Commentary on Competitive Performance of
Elite Olympic-Distance Triathletes Brendon M Downey Sportscience 9, 42 (sportsci.org/jour/05/bmd.htm) |
|
While I
can see the logic in your 1.2%, I believe that the addition of drafting in
the cycle stage has made the running stage more reliable, because the
athletes in a cycling pack can conserve their energy for the run. I would
therefore argue that a smaller improvement in performance is now worthwhile,
probably a little less than 1% in run speed. You have
not dealt with the women's triathlon. The smallest worthwhile improvement is
likely to be greater for women than for men, given that the men's competition
is generally closer (that is, the top ten finish closer together). The International
Triathlon Union takes this difference between sexes into account by setting
different cut-offs for triathletes to earn competition points: 5% of the
men's winning time is the cut-off for men, but for women it is 8% of the
women's winning time. Regarding the transitions, I think that in
practice it is still possible to make mistakes that place athletes back a
group on the bike ride. Of course, the measured transition (between timing
mats) does not reflect the actual full transition (from stand up at swim exit
to up to full speed on the bike). So while I agree that the measured period
you have in your paper is probably not worth much, this does not reflect the
full picture of what can be worked on by the athletes to improve performance
in transitions. On many occasions I
have seen athletes losing a group in the ride by not being able to take their
wetsuit off quickly (stuck zipper, not finding the zipper cord, wetsuit stuck
at ankles) or through errors at transition exit (shoes coming off bikes, crashing
into other cyclists at mounting/dismounting, being penalized by incorrect
bike racking). The frequency of such errors can be reduced through practice
and through experience of the heat of competition. Back to article/homepage
Published Dec 2005 |