The Dark Side of Triathlon

I have personally had a very positive experience, culminating in the Ironman, in the sport of triathlon. It has certainly sustained me, and brought me a lot of pleasure, pain (but the ability to overcome it), and taken me to a lot of places where I have met some very interesting and inspired characters. Triathlon though, is a sport, that more than most, caters to the obessive-compulsive personality. If this is true, it also provides a healthy outlet, as long as we are not driven to overtrain or train when we are sick. I have been, and that's the dark side of triathlon.

But beyond what we do to, or for ourselves, there are also fellow athletes that either command our respect (for me it is guys like Raynard Tissink and Peter Reid), or indiciate what lengths some will go to satisfy a need either to be superior, or be seen as superior, by unsportsmanlike means. A good example of this is Nina Kraft, who won the Ironman world championship, accepted the awards, amde speeches, and then tested positive for EPO.

EPO triathlon cheat Nina Kraft gets reduced ban

FRANKFURT (Germany): Germany’s disgraced Ironman Triathlon world champion Nina Kraft has seen her initial two-year ban for using the blood-boosting drug EPO sport reduced to 12 months, the German Triathlon Union (DTU) confirmed on Monday. The 35-year-old became the first German woman to win the Ironman triathlon in Hawaii back on October 17 2002 but tested positive for EPO (erythropoietin) a month later and was hit with a two-year ban.

It seems ludicrous to me that people at such a high level will try to take short cuts, but I suppose that they are driven to survive financially by their sport, and their sponsors put a great deal of pressure on them for results. Evens so, it seems nonsensical to me that elite athletes will try to gain an advantage over their competitors, because if successful, what does it mean in their private hours after the awards ceremony.

Natascha Badmann, the always smiling Swiss woman who came second at the World Championships, felt cheated and unsure of the reality, and credibility of the title that was taken from Kraft and given to her. Understandably so. She raced again in South Africa, only 5 months after Hawaii, to put it behind her. She says:

“I was frustrated at the beginning, but now, finally, after some time has gone by, I got so much nice correspondence from people – people who I didn’t know at all, who talked to me when I went to the supermarket, and would say “We were with you, and know you won – we knew you were good.” Reaction from people that I never expected to get. Things like that really helped me to get over it,” she said in an interview a couple of days before she raced at the Spec-Savers Ironman South Africa event.

Kevin Mackinnon of Ironmanlive, writes:
The five-time Ironman Triathlon World Champion has become a major proponent of drug testing after her bitter-sweet win in Kona last fall.
Last fall Natascha Badmann, who turned 38 in December, became the oldest ever winner of the Ironman Triathlon World Championship. For Badmann the victory was bitter sweet – it wasn’t until Nina Kraft’s positive test for EPO that the Swiss star was given her fifth Ironman title.

Now, months after the fact, Badmann is beginning to come to terms with the frustrating way she achieved her fifth Kona title.

If it is ludicrous to cheat at such a high level, then it really defies belief to do so at an amateur level. Perhaps the cheater is not really aware that he or she is cheating, but is simply in a hurry... No, I don't think that washes. I think cheating is cheating, and no matter how strong your will to win is, when in a race, everyone should hold to the same standard. The winner wins because he faced the same challenge as everyone else, not because he was the only one to bullshit his way through the system, outsmarting his fellow competitors through guile, good looks or some other charade (as may happen in the real world).

I introduced a New Zealand athlete, Bernard Adams, a stocky, redheaded ex marine, to the sport (of triathlon) towards the middle of 2003, perhaps a little earlier. I did so because he was an exceptionally good swimmer and runner at the time anyway, and was committed to training often. In short he was motivated and habituated to training, and I thought triathlon was the perfect fit. He didn't feel the same way, and actually said on several occasions, "I will never do this..." To his credit, he reconsidered when a friend suggested they give it a go, especially since his friend had a brother who had some experience at the sport. Within a very short time, Bernard had acquired all the very best equipment, including a bicyle frame identical to mine, but the very latest technology.

I remember him as being excessively careful with money, more of a penny pincher than I am, so was surprised to hear that he had suddenly spent a huge amount of money at the drop of a hat on all sorts of equipment. But I also knew he could afford it (more than I could), and also realised with a pang, to what extent he was serious about what was obviously a newfound passion. At one stage he asked me to join in a bulk order, thereby assuring shared discounts. I offered some advice on bicycle wheels, but there our views differed, and while he went for a pair of heavier trispokes, I went for less flashy but high performance Zipp Deep Section rims.

Although we had trained a great deal together when I was a triathlete and he was not, including swimming and running, once he began his preparations for triathlon I am not sure if we trained again after that, beyond a handful of swimming sessions. It became obvious, very soon, that he was out to beat me.
This seemed very unnecessary, because I was far more experienced than he was, and I felt the point was that he should get to know the sport, especially in the first races, and enjoy it, and then worry about performance.
As it turned out, at the very first event, I had an electrolytic and more than likely a glucose bonk, and ended up walking on the run. This obviously gave the appearance that I hadn't much experience or knowledge in the sport. Bernard though, managed to do a really good race, despite an extremely chilly swim, and before the run, he was as much as 1 or 2 minutes ahead of me.
I felt a strong sense that he would go far in the sport, and enjoy it.

I felt profoundly disappointed with my race, not only due to the preventable bonking experience, (due to lack of sleep, I simply had not thought to eat more than I did)but also because I had taken a wrong turn and so lost touch with riders I was drafting with (it qas a draft legal race), and had to recoup lost time at a great cost in terms of energy.

I made good on my commitment to improve on my performance, by winning the next race at Tongyoung. I knew the race offered prizemoney, and few do for age groupers these days, so I was focussed on a top 3 podium finish. To win, was a bonus. But there is an interesting aside to this story. Bernard had managed a podium finish in Gangneung, at number 3, but at Tongyoung, he came out the water first (me second, about a minute behind) and then punctured after 4-5km. Knowing he was probably capable of running 4-5 minutes faster than I was in that race, I still believed the race, between the two of us at any rate, was not over. I would be competing against him directly, if I meant to make the podium. So I was in a very competitive mode for this race. But he was unable to fix his puncture quickly, and so lost time and ultimately fell out of the top 10.

Although I was determined to do well, I was also determined to run my own race, and stuck closely to a heart rate, and did not deviate virtually for the duration of the race. When I finished the race, I was extremely happy to have held it together so well, and to have finished ahead of an outstanding competitor called Mr Pee, but was actually unaware that I was first. I knew I had done well, but I had no idea what my placing was. That's to what extent it was a private race, me just pushing myself as hard as I could, noticing other athletes but not focussed on them.

It was some time later that I heard that Bernard and his friend were both disqualified for drafting. I thought perhaps, due to inexperience, they had drafted without knowing that in this race, as opposed to the last, it was illegal. But I later heard from other Koreans that many people had shouted and called to them to stop, but both athletes had just ignored this. I thought this was a bit of an aberation, didn't quite know what to think of it. But later I heard a comment that Bernard wondered if I had intentionally sabotaged his race, that perhaps I had caused him to puncture. This surprised me, and in fact, annoyed me. I'm not sure if he seriously considered this, but the fact is he was thinking about it, because I heard about it. The implication was that in order to win I had to cheat, and this didn't sit well with me at all.

In a peculiar quirk of fate, later that day when I went to finally collect my bicycle in the transition area, my back wheel was completely flat. I remember seeing a lot of flat stones on the course, and I know on the very last lap I had strayed over a piece of road, riding over these stones that I had intentionally avoided. Evidently they had pierced my tyre on the final lap (of 5), but not enough to prevent me from completing the lap. As it was, I was completely unaware of it until I fetched my bike.

If the disqualification at Tongyoung was an aberation, what happened in Cheolwon was not. Bernard won the very next race, by fair means, but at Cheolwon he later indicated in his log, on beginnertriathlete.com, that he had swum on the inside of the lane ropes (Cheolwon had spanned ropes from buoy to buoy) to avoid the bottlenecks of swimmers. I was also painfully aware of the large amounts of slow swimmers hogging the passage of water, but I took a very wide route in order to avoid all of them. I believed I would have one of the fastest swims of the day, and I also thought it was very likely that my swim would be faster than Bernard's that day. One of my goals, for Cheolwon, was to have an excellent swim as I had had the year before. To hear afterwards that he had swum on the inside, was really disheartening for me to hear. I don't know whether he knew he was cheating, but where lane ropes are setup, a swimmer may not swim on the inside of them. In the Ironman, to do so invites disqualification. In any event, his doing so meant his race was completely different to everyone elses, particularly here, in terms of the swim.

Once again I was not sure whether this was just an aberation, a bad decision, but one borne out of the necessity to get around people in the way. But I was beginning to think so, feeling that a pattern was emerging, and the need to win, for him, was paramount. More important than fairness. This same attitude prevailed, I suppose, at Tongyoung, where many Koreans shouted to no avail 'NO DRAFTING' but they drafted for the duration of the race. Did they think the Koreans didn't know what they were talking about? That they knew better? Who knows? It just sat very badly with me, that this guy that I had introduced to the sport, was running amuck, arrogant because he thought he was so good, flouting the rules. I didn't like it at all. I believe he is a great athlete, but that is no license for dishonesty, to cheat, to serve a superego.

Finally, and this has prompted me to write this and post it in a public place, he made a claim to a close friend of mine that he missed a slot for Hawaii by 'just one place'. He had a very good first Ironman (the race in Korea was not a complete Ironman as the swim section was cancelled due to a typhoon), and he deserves the credit to had lifted himself from absolute rookie, to an Ironman, in a single year. I did triathlon for over a decade before I felt ready to attempt the Ironman. I did my first 3/4 Ironman in 1996 I think, in under 7 hours, and felt I had a special talent over longer distances. But to go under 10 hours over the full distance, in the first time, is truly exceptional. It was my goal, and it remains my goal to go under 10 hours, but I am happy to approach it with not just fortitude, but also patience. The lesson I learned from the Ironman is 'everything in good time', and 'believe in yourself, respect yourself, and then try...'

As I say, Bernard's performance, the result of 6 months of dedicated training in New Zealand, is remarkable for someone so inexperienced, so new to the sport. This achievement though was not enough to guarantee a place at the World Ironman Championships (another goal I have had for some years). In fact, his time was only good enough for 18th of some 186 competitors. This shows the depth of the New Zealand field. I was surprised to hear a friend relay a message Bernard had conveyed to her, saying he had missed his slot to Hawaii by one.
How it works is 2000 people compete in the World Championship, and roughly a thousand or more slots are up for grabs at some 20 qualifying events around the world. Usually 25-50 slots are allocated to each event, divided into various age groups. Ironman New Zealand had 70 slots, the most of any race. 10 went to the elite athletes, and the other 60 get divided into the 20-24 age group, 25-29, 30-34, all the way up to 60-64 and higher. This means if there are 6 groups, each allocated 10 slots, then to miss a slot by one means one has to have come in 11th. For this reason I was once again really annoyed to be aware of this unsportsmanlike attitude to the sport.

Having read Into Thin Air, and having heard Broukeev's explanation for acting as guide without oxygen, I agree with Krakauer that his book was not about a blame game, but was simply an honest attempt to uncover what really happened, and also to hold everyone accountable for what happened. He admits that he needed also to exorcise his own experience, laying down the facts honestly and without judgement, including his own culpability on that mountain.

This account is somewhat different. Ironman does share the goal (with high altitude mountaineering) of attempting to defy the odds to an extent, to be courageous, but one also hopes, to be sporting and fair if it is possible, even in extreme conditions. Be Fair, Play Fair. This is why Woodall and 'O Dowd are an embarassment to that year, '96, because it was one rule for them, it was about their selfish ambitions, their glorification, and to hell with etiquette and everyone else.
Maybe morality does not belong on a mountain, but if one can help someone, if one can be true to oneself about the facts and reasons behind actions, I think one ought to try, and face a disapproving audience if not.

In that sense I thought it was necessary to mention Bernard by name. This certainly isn't a forum frequented by Ironman officials or only triathletes, but it nevertheless presents some kind of audience. I will also bring his attention to what I have mentioned here. Some, most I think, he already knows, from me directly, but if not, here it is. At the very least, it will provide an incentive for him, and others possibly, who are out there, whether in sport or not, to continue to race (or live) well, but to not continue to put himself, unfairly, above other competitors. Sport is after all analogous to our lives, but hopefully better than our lives in the sense that we see definite results for all our efforts, are rewarded, we have comaraderie, attention and support and importantly, fair play. This is how, certainly in the arena, we can all be winners, all be enriched.