Tell me about your first triathlon!

[HillSlugger]

I'm curious, when you guys say "tri", what distance are we talking about? Is there a set distance, or is it basically any event comprising swimming, cycling, and running?

If one says "I did the Sprint", will most people know it's 800M swim, 20K ride, and 5K run? or is that something the University who's hosting it made up?

Rabbit: I never really thought much about transitioning. I've thought about what I ought to wear. I need to get better tights as the pair I have now keeps slipping down when I run! My bike is just a cyclocross converted to commuting with a straight bar. Nothing fancy, but I'd rather not look the part - nothing worse than looking like a million bucks in special gear and coming in towards the end or not finishing!!

I do hope it's not too cold; they've always had it in March. I remember one year it was snowing!! But truthfully I'd rather have it on the colder side than hotter, I don't do well in the heat.

An Olympic distance tri (also called International) will be very close to 1500m swim/40k bike/10k run. Sprint triathlons can be any distance at all that's short of Olympic. A pretty typical one might be 750m swim/20k bike/5k run. My first sprint tri had a 300m pool swim. My second sprint tri (Iron Girl) was 1000m swim/17.5 mile bike/3.4 mile run. I think it depends largely on what the local roads and body of water will accommodate.

Beyond Olympic the standard tri's are Half Ironman (also called 70.3) (1.2 mile swim/56 mile bike/13.2 mile run) and Ironman (2.4 mile swim/102 mile bike/26.2 mile run). For the truly crazy there are Ironman-multiple triathlons 2x, 3x, etc.