Is race course chivalry dead?

October 14, 2008

I vividly remember my first Ironman (who does not?). My first happened to be the Hawaiian Ironman because, at the time, it was the only Ironman in existence. The Ironman Triathlon in Kona was also Andy Pott's first Ironman.

When I entered the Ironman, only about a hundred people had ever finished it. Because of this, there was as much camaraderie among contestants as there was competitiveness. Realize that in 1981, the year of my race, almost no one knew what a triathlon was. Few knew what at Ironman was. There were no triathlon stores or clubs; adult swim teams were not populated by triathletes; there were no triathlon magazines.

In fact, the term "triathlete" was barely invested with meaning back then. How could you be a triathlete if there were no triathlons? And there were almost no triathlons. I competed in just one prior to racing the Ironman, and I had to travel 500 miles to get to it. It was rarer yet to know anyone training for the Ironman, or anyone who'd raced in it.

My first Ironman was Kona's first Ironman. We just celebrated 30 years of Ironman last week, and 27 of them have taken place on Kona's roads, in the town of Kailua. Much has changed. Kona has a Costco. Not only was there no Costco when I raced the Ironman, that company hadn't yet debuted its first store prior to Kona's Ironman debut. Nowadays, during Ironman week, there is traffic where none used to be. There is density.

And there is prize money. For me, Ironman was an adventure. For Andy Potts it was an adventure, but also a business. It was purely business for those against whom he was racing. So much for camaraderie.

And yet, there is something about triathlon, isn't there? Even at the highest levels. Said Potts after his debut Kona race, "When the pack caught us, Crowie [eventual race winner Craig Alexander] turned to me and said, 'Hey, looking good, Pottsie. Keep it rolling.'"

About former Ironman World Champion winner Faris Al Sultan of Germany, who rode by Potts shortly thereafter: "I'd never met Faris, but when he rode by he said, 'You'll be fine.'"

"And then somebody else came up. It was [many-time Ironman winner, and perennian top-3 Kona finisher] Cam Brown. I'd never met Cam Brown. And he told me, 'Alright! Alright, Andy!""

Not long afterward, reigning Ironman World Champion Chris McCormack came up alongside. "And then Macca," Potts said, thrilled not simply with his race, but with the warm greeting by those with whom he was in pitched battle. "Why did you sign up for this race?" McCormack jested.

"So with all this encouragement," explained Potts, "I'm, like, 'cool.' When I passed others, I passed on encouragements. So when Luke McKenzie and I were in the [penalty] tent, he was discouraged. So i said, 'It's okay. Let's just roll together.'"

This unexpected spate of sportsmanship on behalf of his competitors spurred Potts toward the finish, in spite of his lack of the long-distance training days Ironman athletes traditionally engage in. "I saw the 100-mile mark on the bike, and I thought, well, I've never done that before, even in training. Then when I saw the 15 mile mark of the run, I thought, I've never done that before either."

Potts continued on, finishing seventh overall, and as the first American. In contrast to another World Class swimmer-turned-Ironman, Sheila Taormina, Potts seems more inspired by the history, and pulled by the gravitational force, of triathlon than by the weight and allure of the Olympics. "Guys like Mark Allen and Dave Scott and Scott Tinley and Mike Pigg were triathletes," Potts told Slowtwitch prior to the Ironman. "Three sport athletes who could do any distance. They took on all distances without fear… It did not matter what the distance was. They combined all three sports and sorted out who does it the best. What I want from my career is to be called a complete triathlete."

Of course, there was a lot of camaraderie in those historic days of which Potts spoke with fondness and nostalgia. It seems that legacy of course chivalry has been passed down to the present.