Caress to get his sanction and retain L.A. Tri

Jack Caress, the pugnacious, oft maligned race director of the L.A. Triathlon, has withstood the brinksmanship that threatened to end his run as the only organizer this race has ever known. USA Triathlon, triathlon's national governing body, has indicated it will issue a sanction to Caress, which will forestall the placing of the race and its permits out to bid.

USAT's executive director, Skip Gilbert, argued before the L.A. City Council that its race director should be sanctioned by the federation. The Council agreed, and gave Caress until the 18th of May to produce proof that his L.A. Tri would be sanctioned, notwithstanding Gilbert's promise that any such sanction application filed by Caress would be denied.

In his entreaties to the Council Gilbert pointed to the Malibu Triathlon race director Michael Epstein as an alternative to Caress, arguing that Epstein would have the federation's full support. Epstein would put on a race that, according to Gilbert, might double or triple the size of the race Caress has produced in recent years.

Gilbert's rationale for denying Caress a sanction was twofold: Caress owed the federation a $25,000 debt that stretched back a decade; and USAT's parent federation, triathlon's world governing body (ITU), resolved during one of its annual congresses back in the 1990s that no daughter federation may do business with Jack Caress.

But Gilbert was forced to retract the charge that Caress was in arrears with USAT, because no supporting documentation could be found. It was now up to the ITU to produce its documentation that such a resolution against Caress had in fact been passed. "The ITU had three weeks to fax us through any documentation supporting the resolution," said Gilbert. But in the end, no documents were forthcoming. On Thursday, May 14, USAT stopped waiting for the ITU to forward the correspondence it sought, and resolved to issue Caress his sanction for the L.A. Tri.

On that same day Michael Epstein's organization, MESP, issued a press release announcing an Olympic distance triathlon in conjunction with its popular Malibu race the week afterward. Is this in response to Epstein not getting the L.A. Tri, or would this Olympic race in Malibu, with its $40,000 prize purse, have happened anyway? Epstein has not responded to this question.

This busies California's race calendar in September. The L.A. Tri takes place on September 7, the same day as the popular Pacific Coast Tri just down the coast in Newport Beach. The following weekend is the Pacific Grove Tri in Monterrey, as well as the Malibu Olympic on Saturday and the popular sprint race on Sunday. That's more than 10,000 registrations over eight days.