Swichio Blog Could Rev3 Rush Change the Face of Triathlon?

This past weekend, Rev3 debuted a new triathlon race format at the Richmond International Raceway (think big time NASCAR) in Richmond, VA. How? There's No Place To Swim.Rev3 went all in for this race and built a 15-lane 25-meter pool in the middle of the race track. Racers swam in the pop-up pool and then rode and ran on the race track! Yes, it was as cool as it sounds. NASCAR for bikes! Who?Age groupers from the age of 7-100+ could race in addition to an elite development field. With each age group racing at different times, entire families could come out and both race and cheer for their family members. A great family event! The Format Can you imagine paying one race fee and being able to race in up to 5 races in two days? The Rush format gave each racer 3 opportunities throughout two days to better their times to try to qualify for the Age Group Final on day 2. Everyone has had that race where they wanted a do-over because of a cramp in the swim, botched T1, flat on the bike, etc. Now you don't have to put all of your eggs in one basket. Have a bad race? Racers could opt to race in round 2 and/or round 3. Athletes had multiple opportunities to get it right! The athlete's best time from the first 3 races were used to determine if they were one of the top 12 in their age group to race in the Age Group Final on day 2. So, with 3 chances, what's the best strategy? Go all out in round 1 and hope that your time is good enough to qualify you for the finals and skip round 2 and 3? Or do you hold back and race just hard enough to hopefully get you to the finals and conserve your energy but risk having to race again? However they decided to spread or conserve their energy, each round looked the same. Athletes were head-to-head with 14 other racers in their age group on the pool deck of the massive pop-up pool in the middle of the race track. After exiting the swim, athletes ran down the short ramp to their bikes directly at the bottom of their corresponding swim lane. There was no long run to transition or searching through a sea of bikes for their racks and bikes. T1 doesn't get much easier than this. Athletes then rode their designated number of loops on the race track. The other notable difference to this format is that it was draft legal! Now for many triathletes, this sounds terrifying. However, it really wasn't. There were no triathletes with sketchy handling skills in aero bars drafting off of someone in front of them going 25+ miles per hour with no way to hit the brakes. There were no aero bars or aero helmets in this race. Waves consisted of only 15 racers at a time. It was not like the sprint at the end of the Tour de France with 100 racers jockeying for position ending with a finish that appears on DVD's called Epic Crashes. If athletes were lucky enough to get out of the pool with someone around them, they had the opportunity to work together, ride fast and conserve energy by drafting. The more advanced riders at this race had at most 6 riders working together. More often, there were 2-3 working together or solo cyclists doing the standard time trial. Draft legal does not mean crash-fest. In an entire weekend of racing, we did not see any bike crashes due to drafting. Due to the closed nature of the course, this ended up being one of the safest courses we've ever seen. Rev3 is great at making racers feel like world champions. At the end of the bike leg, racers dismounted and handed off their bikes to volunteers. Again, no long runs through transition pushing their bikes. The bike valet service got the athletes to T2 fast and smooth! Depending on their age group, Age Groupers ran a designated number of laps around the inside of the .75 mile track. The condensed nature of this course was one of a kind in allowing spectators to see the entire race from one viewing area. Most spectators at races get to see their racers in T1 and T2. At Rush, spectators were able to see every bit of the swim from the stands and close up views on the jumbo-tron as well as the entire bike and the entire run. Imagine as an athlete having your friends and family be able to cheer for you during the entire race. "I can't believe the wall of sound from the people cheering as I came through the turn" noted Swichio Ambassador, Jim Fisher. Rev3 was spot on when they named the new race format Rush. Grand FinalThe excitement doesn't end there. At the conclusion of all of the Age Group Final races, the top 8 times, regardless of age, competed in one final race, the Grand Final. The FASTEST racers competed head-to-head to determine who was the fastest (or who had the most left in the tank after an exhausting 2 days of racing). This was by far the most exciting race of the day. How close does it get? 16 seconds separated 1st-4th place in the men's Grand Final. Now that's what you call a drag race on a Nascar track! Food for ThoughtAs triathletes we train A LOT for sprints, olympics, halves and Ironmans. Can this type of race change triathlon and how we train for them? People do Ironman distance races for the challenge and for the full race experience. With Rush, it's an entirely different type of challenge and Rev3 comes through with the full race experience. Will this format be the new face of triathlon? In the words of Swichio Ambassador, Jim Fisher, "I don't care where the next one is. We're going! I will be the first to get a Rush tattoo." If nothing else that you've read so far adequately describes how cool this race format really is, take it from a 7 year old. Swichio Ambassador, Maddie, raced in the 9 and under race and thought so much of it that the first thing she did when she got home was write in her journal about the race. Even a 7 year old recognized how unique the race "cors" was. She even rated the race E+ (excellent + in elementary school grading). The kid activities also didn't hurt (trampoline jumping, bull riding, mini race car driving and kona ice)!KudosA big shout out to Jay Peluso from Peluso Open Water for getting the race here and for taking on the exhausting job of local race director. Congratulations to Richmond local, Bob Flanigan from Central Virginia Endurance and Swichio Ambassador, Jim Fisher, for both making it to the Grand Final and finishing 3rd and 4th overall in an extremely competitive field. Find a Rush Race near you!http://rev3tri.com/Share this post on Facebook!TweetFollow @Swichio