitly states, both in person and on NewtonRunning.com, “encourage proper running technique.” Newton’s trademarked Ac-

tion/Reaction Technology is designed to return some of the energy that is inherently lost when running in shoes as opposed to running barefoot. According to Abshire, lab tests show that “typical” running shoes cause runners to lose about 30 percent of the efficiency of their stride.

Most running shoes, he argues, are designed to impose a walking gait—heel strike transitioning to toe-off—as opposed to the natural running gait—a mid-foot strike followed by the heel briefly dropping to touch the ground—you’d see in someone running without shoes. Newton shoes feature a rigid plate underneath the metatarsals for enhanced proprioceptive and sensory feedback; the foot itself does not “perceive” any cushioning. Newtons rely on four mid-foot lugs pushing up into a hollow cavity in the sole while stretching a highly efficient elastic membrane to provide shock absorption, which Abshire is careful to point out is different from cushioning; shock absorption reduces the unnaturally high impact of running on a surface like blacktop or concrete, unlike cushioning, which Abshire argues serves only to introduce instability into an otherwise stable system by allowing excessive deformation directly under the foot. The lugbased Action/Reaction module has even been integrated into the bottoms of some prosthetic

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photo courtesy Zoot

A number of Zoot’s shoes, like the Tempo, feature a span of carbon down the center of the sole to improve the feel of the transition from heel to toe.

lower legs, including those used in the recordsetting half-marathon by a double amputee—a stellar 1:17. Everything about Newtons is designed to optimize the effectiveness of this core technology. Toe-heel differentials in Newtons range from 1.5mm in the race-oriented Distancia to 4mm in the transition-to-mid-foot Sir Isaac, by far the lowest differentials of any brand in the marketplace, which helps to recover the elastic energy generated by lower leg muscles as the heel drops to the ground following the mid-foot strike. Running this way is a requirement in the eyes of Newton. Abshire says, “Coaching form is an integral part of Newtons. You need to run a certain way. And we want to help you run that way.” Indeed, no other company has running clinics as an integral part of their business model.

It’s not just newcomers like Newton and Zoot, however, pushing the envelope on how shoes are made. The largest footwear brand in the world, Nike, has decided to return to its Bill-Bowerman-and-a-waffle-iron roots. Its latest creation—Lunarlon—is the “way forward,” according to EKIN technical rep Scott Meyer of Nike Canada. Lunarlon is comprised of a core made of Lunarlite, a low-density foam codeveloped with NASA, inside a more durable—but 30 percent heavier—outer Phylon or Phylite foam carrier. Lunarlon, along with the hyperflexible Free sole, form the core of Nike’s 21stcentury approach to shoe design and are as important to Nike as both Air and their original waffle sole technologies. As much as both technologies represent Nike’s future, there are lavamagazine.com

strong influences from past Nike classics such as the Sock Racer and Mariah in these new designs. Both Lunarlon and Free represent a big departure from Nike’s hallmark Air technology, but both underscore Nike’s current affirmation, repeatedly echoed by Meyer, that, “The foot controls the shoe; the shoe doesn’t control the foot.” According to Meyer, “Motion control is a dead category,” and dual-density posting, once the principal stability technology

TRiAThlOn givEs shOE dEsignERs A wORld wiThOuT bAggAgE. ThERE ARE nO RulEs. yOu cAn PuT AnyThing in ThE mARkET And sEE if iT wORks.

has shown that, despite its size, it’s still nimble enough to gently apply the brakes and change direction in the way it makes shoes.

As much as there is disagreement or, at least, three very distinct technological approaches to shoe design, the one area where there is universal agreement is on the importance of weight. The heaviest shoe in each company’s repertoire (or, in Nike’s case, the Lunarlon line) is approximately 11 ounces (U.S. men’s size 9), almost 20 percent lighter than many of the stalwart motion control shoe models, which often weigh 13 or even 14 ounces. Additional weight, which must be picked up over and over by the leg, needs to serve a purpose. According to the ad campaign for Nike’s featherweight racing flat, the Mayfly, every 100 g (approximately 3.5 ounces) requires an extra 1 percent in total energy expenditure. That’s significant, and it’s something that all three companies are keenly aware of. But just as they all approach shoe design differently, each also takes a different approach to reducing that weight. Zoot minimizes the amount and weight of material in the upper with their elastic and hydrophobic Dri-Lex fabric and minimal lacing, and drops the weight of the sole by introducing stability through the wafer-thin but very rigid CarbonSpan+. Newton uses a flat profile with a low heel and the unique lug-and-membrane technology to drop weight from the sole and uses mostly mesh construction to keep their uppers light. Nike worked with NASA to shave 30 percent off the weight of its previous proprietary foam and introduced the Flywire concept, built around high-strength tensile fibers, to maintain support in their newer, more minimal uppers.

While no technology will ever trump the sensation of a shoe fitting—at the risk of mixing metaphors—“like a glove,” the goal of all these new technologies is to create shoes that will keep you running happily, quickly and without injury, something that the shoe companies, at least, feel they have “down to a science.”

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in footwear design, is “now on life support.” All of the Lunarlon-based running shoes, with the exception of the extremely popular LunaRacer, feature Nike’s new Dynamic Support technology, which uses an internal foam wedge to provide support and stability. Dynamic Support is designed to replace old-school posting—which Meyer equates with “running a car into a brick wall”—with something that is more like “gently applying the brakes.” Certainly Nike

Jordan Rapp received his BSE in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering from Princeton University in 2002. As a professional triathlete, he is able to work as a true field engineer for the product development teams at Specialized Bicycle Components and Zipp Speed Weaponry. When not riding his bike, he can be found behind his laptop fulfilling his duties as the Chief Technology Officer for Slowtwitch.com.

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THICKER than water

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By Jay Prasuhn

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What happens (and past results show it could) if two of triathlon’s rising stars—Andreas and Michael Raelert—are side by side going into the final yards of the Hawaii Ironman?

LAVA traveled to their hometown of Rostock, Germany, and learned that despite their opposing personalities and individual accolades—from Olympic runs to world titles— the strength of their brotherly bond is their greatest achievement.

Photos by Donald Miralle

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“Go ahead and drink this—it’ll warm you up.”

Andreas Raelert pushes a hot mug of glühwein—a warm mulled wine—into my numb hands. “You’ll like it—I promise you,” he says with a reassuring smile. Sheepishly wrapping my fingers around the cup, I take a sip. True to his word, the concoction starts thawing me from the inside out.

Rostock is a small harbor community along the Baltic Sea in Northern Germany. The Raelerts have called Rostock home since their youth. While the late November conditions were familiar to them, a day of hauling heavy photo equipment across the town’s icy, windy and snowy coastal topography for LAVA photographer Don Miralle had sent my respiratory system spiraling out of control. As we set up at dusk at the Weihnachtsmarkt, a traditional German Christmas fair, I thawed while the two brothers—our photo subjects—did my work assisting Miralle. Embarrassed, I tried to reclaim the equipment.

“Come on, no, you’re our guests,” Michael said as two of the most talented triathletes in our sport today waved off my protests and scooped up hardware to move to the next locale.

I came away from this visit with the Raelerts intrigued. Historically, names like Zäck, Hellriegel, Leder and Stadler elicited an air of invincibility for Germans in multisport, earning them a reputation for displaying brute power on grand stages—which the reigning Kona runner-up (Andreas) and two-time Ironman 70.3 World Champ (Michael) have demonstrated a remarkable affinity for delivering.

But unlike the aforementioned names, the Raelerts belie their national reputation.

Instead of a confident bravado, there exists a boyish aw-shucks attitude with each. Now that they’ve garnered attention on the world stage, scored solid sponsorships and gained a global following, Michi (pronounced “Mickey”) and Andi, as they refer to one another, still retain their small-town, blue-collar values.

The two embarked on a German press tour immediately after Kona and Clearwater by driving across the country in their own car. Everywhere they went in Rostock, the two were met with hugs by friends, schoolmates and

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businessmen. And while the rest of the tri world amasses in Boulder, San Diego or Australia’s Gold Coast, the Raelerts make their base in this tiny northern European town. “We feel at home in Rostock,” Andreas says. “Our family is here; this is our base. It’s important to have a place to call home.”

A restaurateur later leans in to tell Miralle during dinner: “We’re very, very proud of these two.” That is becoming evident. And it’s not because they’ve been suddenly thrust to the forefront of triathlon’s royalty.

Let there be no question: Andreas

and Michael Raelert are the future of distance triathlon, here and now. While the sport’s pro level has experienced tension (see Chris McCormack’s dustups with Normann Stadler and Faris Al-Sultan) or been staid (see Craig Alexander’s titles—remarkable, but without any great ceremony), Ironman is in the throes of the Raelert Era, with a brothers-at-the-top story no one can touch. And it’s none other than reigning Ironman World Champ McCormack who’s ushering in the new era. “These guys are just different to the traditional German Ironman mold, and it’s refreshing,” McCormack says. “I can’t speak more highly of these two guys; they’re

“bRoThERhood iS ThE STRongEST bond yoU cAn hAvE. i nEEd michi, And michi nEEdS mE. i coUldn’T do ThiS AnymoRE wiThoUT him.”

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friendly, competitive and driven. In a single word: class. I think they are the special guys this sport needs.”

While it’s their comparatively high aerobic thresholds and reliable training partnership that gives Team Raelert the edge on their competitors, the key dynamic that makes the duo the most formidable one-two in their sport is that they’re very much their own men.

Andreas, 34, the older brother, is the quiet, analytical, thoughtful one.

With tousled hair and eyes like dark gemstones, he speaks with deliberate, thoughtful concision. It’s no surprise he crafted Michael’s training program for the last few years, and happily shoulders the burden of responsibility for his brother’s results, good or bad. Michael says Andreas has the greater capacity for heavy, painful training workloads, and is the stronger of the two in the mental game. “He never gets tired—and if he does, he’ll never tell you.”

On the other hand, you have Michael. Whip-thin with blond spikes atop his short-cropped head, he’s the antithesis to his older brother.

Michael’s award speeches are quickly becoming a show you don’t want to miss; he generally launches into anecdote, but goes off on several tangents, forgetting—then quickly remembering—details along the

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way, as his 120-mile-per-hour mind is tripped up by a 40-mile-per-hour tongue. Andreas says Michael loves to race as much as he can, and has a definitive edge during their forest speedwork sessions. Says the big brother: “He has this, this … extra gear.”

But unlike most training partners, each would step in front of a bullet for the other. “A lot of people say we are pretty much like twins, but we are completely different,” Andreas says. “But what is great is we have each other to share moments. Brotherhood is the strongest bond you can have. I need Michi, and Michi needs me. I couldn’t do this anymore without him.”

There is actually one trait they share: a piercing gaze. As Andreas finishes his sentence, the two brothers glance at one another in a knowing, loving, brotherly way. It’s the singular feature that convinces you beyond a shadow of a doubt that when Andreas says Michael has an “extra gear” that will show in Kona, he means it. Or Michael’s sincere belief that he can go under eight hours in Kona—despite not having done a single Ironman. It can be viewed by the most cynical as either ludicrous or recklessly brazen—or both—in most contexts. But strangely, in this instance, it’s quite believable.

After quickLy finding success in age-group racing and being selected for the German national junior program (taking second at ITU Junior Worlds in 1996), Andreas was first to go pro over a decade ago on the ITU circuit. As ever, success is hard-won, and never comes in spades on the taxing world tour, but although he had his ups and downs on the world short-course program, he was always deemed a threat. “Andreas was always a gentleman with a big smile who was quietly plotting how to kick my ass,” says 2000 Olympic Triathlon gold medalist Simon Whitfield, “... just an exceptional person and athlete.” The successes, including a 12thplace finish at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games and a sixth-place result in the ’04 Athens Games, are some of his finest memories.

But North American media had scarcely heard of the 34-year-old German, as countrymen like Stephan Vuckovic and Daniel Unger took bigger billing. Raelert’s last years of ITU racing were marred by inconsistent results and a few injuries, and he decided to move to longcourse racing when he was bypassed by the German Triathlon Union to represent the country for the Beijing Games in 2008.

Conversely, his arrival on the long-course scene in 2008 was anything but inconspicuous. He began by earning a Clearwater (and Kona)

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spot by winning the then sole 70.3 Kona qualifier at Ironman 70.3 Monaco. Interest was piqued when Raelert logged a supersonic 1:10 run on his way to a runner-up finish (nearly chasing down winner Terenzo Bozzone) at the 2008 Ironman 70.3 World Championships in Clearwater.

Two weeks later, the interest doubled: Andreas won his first Ironman on debut—Ironman Arizona—on the heels of a blazing 2:46 marathon.

From there, success grew like a rolling snowball: a third-place finish in Kona in 2009 was followed by a remarkable 2010 campaign, highlighted by a definitive bike breakaway victory over chief foe Chris McCormack at Ironman Germany. It finished with an epic battle with McCormack in the closing miles of the marathon in Kona, where Andreas succumbed late in the race to take second.

But even before Andreas’ early Ironman success, the news was out that he was not the only Raelert to keep an eye on. As far back as 2008 word was lavamagazine.com

spreading: “if you think Andreas is good, you should see his little brother.”

Andreas’ junior by four years, the 30-year-old Michael also began his pro career on the ITU circuit. But after three years of varying results, he stepped off the ITU merry-go-round, disillusioned by the baggage that came with the circuit. “Like Andi, (the Olympics) was one of my biggest goals, and I would have given my left hand for it,” Michael says as he shakes his head. “The Olympics are a political thing with federations, and if you’re not in the federation and going by their rules, doing the races they decide for you, you don’t have a shot. I didn’t want to wonder what it’s worth to lose your freedom just to go to the Olympics. So three years ago, I changed my mind.”

So as Andreas was penetrating Ironman distance events, his brother began on the 70.3 circuit. And like his big brother, success came at the flip of a switch. In 2009 the wiry, unassuming “other Raelert brother,” sporting

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low-slung tri shorts, lined up in Clearwater and clinically shredded the field, using a 1:09 half marathon (one minute faster than his brother’s time from the previous year) to claim the 70.3 World crown his brother so nearly snagged the year before.

Skeptics speculated that his spectacular run split and subsequent win were due to Clearwater’s flat topography—that he’d be exposed on a truer course, and the story would be different if he were to race on a “real” course like Wildflower or 70.3 Oceanside. So Michael came to America—and left with all the hardware. After joining the Trek/K-Swiss squad in Los Angeles for team camp, he stuck around to systematically embarrass a field that included Rasmus Henning, Matt Reed and Tim O’Donnell at the season opener in Oceanside, Calif. He chased that by claiming the coveted Wildflower title, winning wire to wire. And it wasn’t just that he won, it was how he won: by taking off on the hilly bike course, leaving no doubt that his

world champion stripes were of true merit. “People ask, ‘oh, why didn’t you do this race here or there, why did you go to Oceanside or Wildflower?’”

Michael says. Andreas adds: “We always want to race against the best. We wanted to show we could go outside Germany and race against the best at the biggest races.” Of course, he closed last season with an appropriately dominant showing to successfully defend his 70.3 world title.

As we walked down Kröpeliner Straße, through Rostock’s Weihnachtmarkt Christmas festival at dusk, Michael reflected on the fun benefits of being world champion. Little things like custom bike paint jobs. “Trek was gonna get something for me special for Clearwater, a special bike, but there was not enough time,” Michael said. “I think they’re gonna do something for next year with the rainbow worlds stripes—but I think they have to change the colors around because the UCI was making problems about guys like Crowie with the rainbow on his jersey. Ah, whatever they lavamagazine.com

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do with my new bike, I’ll be happy.”

While trivial stuff like paint jobs capture the interest of the guys, McCormack says not to underestimate their youthfulness for innocence; both have far more experience and wisdom than most people know. Nobody cakewalks to success in distance racing, and the Raelert boys have certainly cut their teeth. “I really think they have a solid understanding of the difficulties of this sport and learned that on the ITU racing circuit, where success is very difficult and you experience failure much more than you enjoy success,” McCormack said. “It gives you a broader perspective and this is definitely what these two guys have. They have what they need working together—both these guys are capable of anything.”

In two short years, both crossed into a new light: a European Ironman title for Andreas, two 70.3 world titles for Michael. And as Michael steps up to Ironman this year, the promise begins to grow. Triathlon has had its sibling pairings, from the Puntous twins to the DeBooms and Lietos.

But you have to think bigger—think Serena and Venus Williams in tennis, cycling’s Schleck brothers, or NFL’s Peyton and Eli Manning to get a greater scope of how far up the talent pole these guys reside. Never before has triathlon seen two siblings possessing equal promise of winning triathlon world crowns in the way these guys have. Team Raelert is suddenly the strongest team in triathlon. lavamagazine.com

the sport’s future poster boys want to take us on a city tour, and Michael announces that the mayor has given us carte blanche to shoot anywhere in town. As we drive away from the college Michael attends, past Andreas’ flat and the pool where the two swim, we make a visit to Michael’s modest but contemporarily designed two-story apartment that he shares with girlfriend Mona and their dog Jenna.

The brothers explain that Rostock was part of East Germany, a port town with a Russian Army enclave before the Berlin Wall was dissolved in 1989.

Since then, the town has stratified and found its identity; Michael points out the old Russian-style homes in one neighborhood, the stunted ’80s stylings near the waterfront and the more updated college neighborhood, which makes up the majority of the city and is where Michael and Andreas make their homes. “When the wall came down, so much of the talented industry people moved west to the big cities, and I moved with our parents to Hamburg when we were young,” Michael explains. “But Andi stayed here, and I came back here when we started racing—this is our home.”

To answer the question: yes, the Raelert brothers fight. In fact, a pair of boxing gloves helped settle differences when they were young. “Just this morning we’re moving Andi into his new flat, and we were yelling at each other about how to move a piece of furniture in—I was like ‘let’s do it my way,’ and he wanted to do it a different way—for five minutes we didn’t

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talk,” Michael says with a smile, eyes rolling to his brother, who was shaking his head in concert. Our photographer suggests dusting off the gloves for the shoot. “No, no, that’s not who we are anymore,” Andreas says. “We look out for one another more than we complain with each other.”

Good thing, especially since apart from being the perfect training partners, Andreas serves as Michael’s coach. In the past, Michael had a hard time following a plan with diligence. But when your self-coached older brother wins his first Ironman and podiums in Kona in his second, it becomes easy to trust that he knows his stuff. So, as it was when the two were younger, little brother follows big.

“I am always frustrated in training, saying ‘shit, I don’t know how good I am,’ but then I see Andi came second in Kona, and so I go ‘dammit, I actually can win Clearwater again, because I know I can compare the training. I love to help Andi in training and see how he gets better, and then I know I get an advantage training with him too.”

“This is The canal where i did my firsT TriaThlon,” Andreas says, glancing down a narrow inlet leading to the Bering Sea on Rostock’s Warnemünde coastline. Flanked on either side by cod-fishing boats, the dark waters look as inviting as an ice bath. “I did it in 1992, after I saw a documentary about the Hawaii Ironman.

When I saw this, I said to myself ‘I used the bike to go to school, and running was a workout when I was a swimmer. To put it all together?

It must be fun.’” lavamagazine.com

Like most younger brothers, Michael followed in his brother’s footsteps to have fun too, and went on to win that Rostocker Triathlon. And as the two grew from age groupers to become the professionals they are today, it went from fun to nerve-racking—and not just in the races.

“At every race, I’m freakin’ nervous,” Michael says. “It’s like ‘the cards are on the table and we’re playing,’ but I get like this same sensation in training.” Andreas chimes in, “Even if we’re by ourselves, nobody is watching us, even I get nervous.”

Nervous in training? “When we do our speedwork, for that half-hour warm-up, we won’t even talk to each other. And afterward, it’s like ‘hey, why did we stress out so much?” But it’s always like this. Of course we have fun sessions on the bike and run, but there’s always these workouts where we get so nervous. We want to focus 100 percent on them.”

how To become an icon, sTep one: be passionaTe. Michael is tripping over his words again.

At dinner, chatter drifts to triathlon as a passion. “What we really love about the sport is that it’s hard to find a sport where the amateurs, masters and pros are competing together,” Andreas says. “The difference is the time at the end, but everyone goes through the same experience, and it’s not made up in the media.”

Michael kicks in. “Like baseball, like soccer, like football: I like these sports, but it’s entertainment, you know? You go to a game, you watch it and you go home. This is what we talk about; with triathlon, you watch

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054 : FEATURES

nEvER bEFoRE hAS TRiAThlon SEEn Two SiblingS poSSESSing EqUAl pRomiSE oF winning TRiAThlon woRld cRownS in ThE wAy ThESE gUyS hAvE.

it, go home and say ‘this looks pretty tough’ and maybe it creates an idea, and something changes in your mind, and tomorrow you wake up and go, ‘I might go running,’ and … and … Dammit, I forgot what I wanted to say!”

We all laugh, and Michael apologizes for his tongue getting ahead of his brain. “Sorry—sometimes I get like this when I talk about triathlon!”

He regains his thought: “We talked with a potential sponsor a few days ago, and he says, ‘Triathlon is a little sport, like a hobby.’ We explained to him it’s a lifestyle sport. With triathlon, you can get into the community and change lives; people change their diets, their attitudes. It’s a sport for life—but it’s not even sport. It’s hard to explain in English—I hope you know what I mean?”

Loud and clear, we get it: this sport is more than a sport.

The unbreakable bond.

“Andi tried to pass this to me in Clearwater 300 meters before the finish,” Michael says, rolling a simple gold ring across his fingers, “but I couldn’t stop—I was so freaked out about getting caught—so he gave it to me at the finish.”

The ring—or rather, rings—were their mother’s idea and were crafted late last year, a visual symbol of the brotherly bond Michael, Andreas and their other brother, Sven-Peter, share. The story? “Our mother had some old rings from our grandmother, and eight years ago I won a small piece of gold at a race,” Andreas says. “It was her idea to melt it all together, so we took it to the jeweler and had them made.” Each piece is the same: a subtle hammered exterior, and an interior bearing the inscription: RAELERT BROTHERS. “These rings have nothing to do with triathlon: there’s so much more behind this—it’s a pure family thing.”

“It’s a connection for the three of us,” Michael says. “When we’re racing on the other side of the world, my other brothers are with me.”

That connection was visible last fall in Clearwater at the awards banquet for the Ironman 70.3 Worlds. Michael approached the lectern as men’s champ to deliver his comically rambling speech, but closed with a heartwarming thank-you to his coach: Andreas. “Finally, I have to

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thank my brother Andi—I wouldn’t be anything in this sport if it wasn’t for him, and owe him so much. I say 50 percent of this win is because of me, and 50 percent is because of him. And, he’s just a good brother—I love you Andi.”

“I think more and more about this relationship between Andi and I, and it reminds me of when we had two dogs: an older dog and a newer dog,” Michael says with a smile, giving his dog a rough scrub on the head. “The younger dog who learned all the commands—like sit and play dead—we didn’t have to show him, he just learned it. I realized that Andi didn’t have someone to show him how triathlon works. There was no mentor, no master.” And no preconceived notions, which makes Michael’s adherence to his brother’s coaching pretty easy—like the newer dog. “It’s my advantage—I just have to follow his steps. I can’t really explain, but Andi has always gone his own way, so I give all my credit to him. He’s kind of a pioneer with both of our careers.”

Some questioned Andreas’ decision to keep his younger brother on the Kona sidelines last year, calling it perhaps selfish. In unison, the two shoot down this idea. “I could see how people might think I could have this little advantage on Michi, ” Andreas says. “The decision wasn’t really difficult, and we made it together.”

And lest there be any inference that the coach/sibling relationship will be strained in 2011 when both are training for the same Kona goal, you can forget that too. “We don’t compete against each other,” Andreas says. “It doesn’t matter. This is our dream. Our passion.”

Coaching your brother makes things trickier for Andreas—but at the same time, simpler; since Michael is a close genetic copy of himself, he can read the other’s feelings—sometimes before Michael even feels them. Not many other coaches can predict fatigue and energy the way Andreas can of his sole student. And vice versa. “I’m 100 percent responsible for Michi’s performance, and he believes in me 100 percent,” Andreas says. “It’s not easy; when it’s not working, it’s my responsibility to sort out why it didn’t work. But it’s unique; if something

Photo: Eric Wynn

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056 : FEATURES is not working for me, I know it’s definitely not working for Michi too.

That is our benefit.”

The sub-eighT Kona dream. It wasn’t without irony that it was two Germans who sought a sit-down with McCormack—one of the most calculated mental practitioners the sport has seen—last year at Ironman Germany. Recall, if you will, McCormack’s verbal sparring sessions with Normann Stadler and Faris Al-Sultan through the years.

But despite his reputation, Macca was fairly forthcoming when the two asked to chat with him. It was an enlightening discussion, one that they’ll doubtless find poignant now that “Raelert” is among the marquee names with crosshairs on their backs at any race on the planet.

“Macca told Andi and I a nice thought,” Michael recalls. “At one point, people don’t want to go for the title; they want to go for your head. They want to be able to say, ‘I beat Michael Raelert,’ or ‘I beat Andi Raelert.’ It’s more important to them to do this than to win the race. It’s not smart, but it’s true. You want to win sportingly and not have an excuse about ‘oh, he got

AndREAS FEElS ThERE ExiSTS SomEThing in hiS bRoThER ThAT coUld bE ThE kEy To Unlocking A konA win FoR A RAElERT—And noT EvEn nEcESSARily himSElF.

in my mind.’ If you want to be the winner, the icon, you have to battle this.”

That short conversation also featured a theme that planted a seed in the minds of the brothers: risk. McCormack’s message: champions don’t sit in and wait for others to fold. They take a chance—at the risk of wild failure that the press and critics are all too eager to jump on—to make their fate. That weekend, Andreas took the talk to heart and seized on that chance, riding away from the early bike pack, and beat McCormack straight up on the Frankfurt course.

“Chris was right, you have to risk something, and that’s the path Michi and I have to follow,” Andreas says. “Everybody talks about risking something to win a race, but to do it? It’s your decision, it’s your risk. I’m not sure if it works, but we will see. If you don’t even try, you’re never gonna know.

And at the end, you can always say ‘I tried my best, and that’s what I got.’”

The camaraderie among competitors is downright refreshing. “I reckon Macca likes us because we are not complaining, we don’t have excuses at any race,” Michael says. “We both have a lot of respect for him.” Andreas said that the lack of excuses fuels him. “Every professional wants to win, but it’s important for me—for us—to give the best performance. I am so happy with each of my Kona races, because I gave my all, and have no excuses. The fact is Crowie and Chris (Lieto), and last year Chris (McCormack) were just better.”

Until now, each brother has enjoyed their own stage for success, with Andreas taking accolades on the Ironman venue, and Michael simply dominating the 70.3 circuit. But this season Michael is stepping up to the Ironman.

And what about this sub-eight Kona rumor? Yes, Michael had once uttered the unthinkable: that he believes he can turn in a sub-eight performance, in Kona, where it’s never been done. Only 13 men have accomlavamagazine.com

plished this feat in an Ironman-distance event (McCormack owns four of the 19 sub-eights since Lothar Leder first accomplished the feat in 1996).

Most were achieved on the ideal conditions of the Roth course in Germany—not in the windy and irrepressible heat of the Hawaiian Islands.

This from a guy who has yet to start and finish any Ironman-distance event.

His coach, however, is resolute.

“Michi and I believe in this chance,” Andreas says of his brother’s statement. “Someone can tell you ‘that’s your limit’ and maybe it is, but we say ‘I want to set my own limits.’”

Visibly animated, Michael interjects: “Everybody thinks it’s not possible to be under eight hours in Kona. Andi and I think, ‘Why not? Is it not possible because you say so?’ We just need someone breaking the limits, setting up new limits. I’m being respectful, but just because Mark Allen didn’t make it doesn’t mean I can’t make it, or Andi can’t make it.”

Andreas brings in the perfect parallel: Chrissie Wellington. “The best example for me is Chrissie,” he says. “I am 100-percent sure she has the same emotions we have. She gets afraid and says ‘can I do this?’ But she’s smart enough to say ‘it doesn’t matter—I’m going to try.’”

What makes the two—especially Andreas, as Michael’s coach and the reigning Kona runner-up—think such a feat is possible? Andreas feels that something in his brother exists that could be the key to unlocking a Kona win for a Raelert—and not even necessarily himself.

“In training, he has this extra gear, and in triathlon, when we talk about this extra gear, this momentum, it’s very individual,” Andreas says. “Everybody’s on the limit, but some athletes have the ability to find this extra speed. Javier Gómez. Alistair Brownlee. Jan Frodeno … Michi has this ability.”

And so our minds fast forward to what is conceivable in Kona this October. We pose a hypothetical situation: It’s the 2011 Hawaii Ironman, and Michael and Andreas Raelert have inconceivably run, together, away with the race. The two have three minutes on the closest rival as they make the final turn onto Ali’i Drive for the finish line. What happens? Who wins that sprint? Who decides to take the title from the other?

Michael paints a picture that could quite conceivably make for one of the most unforgettable finishes in Ironman history. “We run the last 100 meters as fast as we can, and it’s no secret—you won’t find a timing chip or transponder on us. We finish together. You won’t find one-two, you’ll only find one-one—it doesn’t matter who,” he says. “I wouldn’t do it with anybody else in the world—I’m competitive and I want to win. But at this point, I don’t care about a timing chip, we’d just go through. Someone would say one would win, but … it doesn’t matter.”

In Michael’s living room the two brothers smile at one another, knowing that they would concede the most coveted world distance triathlon crown—an act some might call sacrilegious and disrespectful to the title— for one another.

“Dreaming is not illegal, right?” Andreas asks. “To have this dream to finish together across the finish line, we have to be realistic—and we are, and you never know if it’s going to happen. But it is our goal. It is our dream. Even if I had a terrible race and saw him go off ahead and win in Kona, I would have the exact—the exact—same feeling if I was to win.”

Regardless of what happens for the brothers, it’s about sharing the experience, good or bad, together. “In general, this is pretty simple,” Michael says. “If you see something special, like a nice sunset, it’s fine, but if you have someone next to you, a friend … it’s double in your heart. This is how it is to race and train with my brother. We get this feeling all the time.”

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058 : FEATURES

Once an Olympic mountain biker, Austrian Michael Weiss has taken the triathlon world by storm in his few short years as a professional, but allegations of doping have followed him from his cycling days.

Weiss comes clean about where these allegations came from, his plans for the future, and why he doesn’t waste any time looking back.

A clEAn

slate

By Susan Grant-Legacki

lavamagazine.com

â?˜

Photography by Sammy Tillery

FEATURES : 059

R

oughly 15 years ago, 20 miles south of Vienna, at the Maria Enzersdorf Sportgymnasium school, an extraordinarily lanky teenage boy with prominent features and an ever-so-slightly cocky attitude stared out the window daydreaming. He wasn’t dreaming of a girl, or a sports car, or even a girl in a sports car. While the hormone-oozing teenagers around him reminisced about last weekend’s party, he dreamt about mountain biking the trails of Mt. Anninger, and, when his mind wandered deeper, he dreamed about podium finishes and Olympic medals. “I was definitely an outsider in high school,” remembers professional triathlete Michael Weiss,

lavamagazine.com

060 : FEATURES

who now, at age 30, has grown to a formidable 6 feet 3 inches and 175 pounds. “The other kids wanted to drink and hang out, but I had focused on mountain biking ever since my father took me riding for the first time when I was 12. I started seriously training at 15, and by 16 I had a coach and started racing as much as I could.”

Weiss secured his professional racing license and joined the Austrian national team at age 18, quickly climbing the ranks to become one of the top Austrian mountain bikers in the world. In 2004 he competed in the Olympic Games at Athens, and between 2005 and 2008 he had six World Cup top-10 finishes. However, the World Cup titles became fewer and farlavamagazine.com

ther between. Weiss’ unbelievable power output on the bike helped him consistently pedal past the smaller, more nimble athletes to impressive finishes, but his size was a liability on the course—a painful one. “I crashed a lot,” he says, rolling up his sleeves to display railroad track–like scars that circle his elbows so deeply in places you can almost see the outline of the tree limb he smacked into. “I had this really, really large aerobic engine but I realized I was just simply too big physically to really make it.”

By 2008, the boy who had centered his entire life on mountain biking and making the Austrian Olympic team realized he was at an impasse.

There’s often a fine line between stubbornness and focus, and up to

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062 : FEATURES

“WhEn Michi cAME To ME in 2008, hE Told ME hE WAnTEd To bE ThE bEST TRiAThlETE in EURopE, And EvEnTUAlly ThE WoRld.”

that point Weiss had walked that line effortlessly during his career as a mountain biker. “The first time I met Michi in 2005 I was just taken aback by his energy and optimism,” says Leslie Klein, who runs the American office for Weiss’ longtime sponsor, the German-based power meter company SRM. “I knew right away he had what it takes to be an elite athlete.”

When Weiss began to feel that his focus and energy were waning, it was as if the floor had fallen out from underneath him. “I couldn’t handle the stress that comes every four years with trying to make the Olympic team,” he says. For a while he tried to make a go of it as a road racer, competing in several regional road races in an attempt to make the Austrian Olympic cycling team. On July 3, 2008, he toed the line in what would be his last mountain bike race—and he hated it. Several of lavamagazine.com

his friends had been urging him to try an XTERRA triathlon, and the day after the mountain bike race he did—and won it by 20 minutes. “Something in my head just clicked,” he remembers. “I felt like I should have been doing triathlon all along.”

And just like that, his daydreams shifted from Olympic podiums to lava fields.

“When Michi came to me in 2008, he told me he wanted to be the best triathlete in Europe and eventually the world,” says his coach, Mario Huys. “He had this straight line of thinking; he knew exactly where he wanted to go and it was kind of refreshing for me. He had just the right amount of work ethic and naivete to really be successful and a good match with me.”

064 : FEATURES

Jay Prasuhn

At the inaugural Ironman St George last May, Weiss stormed through the extremely challenging bike course in 4:43:01, more than 10 minutes faster than the rest of the top-five men.

Right off the bat, Weiss saw results: a first-place finish in his firstever half-Iron-distance race in Austria, a second-place finish at the XTERRA World Championships in Maui and a runner-up finish behind Andreas Raelert at the 2008 Ironman 70.3 Monaco, which secured him a slot at the 2009 Ironman World Championship. From the beginning Weiss focused squarely on making it to Kona, and when Greg Welch playfully called him “Wiki-Miki” at the 2009 Hawaii Ironman prerace press conference (in reference to both his speed on the bike and the airport express shuttle at the Honolulu airport called the Wiki-Wiki), Weiss loved the nickname so much that he adopted it as his personal brand for both his logo and website address (Wiki-miki.com). “It’s just really clear that Michi found the right sport,” says Klein. “His power on the bike is harnessed in a much better way, and it turns out he is also a fantastic runner.”

But the switch to triathlon didn’t come without some hardship for the tall, gregarious Austrian. Two days after Weiss’ 25th-place finish at the 2009 Ironman World Championship (which happened to be both his first marathon and full Ironman), a story came out in the Austrian newspaper lavamagazine.com

Kleine Zeitung loosely linking him to Austrian cyclist Bernhard Kohl, who was stripped of his third-place finish at the 2008 Tour de France after testing positive for the blood booster CERA. In the article, Kohl accused Weiss of visiting the Vienna laboratory Humanplasma in 2005. Humanplasma came under intense scrutiny after the 2006 Turin Olympics, when allegations were made that the center aided in various athletes’ blood doping activities.

In 2009 Kohl testified against his former manager Stefan Matschiner, saying he had given him and several other athletes performance-enhancing drugs and, among other things, secured them access to blood centrifuges. Matschiner was found guilty of being in violation of Austria’s anti-doping laws, and was given a 15-month suspended prison sentence. Among the athletes implicated by Kohl were Italian cyclist Pietro Caucchioli and Austrian ITU athlete Lisa Hütthaler, who were both suspended and subsequently retired from competition.

Once Kohl was found guilty and retired from cycling, he began a verbal purging of more than 20 athletes’ names, going so far as to tell Fanhouse. com in October of 2010 that the Tour de France could not be won without

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066 : FEATURES

the assistance of performance-enhancing drugs. His allegations during 2009 and 2010 against several Austrian athletes sent the country’s media into a frenzy, and put intense pressure on the newly formed Nationale Anti-Doping Agentur Austria (NADA) to investigate his claims.

The athletes who tested positive were swiftly suspended, but those unfortunate enough to even be named by Kohl saw their reputations stained despite any concrete evidence of wrongdoing. NADA slowly began going down the list of Austrian athletes Kohl had named, but at the start of the 2010 racing season no investigation into Weiss had been formally opened.

Weiss was confident that the controversy wouldn’t cast a cloud over his budding career as a triathlete, because, as he puts it, he simply had nothing to hide. “This man was naming a lot of names, and he was getting paid by newspapers to do it. My name stuck out for the media because I was getting well known in Austria as a triathlete at the time. I knew the truth would come out eventually.”

Huys, who always looks at the background of his athletes before agreeing to take them on as a client, had a serious talk with Weiss about his past. “I won’t work with people who cheat—period—and so I asked Weiss straight out if any of the allegations were true,” Huys says.

“I wouldn’t have taken him on if I thought for a second he wasn’t a completely clean athlete. I trust him.”

Despite the Kohl controversy, Weiss felt on top of the world at the end of 2009, and it wasn’t just because of triathlon. Two days before the 2009 Hawaii Ironman, while waiting in line at Lava Java, Weiss met a woman, Kim Cole, who was also competing in that year’s race in the 50-54 agegroup category. She invited him to sit down with her and her daughter, Rachel, who had flown out from Boston to watch her mother race. “I fell in love with Rachel while eating my carrot cake,” laughs Weiss.

In typical Weiss fashion, once he saw something he wanted, he didn’t let a thing like the Atlantic Ocean stand in his way. “With Michi it’s just 110 percent in whatever direction he’s heading at that moment; that’s just who he is,” Klein says. lavamagazine.com

Weiss showed he can do more than just ride a bike in St. George. He added an extra five minutes to his lead on the run, posting the fastest marathon of the day (2:58:03).

Two days after the race Rachel flew home to Boston, and Weiss flew to Maui for the XTERRA World Championship. As soon as he landed he called Rachel and invited her to fly back to Maui to be with him. Mario Huys’ longtime friend Chuck Gerson of Encinitas, Calif., is Weiss’ West Coast homestay, and he remembers getting a call from Weiss a few days after Kona. “He told me, ‘Sell my race wheels, Uncle Chuck, I gotta get this girl back to Hawaii!’

And so I did.” After a week together in Maui, Weiss flew back to Boston with Rachel and spent Christmas with her family. A month later they moved to Colorado Springs, Colo., so he could focus on triathlon training at the Olympic Training Center. This past Christmas Eve, Weiss proposed to Rachel in front of her parents. “I am a lucky man,” Weiss says. “Rachel is a gift.”

In May of 2010 Weiss received another gift in the form of his first Ironman title at the inaugural Ironman St. George in Utah, his second Ironman ever. It had been dubbed one of the most difficult Ironman courses to debut in years, and Weiss’ ability to push the pace on the bike was unparalleled.

Averaging 300 watts and between 90 and 93 rpms over the hilly 112-mile bike course, Weiss also proved his mettle on the run by holding a 6:48 pace for a total marathon time of 2:58:03. Weiss crossed the tape more than 12 minutes ahead of second-place finisher Ben Hoffman in 8:40:08.

Hot off his Ironman win, Weiss flew to Austria to compete in the Ironman 70.3 race in St. Pölten, just outside of Vienna. On May 25, five days before the race, NADA announced it was officially opening an investigation into Kohl’s claims against Weiss dating back to 2005. Weiss immediately hired lawyers who, based on the fact there was no physical evidence, kept him from being suspended from starting the race. He went on to finish in sixth place.

Weiss says he believes they waited until a week before the race in order to get more media coverage, but by the time the news hit the United States in July it had taken on a whole new meaning. Weiss had applied in 2010 to transfer his professional membership from the Austrian Triathlon Federation to the USAT and to be added to the World Triathlon Corporation’s Registered Testing Pool of pro athletes. When the WTC

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“LAST SUmmER wAS ToUgh FoR mE. I jUST wAnTEd To RAcE And I wAS TIREd oF EvERyonE ThInkIng my InvESTIgATIon hAd AnyThIng To do wITh TRIAThLon.”

received word about Weiss’ investigation in early July, they, as per their professional athlete drug testing protocols, suspended Weiss from competition until his NADA hearing, which was scheduled for late September. Rumors swirled that his Ironman title would be stripped; that he had had a positive test and that he wouldn’t be racing in Kona.

“Because he had won St. George in May, I think many people speculated his suspension had something to do with that race,” says Kate Mittelstadt, the director of the WTC’s anti-doping services. “The investigation had nothing to do with his triathlon career, and it’s safe for me to say that he was tested in 2010 and there weren’t any adverse tests.”

Weiss returned to Colorado Springs, and, as focused as ever, put his head down and prepared for Hawaii. “Weiss has a good group of friends here who know who he is and who he isn’t,” Klein says. “He also has Rachel. He never really brought up the investigation to me but instead he just kept on training.”

Huys admits Weiss was concerned in the months leading up to Kona, but only because he was worried he wouldn’t be cleared in time to race. “I told him he had to realize that these people he races against and even the people who said lies about him were his colleagues, not his friends. They can destroy you only if you have something to hide,” Huys said.

Weiss kept his worries mostly to himself and to Huys, which, according to Gerson is just the Weiss way. “I’ve had a lot of athletes come and stay at my house, and none of them have had the personality that he has,” Gerson said. “He’s just got this real, shining, bright personality and I’ve never met anyone who, once they met him, just didn’t absolutely love being around him.”

Even when sitting down to talk with that dreaded of all topics—doping allegations—Weiss’ upbeat personality remains intact. “Investigalavamagazine.com

tions into athletes happen more than I think people know, and I think they should because that’s why we all get tested all of the time—and I get tested a lot,” he laughs. “Last summer was tough for me. I just wanted to race and I was tired of everyone thinking my investigation had anything to do with triathlon.”

On September 27, less than two weeks before race day in Hawaii, NADA’s investigation into Weiss ended when the primary witness, Bernhard Kohl, didn’t show up at the hearing. All charges were dropped. The WTC reinstated Weiss as an eligible athlete, and he was cleared to race at the 2010 Ironman World Championship a little more than a week before race day.

Crossing the finish line in an impressive 13th place, Weiss sprinted into Rachel’s arms and planted a kiss on her that lasted well into the awkward-for-everyone-else-watching phase. The boy couldn’t help it.

It had been a roller-coaster year; a year full of rumors, suspensions, wins and uncertainties. Two weeks later he finished in third place at the XTERRA World Championships, and on January 1, 2011, he was accepted into the WTC’s Registered Testing Pool of Athletes.

With no allegations to defend against, a bride-to-be and an Ironman title to defend, Weiss is where he is the most comfortable—focused squarely on the future. Weiss says he doesn’t think a win in Kona is possible quite yet, but over the next several years he hopes to get closer and closer. “I want to be respectful of my body and just grow with this sport. I love it so much and I’m so happy to have all of these opportunities, I just want to do it for as long as I can,” he says.

Huys says the sky is the limit for his Austrian überbiker. “There will always be a finger pointed at him because of his past,” says Huys. “But all he and I can do is move forward with his training and continue to be Scan with smartphone honest. We will show everyone what he can do.” & link directly to video LAVA

Photo: ŠJohn Segesta

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070 : FEATURES

EXTREME MAKEOVER

By Brad Culp

For 70.3 WorLDs

After five seasons, the Ironman 70.3 World Championship trades the flat and frantic course on Florida’s Gulf Coast for a ridiculously challenging venue in the desert outside of Vegas. We look back at five mostly memorable years in Clearwater and ahead to what is sure to be a hit debut in Sin City.

“C

learwater is moving to Vegas, but you can’t tell anyone for two weeks,” said my publisher about two weeks before news went public that in 2011 the Foster Grant Ironman World Championship 70.3 would be transplanted from its original location in Clearwater Beach, Fla., to a new home just outside of Las Vegas. Fourteen days was a long time to keep such a secret safe.

This was great news. I had to tell someone. I wanted to tweet.

Clearwater served as a solid venue to launch the inaugural 70.3 worlds in 2006, but in the five years since then, the race has run its course. The bike leg was too flat, there was way too much drafting, and as a result, the race almost always went to the fastest runner. The proposed course at Lake Las Vegas in Henderson, Nev., should solve these problems.With over 5,000 feet of climbing throughout the 56-mile bike tour of the Nevada desert, it’s unlikely that we’ll hear any cries to make the middle leg more difficult.

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Larry rosa

Rough seas forced organizers to move the swim from the beach to Clearwater’s Intercoastal Waterway in 2009. The channel swim helped Michael Raelert and Julie Dibens post the fastest Ironman 70.3 finishes of all time.

lavamagazine.com

072 : FEATURES

Larry rosa

Even before the first event in Clearwater in 2006, many athletes were concerned that the pancake-flat bike course wouldn’t be world championship worthy. The Clearwater Memorial Causeway (below), which athletes crossed on the bike and run, was the only hill in town.

Along with the change of venue came the announcement that the event would take place in early September instead of November.

News of the much earlier date was welcomed with mostly cheers from the triathlon community, although a few dissenters on the internet forums pointed out one very legitimate concern: The Nevada Desert is still very hot in early September.

Hot? Yes. Unbearable? Hardly. The average high temperature for Henderson on September 11 (the 2011 race date) is 90 degrees, but those who are familiar with the Las Vegas area will be quick to tell you that triple-digit temperatures aren’t completely unheard of at the end of summer. Nonetheless, race day could wind up being 20 degrees cooler than average and the course would still prove to be considerably harder than the original. Case in point: Chris McCormack won the 2010 Silverman Half Distance Triathlon (which serves up very much the same route as the proposed 70.3 World Championship venue) in 4:22:54 after a bike split of 2:29:38. Compare that to the time it took Michael Raelert to win Clearwater last November (3:41:19 after lavamagazine.com

a 2:03:58 ride) and it’s clear that Vegas will be a completely different race—like somewhere in the ballpark of 30 minutes different. No more bike splits under the two hour mark. No more five-minute miles on the run. Absolutely no more world records.

“The first thing that will make this race world championship worthy is the heat. It may not be 100 degrees on race day, but it’s going to be hot for sure,” said race director Frank Lowry. “And then, of course, there are the hills. Out here, you’re pretty much either going straight up or straight down. Needless to say, you won’t be seeing anyone break four hours.”

While the change of date means racers will have to contend with potentially scorching temperatures, it makes the 70.3 World Championship a much more appealing option for athletes also racing Kona for two reasons. First, for the past five seasons, a number of would-be Clearwater contenders have chosen not to start, or have had subpar races because of also competing in Kona five weeks earlier. Peaking for both Hawaii and Clearwater proved to be almost impossible, and very few athletes have found success at both events in the same sea-

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courtesy lowes lake las vegas

The Ironman 70.3 World Championship will be one of five major triathlons to take place at the Loews Las Vegas Resort in 2011.

son. Secondly, the timing of Vegas and the expected conditions make it an ideal tune-up for the big show in Kona. In 2011, Vegas will take place exactly four weeks before Kona, which makes doing the double especially appealing for professional athletes, who have little problem recovering from a 70.3 race in one month. The course itself will also serve as the perfect last-minute test of how ready your body is for Kona, with hot and windy Big Island-like conditions.

Time of year and course difficulty may have been the main motivators for the move, but they’re not the only reasons that athletes and organizers are looking toward the inaugural Vegas event with anticipation. First off, the traffic issues that were unavoidable in Clearwater will be a thing of the past. Henderson, which lies about 20 minutes east of the Vegas Strip, is bordered by the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, which offers up a seemingly endless amount of steep, traffic-free roads. Adding to Vegas’ appeal was the unlimited number of affordable hotel rooms (thanks to the Strip) and ease of travel, with a major International airport only a few miles from the venue.

The Ironman World Championship 70.3 will be one of five major triathlons to set up shop at the Loews Lake Las Vegas Resort in 2011. Next year the XTERRA West Championship, 5150 Lake Las Vegas, ITU Long lavamagazine.com

ThE FiRST Thing ThAT will mAkE ThiS RAcE woRld chAmpionShip woRThy iS ThE hEAT. iT mAy noT bE 100 dEgREES on RAcE dAy, bUT iT’S going To bE hoT FoR SURE.

Distance World Championship and the Silverman Full and Half Distance Triathlons will also use the lake and many of the same roads. Lowery, who has operated the popular Silverman for the past six years, will serve as local producer for all but the XTERRA race, meaning he and his team will have a very busy fall. While it may be a new venue for the 70.3 worlds, athletes shouldn’t expect any of the typical new-venue issues, thanks to the experience that Lowery has hosting races at Lake Las Vegas.

In the five years since the term “70.3” has become more commonplace than “half-Ironman,” Clearwater has served as the great equalizer between the short-course speedsters and long-course diesel engines.

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eric bakke

The 2007 men’s race in Clearwater produced one of the most exciting finishes in triathlon history, with American Andy Potts (right) narrowly pulling away from Argentina’s Oscar Galindez in the finishing chute.

After the first 70.3 worlds in Florida, it was clear that the speedsters had the advantage, especially on a course with essentially no elevation change on the bike. The inaugural event introduced two future longcourse superstars in the form of Aussie Craig Alexander and Canadian Samantha McGlone, both of whom used the new world championship race to springboard their foray into Ironman racing.

The following year in Clearwater saw more of the same, with two former short-course stars showing that they might have what it takes to compete in Kona. The men’s race also provided one of the most thrilling sprint finishes in triathlon history, with American Andy Potts pulling away from Argentina’s Oscar Galindez in the finishing chute. In the women’s race, Mirinda Carfrae proved that she was only scratching the surface of her long-course talent when she finished third the year before. The pintsized Aussie finished the 2007 race with a 1:18:40 half marathon—more than five minutes faster than her run in 2006—to take the win in a new world record of 4:07:25.

Terenzo Bozzone took top honors in 2008, but the big question after the race was: Who the hell is Andreas Raelert? The German finished lavamagazine.com

second, 32 seconds back of Bozzone, but he did so after serving a threeminute drafting penalty on the bike. Without the penalty, Raelert would have been world champ by more than two minutes. That’s not to say Bozzone wasn’t plenty impressive. His time of 3:40:10 was the fastest time in history by more than two minutes. American veteran Joanna Zeiger was untouchable in the women’s contest, crushing the bike course to set a new world record of 4:02:48.

While the older Raelert turned his attention toward Kona last year, the younger of the two Raelert brothers, Michael, entered last year’s race with every intention of one-upping his older bro, and he did not disappoint.

The 29-year-old was flawless in his 70.3 World Championship debut, breaking two hours on the bike (with an average speed of 28.1 mph) before closing with a ridiculous 1:09:05 run (5:16/mile). Raelert stopped the clock in 3:34:04, more than six minutes faster than Bozzone’s world record time from a year before.

Brit Julie Dibens was equally impressive in the women’s contest in 2009, winning by more than four minutes after becoming the first woman to break four hours in a 70.3-distance race. Dibens hammered

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eric bakke

Briton Julie Dibens became the first woman ever to finish a 70.3 race in under four hours in 2009 (3:59:33), crossing the line with a lead of more than four minutes.

the bike ride in 2:07:15, essentially ending the race before the run. She went on to finish in 3:59:33, more than three minutes faster than Zeiger’s record-setting performance in 2008.

Clearwater’s final go-around was turned into a wide-open affair on the women’s side, with reigning champ Dibens still suffering the aftereffects of her first race in Kona. With the defending champ feeling less than 100 percent at the start, many experts pegged ITU standout Jodie Swallow to pull away from the field early, and the Brit lived up to expectations. She out-swam the rest of the women’s field by a minute, before padding her lead by another minute on the bike. Swallow, who is known as a swim-bike specialist, even posted the best run of the day (1:21:59) en route to finishing six minutes in front of runner-up Leanda Cave.

The final men’s race in Florida wasn’t nearly as wide open. The question before the race wasn’t whether or not Michael Raelert would repeat, but rather how much would he win by. Having such a heavy favorite lavamagazine.com

in Clearwater for the first time changed the dynamic of the race completely. Whereas before the strongest riders tried to steal as much time as possible before the run, this year everyone else just sat and waited for Raelert’s move. The result was bike splits three minutes slower than in years past, with Aussie Joe Gambles being the only athlete to make a successful break before T2. Once again the race was left to the run and once again Raelert showed that he’s the class runner at this distance, posting another 1:09 split to become Clearwater’s first and only twotime champion.

The blazing fast splits and furious finishes in Florida will be missed, but as 70.3 continues to carve out a bigger and bigger niche, it was about time to find a truly world championship-worthy venue. If you’re fortunate enough to qualify for the inaugural race this season, be sure you know what you’re getting yourself into: 70.3 of the hardest, hottest and hilliest miles in this sport.

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084

the hype 100

coach’s counsel 104

sidelined 114

the full spectrum 122

to your health 130

competitive edge

”In a sport where symmetry of movement is critical for efficiency, triathletes continue to

DONALD MIRALLE

present musculoskeletal imbalances that wreak havoc on performance, potentially for an entire season.”

—Wolfgang Oswald, lavamagazine.com

(Sidelined, Page 104).

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THE übEr TriaTHlETE Science is busy trying to help us stretch the limits of human endurance.

jay prasuhn

By Erik Seedhouse, PhD

i

magine the following scenario: at the Ironman World Championships in 2030, a littleknown athlete surprises everyone, beating the three-time champion and pre-race favorite by more than 25 minutes. His time? A staggering seven hours and 35 minutes. His performance prompts the inevitable questions about doping, but tests find nothing, and he is simply labeled a freak of nature. But are his achievements thanks to natural ability or are lavamagazine.com

Mirinda Carfrae ran a record 2:53:32 marathon in Kona this year, making many believe, for the first time, that a woman can break 2:50 on the run.

they due to genetic modification? In the brave new world of genetic engineering and medical nanotechnology it’s possible that techniques could be used to create a superhuman triathlete. For example, by modifying the human genome, scientists could, in theory, increase the size of an athlete’s heart, boost the number of red blood cells supplying the body with oxygen and increase the endurance of some muscles by up to 10 percent. Nanotech could

offer similar benefits.

But why would anyone want to modify themselves, whether genetically or by using some nanotech device? Well, it’s a widely held belief that, without genetic help, athletes will soon be approaching the limit of human physiology, despite sophisticated diets, altitude preparation and advanced training regimes. The prospect of genetically modified and nanotech-tweaked athletes would allow competition to thrive again.

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jay prasuhn

Michael Raelert is the only man ever to break 1:10 for an Ironman 70.3 run, doing so each of the last two years in Clearwater.

And it could happen sooner than you think.

It sounds far-fetched, but scientists have already performed studies that introduced DNA changes into laboratory animals. Super mice at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, have been bred to store sugar more efficiently, allowing them to outrun their rivals. Other mice have been bred with stronger and larger hearts and almost double the number of red blood cells flowing through their circulatory systems. What if such genetic changes were repeated in humans? The boost to athletic ability would be phenomenal. Most elite athletes already display some enhanced physical attributes, but genetic modification of an embryo could put an athlete in a different league. For example, Paula Radcliffe, who holds the women’s marathon world record, has a much bigger heart than average, while Haile Gebrselassie, who holds the men’s marathon world record, has an extraordilavamagazine.com

narily high lung capacity and muscle fibers perfectly designed for speed and endurance.

Now you might be thinking all this talk of genetic modification that can transform alsorans into champions sounds like a doomsday scenario, but this is not the science fiction of the Hollywood movie “Gattaca” or an episode of “Fringe.” Genetic manipulation is about to become the new reality in sports. While designer babies may be a generation away, in a decade or so scientists will be able to remove embryonic fluid and predict the sporting potential of the baby. Less distant are gene therapies that will regulate energy metabolism, alter blood flow to the tissues and even modify pain perception (very useful during the final five miles of the Ironman!).

So, what exactly is genetic manipulation?

It’s simply the alteration of genetic material with a view to producing new substances or

wHilE dEsignEr babiEs maY bE a gEnEraTion awaY, in a dEcadE or so sciEnTisTs will bE ablE To rEmovE EmbrYonic fluid and PrEdicT THE sPorTing PoTEnTial of THE babY.

creating new functions. For example, imagine an ambitious triathlete who is fed up with not making the podium in Kona. The enterprising athlete turns to a renegade geneticist for help.

The scientist just happens to have identified the genes that can activate dormant human muscle fibers and make them work longer. The

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jay prasuhn

Belinda Granger has out of this world durability. Her accolades include 37 Ironman finishes, including 12 wins.

lavamagazine.com

scientist injects the budding Kona champion with the special DNA together with a genetic trigger, and within a few weeks, the genetically modified athlete is winning everything in sight.

Or, imagine this; a triathlete who really wants to excel at Ironman is told his muscles just don’t store enough energy to cope with nine-plus hours of racing. An athlete competing in an Ironman consumes large quantities of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), a molecule that fuels many essential cell processes. How quickly you use up the ATP depends on factors like speed and duration as well as the availability of oxygen. But, our Ironman wannabe uses up his ATP too quickly. What does he do? He finds a friendly geneticist who genetically engineers the triathlete’s muscle so the supply of ATP is dramatically extended.

Far-fetched? Actually, this has already been done in laboratory animals.

Most would agree that such manipulation for the purpose of improving performance is tantamount to cheating and should be banned.

After all, biological variation is fundamental to

T : THE HYPE : 089

WWW.COBBCYCLING.COM

Chrissie Wellington is as genetically gifted as they come, as she demonstrated with her Ironman world record performance of 8:36:13 in Arizona last fall.

jay prasuhn

any sport. If what you’re born with is radically affected with bioengineering, it must be wrong.

But, what is “natural” and “normal”? Why should those who benefited by a lucky throw of the genetic dice not have to face equal genetic competition? What about an athlete who uses gene modification to overcome congenital asthma? Should athletes really be punished just because the genetic roulette wheel didn’t land on their number?

Of course, there are no easy answers to these questions. But while the threat of genetic enhancement in sports may seem too remote to worry about today, scenarios that were once the stuff of science fiction are now being covered in mainstream media. The debate over genetic engineering is just beginning. Maybe Ironman champions can be made, but don’t give up on training yet.

As revolutionary as the technology of genetic engineering may seem, a concept proposed by nanotech scientists will make even these breakthroughs appear ordinary. A few years ago, nanoscientists came up with a

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jay prasuhn

Genetic engineering may make it possible for any average Jane to build a physique like Julie Dibens.

concept that involves exchanging a person’s blood with 500 trillion oxygen- and nutrientcarrying nanobots. The system is called a vasculoid (a vascular-like machine), and it is designed to duplicate every function of blood, albeit more efficiently.

One of the key elements of the vasculoid is the respirocyte. Each respirocyte will be constructed of 18 billion precisely arranged atoms and have an onboard computer, power plant and molecular pumps capable of transporting oxygen and carbon dioxide molecules. Not only will it be capable of duplicating all thermal and biochemical transport functions of blood, it will also perform these functions hundreds of times more efficiently than biological blood.

In essence, the vasculoid will be nothing short of a mechanically engineered redesign of the human circulatory system, yet, despite the complexity of the system (it requires 500 trillion independently cooperating nanobots) it will weigh only 2 kilograms and be powered by nothing more than glucose and oxygen. A perfect upgrade for a triathlete!

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T : THE HYPE : 091 By now, you may be wondering what happens to the regular blood. Well, there are about 30 trillion red blood cells present in your blood and these are superfluous as far as the vasculoid is concerned. That’s right: regular blood will be removed and replaced with the more efficient vasculoid. That’s right—replaced. The vasculoid is installed in a complex process that begins with exsanguination (draining the body’s blood). Let’s take it step by step. An athlete undergoing installation is informed he is about to undergo a major medical procedure that involves replacing eight percent of his body mass with nanomachinery. After being sedated, the athlete’s circulatory fluids are removed and replaced with installation fluids.

Then, mobile, artery-walking nanobots clean out any fatty streaks, plaque deposits, lesions, infections and vascular wall tumors. Next, the athlete is cannulated and hooked up to a heartlung machine which supplies the equivalent of resting cardiac output through the circulatory system, allowing the blood volume to be exchanged every few minutes. After the athlete

THE DEBATE OVER GENETIC ENGINEERING IS JUST BEGINNING. MAYBE IRONMAN CHAMPIONS CAN BE MADE, BUT DON’T GIVE UP ON TRAINING YET.

has been anesthetized, the entire blood volume is replaced with a suspension of respirocytes and a mixture of electrolytes and other components normally found in blood substitutes. The respirocyte fleet provides oxygen and carbon dioxide transport equivalent to the entire human red blood cell mass. Once the blood volume has been exchanged, the athlete’s core temperature is reduced from 37 degrees C to just 7–17 degrees C, after which the athlete is ready for the intravenous deployment of the vasculoid. This takes about an hour, during

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which the structure of the vasculoid and its major components are tested.

The installation of such a device into an athlete for the purpose of extending the endurance envelope may represent one of the most extreme interventions that will only be possible if significant advances in medical molecular nanotechnology are realized. However, current knowledge of nanomechanical systems suggests that such a device would not violate known physical, engineering or medical principles and could be made safe for the user.

Genetic manipulation? Infinitesimally small nanobots crawling around your bloodstream?

Surely all this tampering is going to take the fun out of triathlon. I mean, it’s going to be a something akin to a freak show isn’t it? Well, perhaps not. I would argue that in a race between a surgically manipulated and genetically enhanced athlete and one with innate ability, the one with the natural ability will always win. And if you want proof, just watch the performances of Mark Allen, Dave Scott or Chrissie Wellington. Enough said.

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ViVa la résisTancE! Don’t worry: hitting the gym will not make you look like a bodybuilder—unless you train like one.

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By Jim Gourley

E

ndurance athletes are no strangers to certain principles of strength training. We’re all aware of the necessity of maintaining muscular strength and balance to improve our performance. There are plenty of articles out there describing the effects of strength training on muscles, and how to optimize their physiological response. The basic premise involved is that muscles should lavamagazine.com

be trained throughout their entire range of motion. The reason so much emphasis is placed on this is that muscle fibers along the length of a muscle contract at different times throughout the range of motion. To illustrate the concept, think of a bodybuilder’s biceps.

Those mountainous peaks don’t occur at the head of the muscle by accident. It’s a result of focusing on preacher curls, which empha-

size resistance at the lower end of the bicep’s range of motion.

And that’s really the point we so often miss when we’re strength training. Most athletes don’t have the kind of peaks on their arms that bodybuilders do. Regardless of their sport, athletes train for performance, not looks. Emphasizing a limited portion of our range of motion to achieve that bodybuilder

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not sure if you should be using free weights or machines? Try a cable-crossover machine, which allows you to move through a full range of motion on a number of upper- and lower-body exercises.

T : THE HYPE : 095 physique would be a mistake for most of us, yet that’s the very mistake we make all the time. It’s not that you do it without thinking about it—it’s that you do it by not thinking about it.

What’s your gym routine like? Do you use free weights? Maybe a cable machine? Kettle bells? Resistance bands? It’s possible that, regardless of your decision, you could be training incorrectly. The decision has more to do with physics than physiology, but don’t let that frighten you: the explanation is simple.

Two bones hinge together at the joint, and the muscle provides the force to move them by contracting. It is, quite simply, a lever. Now comes the part where most people get tripped up. The muscle always produces a force in the same direction—along its length—however, the direction of the bone’s movement is always changing. Our arms and legs move in arcs around our joints. It’s a circular motion, known in engineering circles as the moment arm, or more simply, torque.

That distinction is important, because torque is different from good old-fashioned straight-

on power. You want the muscle to experience a constant level of resistance throughout the range of motion so that all of the muscle fibers get trained. But the problem in achieving that consistency lies not just in the amount of re-

bEcausE of THEir inabiliTY To Train musclEs EvEnlY along THEir rangE, dumbElls arEn’T alwaYs THE bEsT answEr for EndurancE aTHlETEs.

sistance you use, but the direction in which it works, which is where vectors come in. Let’s assume our muscle model is a simple bicep curl.

As you curl a dumbbell from 180 degrees (arm fully extended) to 0 degrees (arm completely

contracted), the less the direction of gravity and the direction of our arm’s motion will have in common. By the time you reach the top of the movement, the dumbbell isn’t giving you any real resistance at all. The muscle uses the greatest amount of force at 90 degrees, and it gets progressively easier as you move toward either of the ends of the movement.

“But wait,” you say. “Why does it feel so difficult to bring the weight from full extension to 90 degrees if the resistance is essentially nothing at the start of the movement? That’s because there’s a physiological phenomenon at work here. Known as the force–length relationship, the principle simply states that at a certain length of extension, a muscle’s strength decreases. This is why you use that jerking motion to “cheat” and get the weight moving when pumping serious iron. You use momentum to overcome that initial weakness.

Because of their inability to train muscles evenly along their range, dumbbells aren’t always the best answer for endurance athletes.

What about resistance bands? Again, the prob-

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096 : THE HYPE : T lem is pretty intuitive. The more you stretch a cord, the more resistance it provides. In fact, the relationship is linear.

Resistancecord = -k(length)

Joints are created at the intersection of two bones, and muscles act as levers by using force to move the bones along these joint intersections (like the knee joint above).

Many weight machines are designed to mimic this lever system and apply resistance directly against your body’s motion.

lavamagazine.com

Where “length” is the distance you stretch the cord and k is a constant defined by the cord’s elastic properties. You can probably find the “k” value for your bands by researching industrial websites.

In the case of our bicep curl, increasing the distance we stretch the cord is directly related to the angle of bend in our elbow. So instead of resistance decreasing after the 90-degree mark like it did with our dumbbell, we get more resistance at the top end of the range of motion. What this means is that you could vary your routine between using dumbbells and cords to hit both the middle and top end of the range of motion. That’s not exactly constant, though, and it doesn’t do anything for the bottom of the range of motion. Isn’t there anything out there that stays constant all the way through? Kind of.

The debate about the relative benefits of free weights versus machines has raged for years. But before tackling that, we have to qualify exactly what type of machines we’re talking about here, because as any gym rat can tell you, not all machines are created equal.

Machines using stacked weight plates attached to a cable offer certain advantages. They transfer the resistance generated by the weights through the length of the cable, allowing you to pull the cable in any direction while keeping the weights’ direction of resistance constant. The problem is the cable’s direction of resistance. It’s similar to the issue with the dumbbell, except instead of the resistance remaining constant in the direction of gravity, it remains constant along the direction of the cable.

But machines that transfer the resistance through a series of gears, pulleys and levers provide that constant resistance you’re looking for. It can come at a cost, though. For starters, most of these machines require you to apply force against a moment arm of their own, hinged at a fixed joint. If that sounds a lot like your own body, there’s a good reason. The machine’s motion is designed to mimic your own, which is why it’s able to always maintain resistance directly against your motion.

But even machines that are able to apply constant resistance aren’t perfect. They have

Off-SeaSOn Training SpliT There’s a time and place for resistance training, especially during the off season, when you don’t have to worry about wearing your body out for key swim, bike and run sessions. Here’s an example of a weekly schedule for a long-course athlete looking to build all-around strength during the off season.

3 Monday: Gym (focus on chest, shoulders and triceps) 3 Tuesday: Easy 90-minute spin (stationary trainer or outdoors) 3 Wednesday: Gym (focus on back, biceps and abs) 3 Thursday: Easy 60-minute run (treadmill or outdoors) 3 Friday: Moderate 75-minute swim 3 Saturday: Gym (focus on legs) 3 Sunday: Recovery

a tendency to restrict your range of motion by fixing your joints to the pads and points of leverage. On the plus side, it prevents you from cheating against the resistance and forces the muscle to work through the whole range of motion, which is what you want. On the minus side, that restriction of movement doesn’t require you to maintain your balance, and so you don’t train the support muscles that are oh-so-important for athletic performance. In this regard, you take a step closer to being a bodybuilder instead of an athlete.

So what’s the answer? Put simply, there is no perfect way to train. You’re always going to sacrifice one thing in exchange for another—resistance somewhere along the range of motion, balance conditioning or proper form. Something’s got to give. As always, you have to take into account what your goals are, determine (ideally with a coach) what training techniques will best accomplish them, and apply the methods the best way you know how.

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THE FACTS

HERE IS WHAT YOU NEED PER HOUR OF ACTIVITY:

THE 3 CRUCIAL ELEMENTS FOR ENDURANCE:

(1) WATER (hydration) (2) CALORIES (fuel) & (3) ELECTROLYTES (primarily SODIUM) Q U I C K

WATER: at least 20 oz. / 600 mL – adjust according to weather and solids consumed.

CALORIES: at least 2 calories per pound of bodyweight. Use watersoluble complex carbs, and eat solids only if necessary.

SODIUM: at least 300 mg, and up to 1,500 mg (1.5 grams) of sodium if the conditions are hot and humid.

With the right combination of our products and optimal amount of water, you can reach peak levels of performance to enjoy any ENDURANCE ACTIVITY UNDER THE SUN.

R E F E R E N C E

TRAINING

G U I D E

LOADING

RACING

Quantity - PER HOUR of TRAINING

Quantity - 4 days leading to an EVENT or RACE

Quantity - PER HOUR during an EVENT or a RACE

CARBO-PRO

2 to 3 scoops (2 oz to 3 oz) in 16 oz of water; 200 to 300 calories

2 scoops in a glass of water; once in the morning and once in the evening

2 to 3 scoops (2 oz to 3 oz) in 16 oz of water; 200 to 300 calories per hour

CarboPro 1200 AMINOS

2 to 3 oz. in 16 oz. of water; 200 to 300 calories

2 oz. in a glass of water; once in the morning and once in the evening

2 to 3 oz. in 16 oz. of water; 200 to 300 calories per hour

MetaSalt THERMOLYTE

2 caps for normal; 4 to 6 caps for hot/humid; drink at least 16 oz. of water

VO2 Max Endurance

4 to 6 caps 30 minutes before start

4 caps after breakfast

4 caps before start; and 3 caps per hour

RECOVERY Amino Power

3 caps before; 3 caps after; and 3 caps before bed at night

3 caps in the morning; 3 caps at noon; and 3 caps before bed at night

4 caps before start; and 3 caps per hour

INTERPHASE Hypertrophy Matrix

2 scoops a day: before training or after training or before bed at night

for 15 days leading to event or race get at least 0.6 grams of protein per lb of bodyweight; use at least 2 scoops of INTERPHASE per day

2 scoops before start; and 2 scoops once every 8 hours for an Ultra-event

MOTIVATOR

2 caps before training

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2 caps for every 4 hours of the race or event

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100 : COACH’S COUNSEL : T

SLEEpiNg ON Empty Is going calorie free after dinner really a safe way to lose weight?

istockphoto.com

By Troy Jacobson

Q:

Coach Troy says skip the starvation diet and just make sure your fridge is stocked full of healthy late-night snacks.

Dear COaCH,

2011 will be my second year competing in triathlons. I did a few Olympic distances last year and had decent results, but I’d like to be a bit more competitive this year. I know I need to lose weight to do this (I’m 5 foot 10 and 195 pounds) and a few of my training buddies say the best way to do this is to “starve” yourself late in the day. They say to eat a light dinner around 5:30 p.m. and then not eat anything for the rest of the night. I’ve had a hard time with it

lavamagazine.com

so far (I get really hungry at about 9 p.m.), but it seems to be effective when I stick to it. Does this sound like a reasonable weight loss plan and do you have any tips for making it easy to go hungry late at night?

—Corey Cleveland, Ohio

A:

Dear COrey, If you flip through this magazine and look at pictures of the elite triathletes, you’ll notice a dominant

body type—lean and muscular. With some exceptions, most accomplished triathletes tend to carry a low percentage of body fat while maintaining a fair amount of muscle mass in the quads and upper body. These attributes contribute to strong results in each sport discipline by maximizing the athlete’s powerto-weight ratio. However, while many people aspire to achieve the lean, muscular physique displayed by many elites, not everyone can, as some people’s body types are different.

While being leaner and lighter makes sense,

: COACH’S COUNSEL : 103 every triathlete has to discover his ideal body composition in order to maximize athletic performance while also maintaining health and personal well-being. Being extreme in terms of diet is rarely advisable, and there is a point of diminishing returns where attempting to become too lean through extreme calorie restriction or excessive training can lead to muscle loss, impede recovery from training and ultimately have a negative impact on one’s performance (and health).

As a coach, I am careful not to give specific nutritional advice to my athletes as this is the domain of the registered dietician (RD). For your question, I consulted with Abby Mcqueeney Penamonte, a registered dietician and nutrition coach at Life Time Fitness. She advised eating a balanced diet during the day, choosing high-quality proteins and eating a mix of healthy carbohydrates. This should limit your evening cravings and prevent you from eating “empty calories” at night just before bed, one of the worst things anyone interested in achieving an optimal body composition can do, (although this might be permissible during peak volume periods for an athlete training for Ironman).

As a general overlying concept for the triathlete concerned with getting faster, I suggest that you focus on eating for performance and allow weight loss to take place at a natural rate over time. I have found that as athletes focus more intently on following a structured train-

THE PRE-SEASON, WHEN YOU’RE NOT RACING, IS THE MOST LOGICAL TIME TO LIMIT CALORIE INTAKE AND PREPARE FOR RACE SEASON.

ing program (i.e., doing aerobic base work, interval training, etc.) and racing well, they tend to elevate their awareness of what goes into their mouth, and when. Once your ideal body composition is realized, one that allows for high-level training and recovery, it should be your goal to maintain that weight within a couple of pounds year-round. Developing and sticking with healthy eating habits is the key, not starving yourself before bedtime.

LIGHT & QUICK LATE-NIGHT SNACKS ✓ 1 cup of cottage cheese (1% milkfat) with 1/2 cup of melon. *200 calories (27g protein) ✓ 1 banana with 1 tbsp of all natural peanut butter. *270 calories (8g protein) ✓ 1 cup of yogurt (1% milkfat) with 1/2 cup of low-fat granola. *350 calories (14g protein) ✓ 16-ounce smoothie with 1/2 cup skim milk, 1/2 cup lowfat yogurt, 1/2 banana, 1/2 cup strawberries, 1/2 cup ice and 1.5 tbsp of whey protein. *290 calories (30g protein) ✓ 10-ounce hot chocolate protein shake with 1 cup milk, 3 tbsp chocolate syrup and 1 tbsp of chocolate protein powder. *200 calories (26g protein).

If you are to restrict your calories, make sure it’s not a severe restriction and that it takes your weekly training energy output into consideration, otherwise you put yourself at risk of losing muscle. The pre-season, when you’re not racing, is the most logical time to limit calorie intake and prepare for race season, if necessary. Eating sensibly and maintaining your “fighting weight” inseason is important because calorie restriction can negatively affect your recovery from hard training and racing.

Everyone is different and those individual differences will play a huge role in what your ideal body composition is for maximizing performance on the race course. Be patient and pay equal attention to your training program as well as to what goes into your mouth (and when) to support your performance goals. They both work hand in hand to make you a faster triathlete.

The official coach of Ironman, Troy Jacobson is a former pro triathlete with sub nine-hour Ironman Hawaii credentials and was a top half-Ironman distance racer in the 1990s. The creator of the Spinervals Cycling Workout series, Jacobson has coached triathletes of all levels since 1992. Visit Coachtroy.com or email him at Troy@coachtroy.com.

LAVAMAGAZINE.COM

104 : SIDELINED : T

ThE TrIaThLETE BoDy ImBaLaNcE Injury proofing your body this off season.

By Wolfgang Oswald, PT, OCS, and Nathan Koch, PT, ATC

I

n simplistic terms, we all come from the same “place”: We have similar physiological and physical properties and function in daily activity using approximately the same movements. Consider the body and mind’s unique ability to adapt to various stimuli to create an adaptable and predictable musculoskeletal structure. Over time, we adapt to both positive stimuli (exercise, in general) and negative stimuli (like smoking). Some of us have been out of the athletic world for quite some time and are making our way back through the sport of trilavamagazine.com

athlon, while others have never lived without a regime of training. In either case, our day-to-day movements and posture may not have enough variation, causing us to create an imbalanced system of movement that results in eventual breakdown of bone, joint, tendon and muscle.

The relatively sedentary person who picks up triathlon in their 30’s, 40’s or later may begin the sport with compensation patterns related to sitting in front of a computer all day, while on the flip side, the body of a triathlete who has put in millions of steps, revolutions, and strokes from

a young age may have specific imbalances that can impair performance, cause injuries and affect long-term quality of life.

In a sport where symmetry of movement is critical for efficiency, triathletes continue to present musculoskeletal imbalances that wreak havoc on performance, potentially for an entire season. In some cases, imbalances may be amplified by one triathlon event and subsequently hinder performance at the next event. When we assess triathletes for injury relief or performance enhancement, we tend to see the same

106 : SIDELINED : T

EXERCISE 1 & 2 : Gym ball “T” & side-lying external shoulder rotation

Exercises to improve rotator cuff strength, like the gym ball “T” and shoulder rotation above, can be extremely effective in only a matter of weeks. Be sure to keep the weight low, since the rotator cuff is very susceptible to injury.

imbalances occur over and over. This happens in pros as much as age groupers, sometimes even more so because the volume and intensity of their training magnifies their imbalances. Remember, the body adapts to repetitive stimuli, resulting in positive and/or negative consequences. Because most of the movement in triathlon is in the sagittal plane (straight forward motion), large prime mover muscles (i.e., quadriceps in cycling) become developed and strong, while frontal (side to side) and transverse plane (rotation) movements become weak or restricted. Excessive movement in the latter planes of motion due to weak stabilization will create inefficient transfer of power and effort, and contribute to injury. On the other hand, if there is a lack of movement in the frontal and transverse planes, those planes of motion may become limited over time.

Throughout the rest of this article we will discuss several key areas where imbalances occur and some tips on how to correct them.

Swimming tends to develop strong and tight pecs and lats, although it contributes to weakness in the rotator cuff (rotation of the shoulder) and scapular muscles that help provide good posture by pulling the shoulders back. These imbalances can significantly contribute to overuse injuries such as rotator cuff tendinitis/tendinosis and shoulder impingement. Swimming performance may also be compromised as a result of cycling. Due to the mid spine (thoracic spine) being mostly bent forward during cycling, the ability to bend the thoracic spine lavamagazine.com

backwards (extension) and rotate from side to side becomes limited or hypomobile. Compounding this issue is the fact that most of us also work and drive to work in a seated flexed position, further increasing stiffness. This imbalance may limit the ability to extend the arm fully during swimming, further contributing to shoulder impingement syndrome. Furthermore, since there is little to no trunk rotation during running and cycling, the thoracic and lumbar spine may become restricted in rotation. It’s a given that trunk rotation is a vital part of swimming, but the spine’s ability to rotate in a stable and free manner, even if it is a small amount of movement, is paramount to moving efficiently and symmetrically during cycling and running.

Solution: Strengthening what’s weak and stretching what’s tight will eliminate these imbalances and help you swim faster. A weak rotator cuff can be strengthened with shoulder external rotation in a side lying position (beginner) and external rotation in a side plank position (advanced). Scapular retraction and shoulder blade strength can be done with shoulder “T & W’s” on a gym ball. Doorway pec stretching for tight pec muscles, thoracic extension mobilization and trunk rotational stretching (leg cross-overs) can help improve thoracic and lumbar mobility. (See exercises 1 and 2, above).

In addition to affecting swim mechanics, “cycling stiffness” may also affect run gait. In cycling, it all starts with bike fit and positioning. It is important to understand not only how fit af-

fects your cycling performance but also how it affects your run performance (remember, “bike fitting” is not just getting the bike to fit to you, it’s also understanding how your unique physical structure works in a specific position over a prolonged period). Cycling is mostly a sagittal plane motion using predominantly the gluteus maximus and quadriceps while the frontal plane hip muscles (abductors) and the external rotational muscles (the “rotator cuff” of the hip) become weak and underused. These muscles provide stability to the knee and pelvis, helping the knee track correctly and stabilizing the pelvis during the power phase in cycling. Without a stable pelvis there is excessive movement in the lower back and a loss of power into the bike’s drive train. Remember the analogy: you can’t shoot a cannon from a canoe. During the cycling motion the hip joint never goes into full extension, as is ideal in running. This fact, combined with prolonged sitting (which we all do), limits hip flexor flexibility. The iliopsoas, one of the most powerful hip flexors, has large attachment points at the front of five vertebrae, thus placing excessive stress on the spine when it’s limited in flexibility. In running, good hip extension (as when the leg is back behind you as it lifts off the ground) is essential to having a good stride length and efficient push-off. If the hip flexors are tight, the shortened stride limits the ability of the gluteus maximus to produce maximal force and thus affects leg push-off and run performance.

faster by the minute Aerodynamics = Speed. Changes in aerodynamics have a substantial impact on an athlete’s performance on the bike.

Ironman Wheel Rentals rents high quality aerodynamic wheels for race day. Reserve online before each race and have your wheels shipped directly to you.

At select events we can install your race wheels and make any necessary adjustments to insure everything is working properly.

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108 : SIDELINED : T

EXERCISE 3: Side-Lying Clam

You may get a few strange looks doing side-lying clams in the gym, but you’ll also injury-proof your abductors.

Solution: Strengthen the hip abductors (specifically glute medius and external hip rotators) with side stepping and side-lying clams. Stretch the hip flexors primarily with the “Thomas stretch,” as it protects the spine and best isolates the hip flexors (you may also try the kneeling hip flexor and rectus femoris stretch). (See exercise 3, left).

Finally, running also occurs primarily in the sagittal plane, so the hip muscle imbalances mentioned in the cycling section also apply here. The frontal and transverse plane hip muscles play very important roles in running mechanics, especially with athletes moving to minimalist shoes. The hip external rotators and abductors control leg pronation or knee tracking, and foot pronation. Therefore, a weakness may cause over-pronation of the thigh, knee, foot and ankle. Simple test: try rolling your knee inward while standing and see what happens at the foot. Besides increasing the incidence of injury, these imbalances may inhibit running performance by delaying the re-supination of the leg and

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27/10/10 12:15

110 : SIDELINED : T

EXERCISES 4, 5 & 6:

Glute Extension, Thomas Stretch & Leg Crossover

Tight muscles and joints around the hips can wreak disaster on your run training. Keep your midsection feeling loose with these popular glute and hamstring stretches.

limiting push-off. These hip muscles will also provide spine and pelvic stability at ground contact and stability during push-off. Develop good strength here and hip injuries and lower back and SI joint complaints will be a thing of the past.

Solution: Hip-strengthening exercises and stretches mentioned earlier to strengthen the

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hips in the frontal and transverse planes. (See

exercises 4, 5 and 6, above).

While full scope of this topic cannot be covered in one article, this should provide some basics to assist the triathlete in getting started on the path to symmetry. Not all of the above imbalances may apply to you, and this does not by any means cover all of the imbalances caused by

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regular life and triathlon life, but it’s a good place to start. This program should only require 15–20 minutes to complete and will reduce the typical triathlete’s injuries and improve performance in all three sports. Unlike the phases of training that we are used to, this is an ALL-SEASON program.

For pictures of the exercises mentioned here, see the link at Endurancerehab.com.

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114 : THE FULL SPECTRUM : T

OPEn-waTER dRaFTing— dOES iT wORk?

Every triathlete knows the benefits of drafting on the bike, but is drafting on the swim all it’s really cracked up to be?

donald miralle

By Jim Gourley

lavamagazine.com

T : THE FULL SPECTRUM : 115

Y

ou and your friends have asked each other if it really works. The resident aquatics know-it-all in your local club swears by it.

Your training partner says she once got a swim PR by doing it. But does the principle of drafting on the swim hold any water?

Absolutely.

Using both computer models and direct experimental measurements, scientists have broken the surface of athletes’ more superstitious

assumptions about drafting and uncovered the numbers-based proof that it works. Research into the idea began in the early 1990s, but only in the last 10 years have our techniques for measuring athletic performance in the water allowed experts to collect data accurate enough to be considered conclusive.

The best way to gain a full understanding of the idea is to begin with the most recent findings and go backward. In 2008, a team of scien-

tists from the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro, Portugal constructed a mathematical model for two swimmers moving through the water. Using computational fluid dynamics (CFD), the team assessed the reduction in the trailing swimmer’s drag coefficient at varying distances. What they found was impressive.

When the toe-to-head distance between the two swimmers is half a meter, the trailing swimmer experiences a 45 percent reduction in

lavamagazine.com

116 : THE FULL SPECTRUM : T

JAY PRASUHN

wHEn THE ToE-To-HEad diSTanCE bETwEEn Two SwiMMERS iS HaLF a METER, THE TRaiLing SwiMMER ExPERiEnCES a 45 PERCEnT REdUCTion in dRag.

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his drag coefficient. That’s serious savings. The only problem is that it may be a little too close for comfort on a 2.4-mile swim. There’s plenty of leg (and arm) room in the slipstream, though.

The Portuguese team found that even at a sixmeter interval, the trailing swimmer can shave up to 16 percent off their drag coefficient.

Fluid dynamics are all well and good, but what do they translate into in terms of your actual swim performance and coming out of T1?

Jean-Claude Chatard and Barry Wilson, of the University of Saint-Etienne in France and the

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118 : THE FULL SPECTRUM : T University of Otago in New Zealand, respectively, shed light on that proposition in 2003.

Chatard and Wilson tested 16 swimmers (11 of whom identified themselves as triathletes) by placing them in a flume (think a giant Endless Pool) and measuring their physiological response to drafting off each other in different positions. When the draft swimmer closed to within a half meter directly behind the leader, they observed the following benefits: 3 11% reduction in oxygen uptake 3 6% reduction in heart rate 3 38% reduction in blood lactate 3 6% reduction in stroke rate 3 6% increase in stroke length These are incredible numbers, but less exertion doesn’t necessarily equal an easier day in the water. In a paper published in the European Journal of Applied Physiology in 2000, Gregoire Millet and a team of researchers including Chatard reported that the six-beat kick used by some swimmers and triathletes can create turbulence that makes drafting them a

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Drafting on the side of a lead swimmer isn’t quite as effective as trailing directly behind, but it will significantly reduce your chances of catching a kick to the face.

miserable experience. That’s why Chatard and Wilson included lateral drafting positions in their 2003 research. From their measurements, they concluded that if the competitor in front

IF THE COMPETITOR IN FRONT OF YOU IS MAKING THE WATER TOO CHOPPY, YOU CAN STILL REAP BENEFITS BY GETTING OUT TO THE SIDE.

of you is making the water too choppy, you can still reap benefits by getting out to the side. The optimal lateral drafting position is to keep your head even with the lead swimmer’s hips, and be as close to them as possible (without getting slapped)—however the advantages are significantly less. Drag reduction is only a third of what you can pick up directly behind another swimLAVAMAGAZINE.COM

mer, ultimately leading to a performance gain in the single-digit percentages. If you’re tagging behind a swimmer who doesn’t like you tailgating, your best bet is to blow past them and find a better candidate.

A few notes of caution in terms of race strategy. For starters, don’t get lulled into believing that your reduction in perceived exertion is solely the result of drag reduction. You could just be tailing a much slower swimmer and killing your time. At the same time, if getting banged around in a pack is killing your ability to stay level and maintain correct form in the water, the increased drag profile you create will quickly negate the advantages provided by the leader. Think of it like a parachute deploying off the back of a drag-racer.

Sure, the chute is “drafting” off the car, but nothing can help a profile like that. The key to success is balancing your position in the slipstream, your own streamlined position, and your comfort zone. Make sure you’re ready to handle yourself in the choppier waters of a faster swimmer’s wake, and you’ll soon find yourself on a course for smooth sailing to your next swim exit.

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122 : TO YOUR HEALTH : T

PiLL POPPing 101 Recent research suggests that when you take your nutritional supplements can be as important as which ones you take.

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By Ben Greenfield

W

ith all the buzz about nutritional supplements and sports performance aids, one neglected topic is when a triathlete should actually take these supplements. When should you swallow fish oil? Before a race? After a workout? What about antioxidants? Do they actually hurt you during exercise? Are there some supplements you should avoid taking together with others, like a high-fiber supplement and a multivitamin?

Keep reading to learn when to pop which pill.

MultivitaMins. The most commonly used supplement among both athletes and the general population, a multivitamin typically conlavamagazine.com

tains the major fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K and water-soluble vitamins B and C. Multivitamins that contain fat-soluble vitamins should ideally be consumed with food that contains fat, since you absorb these vitamins best when animal or vegetable fat is present in the stomach.

The B and C vitamins will often cause some mild nausea or acid sensitivity when taken on a light stomach, so they should also be consumed with a meal. However, a heavy, greasy meal can interfere with absorption of these vitamins.

While this may seem paradoxical, since you just learned that fat-soluble vitamins should be consumed with a fat-based meal, the type of meal that would interfere with absorption of water-sol-

uble vitamins would be a butter-soaked omelet served with gravy and sausage—a meal most triathletes aren’t consuming on a typical day.

One exception, vitamin B12, is actually absorbed best on an empty stomach. So if you are taking an energy powder or energy drink, which usually contain high doses of B12, you’d be best served to use it in the mid-morning or afternoon on an empty stomach, or mid-training session or race.

Take-away message: Take a multivitamin with your main meal of the day, unless that meal is directly before a workout or race, in which case you should take your multivitamin with dinner.

124 : TO YOUR HEALTH : T

Fish oil. The beneficial cardiorespiratory effects of fish oil are proven, but fish oil, or any other omega-3 fatty acid supplement, doesn’t need to be taken immediately before a workout or race for this effect. As a matter of fact, while carbohydrates empty from the stomach within 30 minutes to two hours after consumption, protein can take 1.5 to six hours, while fat can take much longer, since only 10 grams of fat can be processed by the digestive tract each hour.

For this reason, fatty acid supplements like fish oil may actually cause gastric distress and indigestion when consumed immediately before a workout or race. For this reason, you should take fish oil at the same time you take your multivitamin: with your primary meal of the day.

Take-away message: Take fish oil with your main meal of the day, unless that meal is directly before a workout or race, in which case you should take your fish oil with dinner. iron. For many endurance athletes, especially female athletes, iron may be a necessary supplement. It should ideally be taken on an empty

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stomach for the best absorption, and taken separately from other supplements that may interfere with absorption, especially calcium and vitamin E. Some individuals experience nausea or upset stomach with iron intake, in which case a very light meal would be acceptable.

Take-away message: Take iron in the mid-morning or mid-afternoon on an empty stomach, and include a light snack if you experience stomach upset.

Minerals. Calcium and magnesium are the two most common and beneficial minerals for active individuals. During exercise, energy is produced by the conversion of fatty acids and amino acids with calcium-dependent enzymes, so calcium, which should always be accompanied by magnesium in an approximate ratio of 2:1, is a good supplement to take before a workout. Since absorption of both minerals is enhanced when they are consumed with meals, your pre-workout meal is the perfect time for mineral intake. Calcium and magnesium can also assist with sleep and muscle re-

laxation, so additional supplementation can be beneficial before bed or with dinner.

Take-away message: Take minerals with the main pre-workout or pre-race meal, and take magnesium again before bed.

high-Fiber suppleMents. Many triathletes use superfood blends or “greens� supplements, which contain ingredients like powdered broccoli, spirulina, kelp and inulin. While these can be beneficial nutrientdense energy sources, the high fiber in these supplements will significantly slow gastric emptying, and may also cause gas, bloating or bowel movements. For this reason, their use before a workout or race will necessitate eating the pre-workout meal one to two hours earlier than usual. Since fiber can decrease the absorption of fat, you may also benefit from taking a greens supplement at a different time of day as a fatty acid supplement. Finally, since many of these nutrients are stored by the body, it is fine to simply use a greens supplement before bed, provided it does not

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126 : TO YOUR HEALTH : T contain caffeinated compounds like green tea or yerba maté extract.

Take-away message: Take high-fiber supplements with the main pre-workout or pre-race meal, but move the meal to about three hours before competition or exercise; or, take the high-fiber supplement early in the day before an afternoon or evening workout.

Proteolytic enzymes.

Proteolytic enzymes like bromelain, papain, trypsin and chymotrypsin are found in many recovery capsules and pills, and for recovery and antiinflammation will work best on an empty stomach. If taken with a meal, these supplements simply serve as digestive enzymes, but will not significantly enhance muscle recovery.

Take-away message: Take proteolytic enzymes on an empty stomach in the mid-morning or mid-afternoon, preferably after the day’s workout.

Probiotics. Probiotics like acidophilus and lactobacillus are important for a healthy digestive system and useful for treating Candida (a big

problem in high-carbohydrate consuming triathletes) and for replenishing the intestinal flora, especially after taking prescription antibiotics.

They should be taken on an empty stomach.

Take-away message: Take probiotics at night, before bed, two to three hours after the final meal of the day.

AntioxidAnts. The antioxidant family includes compounds such as coenzyme Q10, bioflavonoids and phytochemicals such as quercetin and resveratrol, and vitamins C and E (although vitamins C and E are also found in multivitamins, antioxidant supplements generally contain larger amounts of these vitamins).

Interestingly, several studies have observed that antioxidant intake before exercise actually decreases insulin sensitivity and eliminates activation of the body’s natural defense mechanism against oxidative damage. By shutting down the body’s need for natural antioxidant activity, which helps it adapt to stress and respond to exercise, antioxidant consumption can actually blunt the workout benefit. For this

reason, antioxidant beverages and capsules should be consumed only in moderation, and not as a consistent part of the pre-workout or during-workout nutrition protocol.

Take-away message: Take antioxidants with a pre-race meal, and only before very difficult workouts. Otherwise, keep your antioxidant intake low to moderate, and attempt to consume them as far as possible from an exercise session.

If you’re confused about when to take what, consult with a trusted coach or certified dietican before trying any new supplements.

Remember, you’ll get benefits no matter what, but you’ll get ideal benefits from following these rules!

And finally, what about those “shotgun” supplements that give you every possible vitamin, mineral and nutrient in one convenient capsule or powder? Be careful: While convenient, these all-in-one products can prevent you from receiving the full benefits from Scan with smartphone & link directly to video. your supplementation.

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128 : TO YOUR HEALTH : T

a pill for every ill Fix any nutritional deficiency at your local pharmacy.

First Endurance Multi-V $50 / 90 tablets; FirstEndurance.com Way more than a Flintstone, First Endurance has designed a multivitamin to cover all of an endurance athlete’s nutritional bases.

Calcium $7 / 90 tablets Female triathletes are particularily at risk for low calcium levels. Many calcium supplements include additional vitamins like C or D.

Vitamin D $9 / 90 capsules It’s easy to lack vitamin D, especially if you stay out of the sun or wear a lot of sunscreen. Take this fat-soluble vitamin with a meal.

Fish Oil $12 / 90 capsules Fish oil may give your cardio system a boost, but it can also upset your stomach, so be sure to take it with a light meal.

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Iron $11 / 60 tablets Keep your recovery on track with iron, just don’t take it along with calcium or vitamin E or with a large meal.

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Vitamin B Complex $12 / 90 tablets Need an energy boost? Reach for some vitamin B complex but be sure to take it with a light meal if you have a sensitive stomach. When taken alone, vitamin B12 is best absorbed on an empty stomach.

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130 : COMPETITIVE EDGE : T

A PlAnnED ATTACk Executing the perfect season starts with focused planning during the off season.

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By Mark Allen

G

iving your training the right structure over the entire season is clearly one of the keys to having great races throughout the year. Some questions to answer are: How much variation should be put into a weekly plan? How much variation should there be week to week? When should speedwork start?

And how can you make all this work for a numlavamagazine.com

ber of big races all in one season? Let’s take a look each of these elements, starting from the last piece—your races—and then we’ll move into finer and finer detail.

First and foremost, it is important to have a very good idea of which races you will target in a season so that you can build your training to get great results in each high-priority

race. So before reading any further, set your race calendar up. Pick a bunch of races that you might want to do and then go through the next few steps to strategically decide the best ones to actually register for. Rule #1: you can easily hit two big peaks in one season if they are separated by about three to four months.

This means you should put your two big A

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132 : COMPETITIVE EDGE :

If you want to have two A races in your upcoming season, make sure they are at least three months apart so you can peak for each one.

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priority races on the map first, and if they are of equal importance, try to have them separated by about three if not four months. If they are separated by more than about six months, you can pick what I call an A- goal race that is parked about six to eight weeks after that first big peak, but still allows you three or four months before the second A event. This will give you enough time to really hit a big peak in fitness, recover, and then build up again.

Want some examples? Let’s say your first goal is going to be Ironman St. George on

May 1 with the hope of qualifying for Kona in October. That gives you about five and a half months before Kona if you do qualify. But just in case, you have a second qualifier on July 24 in Lake Placid. That gives you, say, three weeks to recover from St. George, about nine to build up and peak again for Lake Placid, and then hopefully with your coveted slot just slightly less than the three-month minimum (eleven weeks) away, you will be able to fine-tune everything for Ironman in Hawaii. Of course the combinations are almost limitless, but this is

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134 : COMPETITIVE EDGE : T

JAY PRASUHN

If you ended last season feeling tight and uncomfortable in the saddle, take the time to reassess your bike fit before grinding through the early-season base miles.

one example of how to pick the main races for your calendar. From there you can fill in the open weeks with other events that give you race experience, help you gain race fitness and help break up the training with the real deal. In general, when adding in more events, give yourself about one to two weeks between Olympic distance events, three to five between half Ironmans and six to 12 weeks between full Ironman-distance events.

Now the training. Again, let’s start at the end close to the race and work back to the early season. This brings in Rule #2 for season planning: your training must vary throughout the year to keep your fitness improving. You have likely heard of varying the cycles or phases of your training. While there are many philosophies about the ideal way to do this, the key in all of them is that it is good to vary your training over time rather than just doing the exact same distances and intensities every week of the year. The body is an amazingly adaptable machine, and when given a specific workout diet it will become extremely efficient at doing those workouts. Initially, a change in your training regime will give you big gains in fitness, but then, as the body adapts, the new regime will become standard and fitness will lavamagazine.com

Try TO Vary yOur TraInInG OVEr TIME raThEr Than jusT DOInG ThE ExaCT saME DIsTanCEs anD InTEnsITIEs EVEry wEEk Of ThE yEar.

plateau or even diminish unless the training is changed again.

The two main components of your training are speedwork and base training. The speedwork is what we are looking at getting in place right now. Take your first goal race, that one on May 1 in St. George, for example. Speedwork for that event should start soon enough that you are just getting to the full adaptation to it by race day, but not so far in advance that it has become a detriment, or at best is giving you diminishing returns on all those tough sessions. Most people will get the big gains from speedwork after about four to six weeks.

That means speedwork should start at least four to six weeks out from your first big race.

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136 : COMPETITIVE EDGE :

JAY PRASUHN

Give yourself a solid three to four months of base work to build up your endurance and strength before you begin any speed sessions.

Then, if you figure in tapering, you may want to start it closer to eight weeks out so that you spend the last three weeks or so doing some lighter speed that’s not as taxing as the first three to five weeks.

One hitch that you may have noticed with this plan is that it works wonderfully for the first big race, but what if you have a second big race in that six to eight week window after the first one. The answer? Think condense.

This means you condense the variations in your overall schedule through that shorter period. Take the general ratio of base to speed that you did in the first long buildup and scale it down to the shorter period between races.

That can mean doing a quick couple of weeks of base, then a couple more of speed and then your taper to your A- event.

Now that you have the general plan for when to start your speedwork, the early part of your training season is easy to put in place. It is basically the weeks or months you have from the first workout of the season until you start your speed sessions. This period can last

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138 : COMPETITIVE EDGE : anywhere from three to four months. This is when you are going to be gradually building up your overall training volume, laying down a base of strength training and slowly lengthening your long endurance workouts in each sport each week so that they are eventually in line with the endurance necessary for your race.

Again, the key to keeping your fitness gains coming is making sure there is some variation in your training from week to week. One way to do this that many people find extremely effective is to build your overall training volume for a couple of weeks and then reduce it in the third week. The one challenge to this is that if you are building your efforts in all three sports at the same time, there is a risk of having that week of recovery being more like a week of total collapse. A second alternative is to have the weeks that you are building your sports be offset. For example: Week one is an easy swim week, a moderate run week and a big bike week. The next week, the bike is in recovery mode, the run is very long and the swim is moderate. Then the third week is a long swim week, a recovery in

the run and a moderate bike week. Again, this varies the training from week to week so that your fitness keeps responding.

Within each week, variation is the key again. It is usually easy to do this, simply because work schedules dictate shorter sessions during the week and longer workouts on the weekend, when time is more abundant. A generally good template is to have at least one recovery session in each sport each week that is short and not taxing, one that is faster-paced but also fairly short (this will be aerobic during your base phase and a speed session during that segment of your training), a third that is your long endurance workout in each sport and if time permits, a moderately long workout in one or more sports.

The final thing that spices all of this up is Rule #3: you must race to be able to race well.

If you want to do well in your target races, it is important to have prep races on the calendar also. In the early season, a prep race can be a single-sport event like a running race, time trial, cyclocross race, cross-country ski race,

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open-water swim event, etc. Anything that allows you to race hard and fast, but is short enough that you can recover for the upcoming week’s workouts is ideal for an early season race. In the middle of your preparation for a target race a triathlon is best. The distance can be anything from a sprint to a half Ironman. No need to do an Ironman to get ready for an Ironman! Racing every three to six weeks will give the final touch to your training buildup and give vital variation to keep your fitness gains coming as well as giving you much-needed experience for the year’s big races.

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Mark Allen, “The Grip,” is a six-time Ironman Hawaii world champion. He offers coaching at MarkAllenOnline.com and is an award-winning author for his book, coauthored with Brant Secunda, titled Fit Soul, Fit Body: 9 Keys to a Healthier, Happier You. You can find more information about that at FitSoul-FitBody.com. Mark also speaks to companies worldwide. Take a sneak preview of that at MarkAllenSpeaking.com.

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New ReseaRch uncovers how elite athletes are gaining the edge: critics call technique an Ò unfair advantageÓ.

BY MARK HANSEN Athletes of all ages and from all sports have long sought ways to improve their performance through nutritional supplements and creative training strategies. A new supplement developed for competitive athletes is generating controversy and threatening to revolutionize several endurance sports. the product that has been generating so much debate is ePo Boostª -an all natural supplement developed by u.s. based Biomedical research Laboratories. ePo is industry shorthand for erythropoietin, a hormone produced by the kidneys that regulates red blood cell (rBc) production.

IncreasIng red blood cell productIon has long been the focus of competitive athletes due to the impact of rBc levels on oxygen intake and utilization. the greater the red blood cell production, the greater the bodyÕ s ability to absorb oxygen, which in turn gives an athlete more strength and endurance. strength and endurance are precious resources to any athlete. thus competitive athletes have tried various techniques to gain an advantage by increasing ePo and rBc levels. traditional techniques for boosting rBc levels include synthetic drugs and blood doping. these practices are both dangerous and banned by organized sports associations. Fans of ePo Boostª point out that the patent-pending formula is all-natural and is clinically proven to increase erythropoietin levels, resulting in greater strength and endurance. the scIentIfIc evIdence behind ePo Boostª does seem to represent a breakthrough in sports medicine. A 28-day double-blind placebo-controlled clinical trial, performed by dr. Whitehead from the department of Health and Human Performance at northwestern state university, showed that the ingredients found in ePo Boostª increased ePo production by over 90% compared to the group taking the placebo1. the supplement group also showed dramatic improvements in athletic performance (as measured by vo2max and running economy). one of the active ingredients in the formula is echinacea Purpurea, an herb that stimulates the immune system and is normally associated with alternative treatments for the common cold.

surprisingly, dr. WhiteheadÕ s study revealed that echinacea promotes a substantial increase in natural levels of ePo (erythropoietin). industry experts were shocked to discover that this simple herb had such an effect on the body. sInce Its release last year, competitive athletes have flocked to this new supplement, which offers all the benefits of greater ePo levels with none of the dangerous side effects or legal trouble. A company spokesman confirmed that the patent-pending formula contains active components that have been shown to boost ePo levels, resulting in greater strength and endurance.

Jason Walkley, a member of the royal Air Force elite triathlon team in the united Kingdom claimed an increased tolerance to fatigue after taking ePo Boostª . Jason stated, Ò i recently ran a 26.2km race completely at my Lactate turn Point (LtP) without a drop in pace, and with 5 km to go i really turned the screw on my competitors and increased my pace significantly over the last 5km.Ó mr. Walkley is not alone in his praise of the product. ursula Frans, a top marathon runner from south Africa used ePo Boostª in her preparation for this yearÕ s two oceans marathon.

Having finished in the top 20, she stated that her performance and endurance were substantially improved with ePo Boostª . the product has appeared in several magazines and dozens of websites and blogs.

According to published reports, the promise of ePo enhancing products has even been picked up by olympic athletes such as Jenny thompson and dara torres. not everyone is so endeared to the product. several athletes have said the supplement gives some athletes an unfair advantage. they

describe the performance improvements as Ò unnaturalÓ and pointed to athletes from cycling and long distance running as evidence that people are catching on to the supplement and using it for a competitive advantage. any athlete can use epo boostª without a prescription and without changing a diet or exercise regimen. the company offers an unparalleled guarantee. Athletes can use the product for a full 90 days and if not completely satisfied, send back whatever product is remaining - even an empty bottle - and get a Ô no questions askedÕ refund.

A company spokesman, speaking off the record, admitted that the product doesnÕ t work overnight and that most athletes wonÕ t see the extreme performance enhancements for up to four weeks. in a world infatuated with instant success, that kind of realistic admission might cost some sales but is likely to keep customers happy.

While the controversy over the advantage athletes using ePo Boostª are obtaining is unlikely to go away anytime soon, one thing is for sure: blood doping and synthetic drugs are a thing of the past now that amateurs and professionals alike can tap into a natural product that generates olympian-like strength and endurance.

Biomedical research Laboratories accepts orders from its website at www.ePoBoost com. A company spokesman confirmed a special offer: if you order this month, youÕ ll receive Free enroLLment into the companyÕ s elite Athlete club where youÕ ll qualify to receive a full 25% discount on all your bottles of ePo Boostª . And so you donÕ t go a day without ePo Boostª in your system Ð increasing your endurance, youÕ ll automatically receive a fresh bottle every 30days and your credit card will be billed the elite Athlete club member Price of $44.95 plus s/H Ð not the $59.95 fee non-members have to pay. there are no minimum amounts of bottles to buy and you can cancel at any time. the number to call is 1-800-590-6545, and you can call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

1. Whitehead et al. int J sport nutr exerc metab, 17 (2007): 378-9.

DELLY CARR

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RACING R

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in focus 152

boarding pass 160

the last word

Riders roll through dense woodlands at Ironman Western Australia on December 5.

Aussies Kate Bevilaqua and Courtney Odgen rocketed through the flat-and-fast bike course to take the final Ironman titles of 2010.

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the largest international distance triathlon series in the world

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ForD

ironman ariZona

NOVEMBER 21, 2010 : TEMPE, ARIZONA 2.4 MI. SwIM : 112 MI. BIkE : 26.2 MI. RUN mEn’S ToP FiniSHErS 1. Timo Bracht : GER : 8:07:16 2. Rasmus Henning : DEN : 8:10:58 3. Tom Lowe : GBR : 8:11:44

WomEn’S ToP FiniSHErS 1. Chrissie Wellington : GBR : 8:36:13 2. Linsey Corbin : USA : 9:05:33 3. Leanda Cave : GBR : 9:13:50

In what may have been the most competitve Ironman race of 2010 not staged on the Big Island of Hawaii, Chrissie Wellington and Timo Bracht were a cut above the rest, with each picking up a win and a new course record. Bracht’s 8:07 was mighty impressive, but it only put him at the finish 29 minutes before Wellington.

The three-time Kona champ’s 8:36:13 bested the previous women’s Ironman world record by more than 11 minutes (set by Sandra Wallenhorst at the 2008 Ironman Austria). lavamagazine.com

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NOOSA TRIATHLON OCTOBER 31, 2010 : NOOSa, QUEENSlaNd, aUS. 1.5K SWIM : 40K BIKE : 10K RUN MEN’S TOP FINISHERS 1. Courtney Atkinson : AUS : 1:46:54 2. Kris Gemmell : NZL : 1:47:06 3. Peter Kerr : AUS : 1:48:10

WOMEN’S TOP FINISHERS 1. Caroline Steffen : SUI : 2:01:18 2. Ashleigh Gentle : AUS : 2:01:22 3. Nicky Samuels : NZL : 2:03:30

The name “Noosa” may not get a lot of attention in the Northern Hemisphere, but ask anyone Down Under and they’ll tell you Noosa is synonymous with triathlon. The weekend-long multisport

PHOTOS COURTESY USM EVENTS

festival brought together some of the

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world’s top short-course speedsters for a final, year-end showdown on Australia’s Eastern coast. Aussie Courtney Atkinson and Switzerland’s Caroline Steffen both blazed through the 10K run to squeeze out narrow wins.

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SUNSMART IRONMAN

WESTERN AUSTRALIA

DeCember 5, 2010 : bUSSeltON, WA, AUStrAlIA 2.4 mI. SWIm : 112 mI. bIke : 26.2 mI. rUN MEN’S TOP FINISHERS 1. Courtney Odgen : AUS : 8:14:01 2. Matty White : AUS : 8:18:06 3. Pete Jacobs : AUS : 8:21:16

WOMEN’S TOP FINISHERS 1. Kate Bevilaqua : AUS : 9:19:44 2. Rebekah Keat : AUS : 9:22:37 3. Amelia Pearson : AUS : 9:36:52

It was a clean sweep for the home team at Ironman Western Australia, with Aussies Courtney Odgen and Kate Bevilaqua each picking up their first Ironman titles. Bevilaqua’s performance was one of the most impressive and gut-wrenching of the year, as she was PHOTOS DELLY CARR

relegated to a listless crawl down the

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finishing chute (photo left) and went unconsicous only a few seconds after crossing the line.

IRONMAN® 70.3®and M-DOT 70.3™ are trademarks of World Triathlon Corporation used here by permission

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theOTHER

DOWNUNDER

A favorite season-ending destination of triathlonÕ s elite for more than 15 years, Phuket, Thailand, hosted the inaugural Ironman AsiaPacific 70.3 Championship in December, welcoming 800 triathletes to one of the most exotic race venues in the world.

By Ben Greenfield

A

n island off the southwest coast of Thailand in the Andaman Sea, Phuket has traditionally served as the site of the popular Laguna Phuket Triathlon (LPT), and now offers a perfect backdrop for the new Asia-Pacific 70.3 Championship. It was evident during race week that the event directors had their race organization skills sharpened by previous experience with 17 years of the LPT, and from race start to finish, there was hardly an organizational hiccup. More than 800 international participants competed, with American Tim O’Donnell crowned men’s champion, and Switzerland’s Caroline Steffen taking the women’s race less than two months after her runner-up finish at the Hawaii Ironman.

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Colin Dunjohn

Despite having only a few relatively short climbs, the 56-mile bike course in Phuket is no place to set a new PR. Riders are forced to navigate a pedestrian footbridge (with a mandatory dismount), as well as plenty of tight, technical turns through the jungle.

A

quick glance at the race course reveals several unique and defining aspects of the event. After swimming 1200 meters in the Andaman Sea, athletes sprint under the starting arch and across the beach to then swim a final 600 meters across a lagoon and into the transition area. The winding bike course, featuring two steep, hilly sections, includes a dismount and bike carry across a footbridge, and several sweeps past throngs of cheering Thai schoolchildren. While pancake flat, the two-loop run course combines dirt trails, gravel roads, paved asphalt, cobblestones and plenty of spectating opportunities.

The primary attraction for this event, apart from the unique course, is the stark beauty and endless adventure available in and around Phuket.

Thai culture places a strong emphasis on the concept of “sanuk,” or the idea that life should be fun. Because of this, you’ll find the Thai people to be playful and happy, and the positive emotions, friendliness and extreme hospitality become quite contagious during race week.

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Lodging. Upon arriving at the race venue, most triathletes opt to stay at one of the six Laguna Beach hotels near Bang Tao beach and the race start, choosing from Banyan Tree Phuket, Sheraton Grande, Laguna Beach Resort, Dusit Thani, Best Western Allamanda or Outrigger Resort.

While slightly more expensive than staying in the nearby towns around Bang Tao beach, the resorts offer a relaxing blend of cleanliness and convenient amenities such as golf and water sports while still being located close enough to cities and the beach to hop on a free shuttle and grab a cheap plate of pad thai or a massage.

Food. While Western fare is readily available, Thai cuisine is a relatively healthy (and very affordable) combination of rice-based starches, lean proteins and fresh vegetables and fruits—all of it infused with flavors of lime, tamarind, chilies and curry. Must-have dishes during your stay in Phuket include traditional pad thai noodles, lightly fried fresh seafood, pineapples filled with fried rice and cashews, and the tradi-

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Colin Dunjohn

American Tim O’Donnell put the exclamation point on an incredible 2010 season in Phuket, leading from start to finish. O’Donnell’s girlfriend, Kona champ Mirinda Carfrae, chose vacationing over racing in Phuket this year.

tional Thai dessert: steamed bananas in sweetened coconut milk. Local restaurants with excellent dishes for great prices include the Black Cat and Tawai restaurants in town and Tom Yum Goong and Lay Pang on the beach.

Activities.

Adventure is instantly accessible on Phuket. Whether booking online, in town or with the resort concierge, most triathletes will enjoy a speedboat trip to the Phi Phi Islands, a trip to partake in the nightlife at Patong Beach or nearby elephant trekking and bamboo river rafting. For just a few dollars a day, motorbikes and shuttles are readily available for creating your own sightseeing events (such as a race course preview) or bartering

and shopping itineraries (such as a trip to Central Festival or Patong Market).

One highly recommended pre- and postrace activity is the traditional Thai massage, a form of bodywork that combines active, partner-assisted stretching with kneading massage from elbows, palms, fingers and feet, along with the occasional neck, back and hip adjustment. For as little as 10 dollars an hour, you can have your body tuned up and ready to race, or relaxed and pampered afterward. Be forewarned that if you venture off the resorts for your massage, you may run into parlors that offer ancillary sexual services you may want to be prepared to politely decline. lavamagazine.com

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Women’s winner Caroline Steffen strolls down the finishing chute alongside an elephant, Thailand’s most revered animal and a Laguna Phuket Triathlon tradition for almost two decades.

Whether you plan to take a relaxing two-week vacation and participate in both the LPT and the Asia-Pacific 70.3 Championships, or simply roll into Phuket for the new event, plan on experiencing multiple days of triathlon fun, with cuisine, course previews and celebrations that go beyond those found at most destination races.

“The Laguna Phuket Triathlon has the welldeserved reputation as the most fun you can have at a triathlon,” says Murphy Reinschreiber, managing director for WTC Asia-Pacific.

“For the 70.3, we’ve seasoned this reputation with a bit of championship flavor.”

After competing in the 2010 inaugural event, I’ll certainly be adding this race to my list of annual triathlon destination events, and would highly recommend the Asia-Pacific 70.3 Championships as one that jet-setting triathletes shouldn’t miss.

Colin Dunjohn

LAVA

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Ben Greenfield competed in both LPT and Asia-Pacific 70.3 this year, and his adventures can be followed at Bengreenfieldtri. blogspot.com

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WELLingTOn vS. cAvE After years of watching the Aussies have all the fun, Great Britain has emerged as the new triathlon superpower on the backs of athletes like Chrissie Wellington and Leanda Cave. This month, we sat down with the Queen and Princess of British Tri to talk federations, funding and Team USA. CW: That’s right. You have all these British athletes doing well at ITU racing and then a few years down the road they’re winning Ironman races. You have Rachel Joyce and Julie Dibens and Cat Morrison and so many others.

It’s amazing, but I don’t think you can chalk up the success of the British team to the support structure of the federation.

Leanda Cave: When I was starting out, it was hard to get any funding at all from the British Federation. I had to fight my ass off to get funding back then. I had to get to a really high level just to get a little money. Then I got a little funding, got injured, and lost my funding. It’s a vicious circle for the short-coursers trying to make it, because you have to rely so much on funding from the federation.

LC: Absolutely not, but in a way I think it’s

Chrissie Wellington: The system has definitely improved throughout the years, but there’s still a lot that needs to be done. That’s why I admire Alistair [Brownlee] so much. Sure, the federation has been there for him a bit, but he’s really gone off and made it on his own. It’s not easy to do.

been our blessing. At one point early in my career I was training at the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs with the U.S. Team and there were these Americans there who had it all. I was kicking their ass at the races, but they were getting free accommodation, free food, you name it. I had to win my first world championship to get all that stuff. It kept me hungry.

LC: It’s like you have to choose the lesser of two evils. Either you take the funding and

CW: Do you think it helps that there’s not this crazy youth sports culture in the U.K. like there is in the U.S. or in Australia? Maybe the British kids aren’t burning out, because they didn’t grow up treating sport as life or death.

you do what you’re told, or you don’t take the funding and you’re on your own.

CW: I guess I was lucky that I never really experienced that situation because I didn’t come up through draft-legal racing. Maybe I benefited from not having that pressure.

LC: Right, but you ran a bit before you started doing triathlons.

LC: But you’re unique! Not everyone picks

CW: I did—badly—but I wasn’t trying to be national cross-country champion at age 11. I was fresh when I started. How much do you credit the older guys like Spencer Smith and Simon Lessing for taking triathlon in the U.K. this far?

up the sport one day and is winning Ironman

CW: I think that definitely helped me when I was starting out, because I didn’t have any preconceived notions about the sport and didn’t really know much about ITU and Ironman racing. Maybe it helped to be a bit naive.

jay prasuhn

the next.

LC: Those guys were in a league of their own. Simon is simply one of the greatest there has ever been—he’s up there with you. I think when you get an enormous talent like that it

LC: Like I said, you’re a unique case. I trained and raced a lot in Australia early in

ter. You’re seeing that in the U.K. now. Guys

helps boost the profile of the sport. People like

my career and you knew exactly how good

like Tim Don have ushered in guys like Alistair

watching a superstar.

you had to be to be good. There was a lot

and Jonathan [Brownlee]. Now there are a lot

of talent down there and I think having that

of fast guys training together. There’s a snow-

giant talent pool helped make everyone bet-

ball effect and it’ll keep going.

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