Triathlon National Championships
Dan Empfield (www.slowtwitch.com)
October 4, 2003, Shreveport, Louisiana

There are two ways you can look at triathlon nationals. You can focus on the race and the competition, and zone out everything else. Or you can consider the entertainment value of the race itself — how it rates on the fun-meter.

I knew the competition would be good. The race was big, 1300 registrants. The quality of my own age-group, the 45-49, was best described by who wasn't there — the Martins (Nick and Mac), Brockenbrough, and Schiller. Everyone else attended.

I had low expectations for the town. I mean, Shreveport? This was confirmed, I thought, on the second evening, when we passed up Outback Steakhouse while looking for a good restaurant for dinner. Forty-five forlorn minutes later we were on the freeway asking each other, "Is this the offramp for Outback?"

We routed ourselves to City Cycle, the technical name of Bicycle Sports' Shreveport store. John Cobb (center) used to be the big man behind Bicycle Sports, but as you can see via unretouched photographic evidence, that mantle is now laid upon senior partner Cody Smith. Also in the photo is — newly bike-fitted by John — Seattle's Anne Jensen.

Then it was to pre-race, packet pickup (as in pledge pin, for you Animal Housers). Not much going on here, except that a few USAT big whigs were in attendance, such as board president Valerie Gattis (tall) and Age-Group Commission chair Liz Dobbins (not tall). One doesn't think of a USAT board member as a person with whom you'd want to party, but I have a suspicion that there's a side to Val Gattis that few have seen, but that would be very entertaining. Next time we all go out for apres-tri I'm going to try to drag her with us.

Then it was bike drop-off at the transition area, which was on a grass field adjacent to the lake. We'd passed a huge billboard on the way that was entirely red, with the silhouette of a forty-foot black mosquito on it, and only the words USE MOSQUITO REPELLENT. I thought about that as I laid out my transition stuff, smacking one part of my body or other every 20 seconds.

I hate to be gratuitously literal, and you don't want to know what I was envisioning when thinking about the Shreveport swim. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Yes, it was like swimming in chocolate milk, but I like chocolate milk. And besides, as long as I'm only swimming through liquids and not solids, I'm okay.

Typical USAT email update: "The lake water generally doesn't start boiling until 11AM, and while there is a greater chance of getting struck by lightning — standing indoors, in your basement — than wetsuits being allowed, bring wetsuits just in case."

USAT at the pre-race meeting, the night before the race: "The water is sufficiently cold that we aren't even going to bother measuring on race morning: wetsuits are allowed."

For the record, the water was 71 degrees, as opposed to the 84 degrees a week earlier.

With 1300 people showing up, most of whom will ride the bike split within a 15-minute span of each other, I figured the bike race would be a draft-fest the likes of which even I'd never seen. So I was pleasantly surprised to see a bike course entirely devoid of cars, with wide lanes, and almost no drafting. I'd brought my secret weapon bike, upon which I'd relied to give me extra speed. Instead I ran well and biked slowly. But I can't blame my bike for a lack of leg.

The run was through a residential area, and the Louisianans had their water sprinklers out and were getting into the spirit. All in all, no complaints. Very well-run race. Quick results. Gatorade everywhere, as well as other food thingies.

There were a lot of long faces after the race, but not because they didn't enjoy the event. As competition goes, this was really the best of the best, and people who were used to being overall age-group champions in their regional race environments were getting 5th, or 13th, or 22nd in their age-group here. I was 16th in the 45-49 out of 77, and I'd only been out of the top 3 in two races this year.

The main thing I want to relate, however, is that the town finally opened itself up to us on the night after the race. We were apprised that the good restaurants were on Line Avenue, and off we went. This is, after all, the Party Tour.

So Emilio De Soto, Mike Collins, Dan Neyenhuis, Mark Montgomery, and I and a few others did finally end up with smiles on our faces. As for Collins (4th in the 35-39, and to the left of 30-34 Shari Russell) I'm sorry if I'm getting you in the dutch with this photo. But there's no denying that if you're a guy there are worse groupings of women than those who go to tri nationals. As one fellow at the awards ceremony put it, "I'd [like to get to know] the entire 30-34 podium (10 women strong).

Now that we've got the hang of Shreveport we're certainly coming back for next year's nationals, which will again be in this town. If you're joining us, three words of advice from the locals that I'll pass on: Use mosquito repellent.