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Hi Fellow Athlete,

My mission is to provide thought-provoking, fun, and maybe even sometimes useful news, stories, and opinions related to triathlon and endurance training and racing.

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Don't Forget to Swim.

That's advice I should take. I've been terrible at swimming these past few months.

And if you know me at all, you’ll know the swim isn’t my strength. My struggle from slow breast-stroker to average crawler was hard-won.

So when I heard about Ironman offering the option to skip the swim on some races and do a run in its place, I wasn’t thrilled.

You may think the bad swimmers would welcome this, but we, of all people, have so much more to gain by overcoming the swim.

I don’t love it because it’s easy, I love it because it’s hard! Really hard!

Here I am, happy as ever, after finishing the swim in Pt. Elisabeth, South Africa, in 2018.

Ironman says they are making the swim optional in some races simply to accommodate many of the athletes who didn’t have access to pools or any swim training due to COVID-19.

But if so many people have been affected, aren’t they all even? If such a majority really hasn’t been able to swim recently, isn’t the playing field level?

I really believe this is more of a revenue generating ploy to get races filled. We all know that Ironman’s revenues haven’t been great lately, and money has to be a driver.

They aren’t doing a very good job of salvaging what little brand loyalty they may have left, especially after their CEO’s message that didn’t exactly win the brand any fans.

It’s not really hard to see that this was a risky move to do now, especially with waning brand sentiment and plenty of already-unhappy athletes.

I, for one, will never opt out of 1/3 of what I have trained for.

CeramicSpeed Driven.

I’m ready for this one. And I’m sure many of you are, too.

You probably saw CeramicSpeed’s insanely innovative drivetrain which was first unveiled in 2018 at Eurobike. When I saw it, I got excited for a few minutes, but dismissed it as a prototype that would never see the light of day.

But then subscriber Mitch sent me this update from CeramicSpeed. The Danish company has supposedly built that prototype into a more viable iteration, and is looking to get it on the market by 2023.

They are asking for investment from the public, of $1,000 or more, and they’ve raised well over $600k, and it’s oversubscribed.

Here's a good overview of how it works

That’s good news for those of us that want Driven on our bikes.

They say they have an electronic shifting version, and that it will require little to no maintenance, and will cost around $1,600.

In theory, this sounds great and is exciting, but there are a lot of questions still outstanding, in my mind.

When I look at it, I see they’ve put it on a Specialized, a Canyon, and other bikes – but it appears that they’ve had to modify the chainstays to do so.

To me, it appears that you’d have to buy a new frame to get this drivetrain. Is that a big obstacle?

Most of us are very picky about our bikes and frames, and if it wasn’t exactly the frame I wanted, I’d probably stick with my greasy chain and cassette setup.

Also, why they’re not having CeramicSpeed fund it is another concern. Is it deemed too risky?

Why would they want to expose things like financial forecasts, expected costs, profits, and more when they could probably fund it themselves? Must be risky.

In short, if CeramicSpeed wants to avoid the risk of this why should you take it on? What do they know that we don't?

Consider that Shimano and SRAM have a near-duopoly on the bike drivetrain market, especially in the performance space, and that’ll be hard to break into. Think of all the parts, tools, mechanics, components, distributors, shops, training, and more that would have to align.

But CeramicSpeed sees this as an opportunity, stating that this duopoly has no real motivation to innovate. And that’s why we’re stuck with a system that’s over a century old.

Still, I hope this works, and I’d love to have it.

Now, imagine pairing your new CeramicSpeed Driven with those metal Mars tires we saw a few weeks ago.

Supersapiens.

If you’re not familiar with Supersapiens and continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) yet, you will be soon.

The device lets you view real-time fuel levels on your phone or other device (not sure if it’ll work on a Garmin or other watch yet, but I bet that’s coming soon).

“Once athletes have minute-by-minute fuel data right during a workout, they can quickly identify the correlation between their glucose levels and performance — translating more fueled training minutes into bigger performance gains,” said Todd Furneaux, Supersapiens co-founder and president.

Promo video for Supersapiens

It has its sceptics, though, like the TriDoc, who did a podcast on GCM recently.

He takes issue with some of the claims on the Supersapiens site, like one claiming that “without this device fueling properly is nearly impossible and an unknown black box.”

He continues, saying that the factual studies are small and inconclusive. And an endocrinologist he spoke with said, “Why in the world would anyone need to know this and what would they expect it to tell them? They can’t change how their bodies react to glucose anyways.”

He adds that CGM doesn’t tell you anything you don't already know; nor does it offer data that you can even act on.

Either way, you won’t be able to avoid the brand, as they have become the title partner of Ironman World Champs in Kona. They’re also sponsoring more than 25 other fulls and halves around Europe in 2021.

Presumably they got all that sponsorship cash from the $13.5 million of early stage funding they just raised. With brands like Zwift and Wahoo invested so I’m sure we’ll continue to hear and see a lot of Supersapiens in the coming years.

And also…looks like they’re using some of that cash to hire everything from customer service and sales to a creative directors and project managers in both Germany and their Atlanta, GA offices.

Tales of Pain.

Here comes a second Tale of Pain, this time from Clarke in Singapore.

Here is Clarke racing in considerably less pain, in Bintan.

"My most painful race ever was the Cairns full Ironman, in 2019. I injured two tendons in my arm and couldn't use it well on the bike," Clarke told me.

"As a result, I strained my neck. I forced myself to complete the bike in under 7 hours, which was ok, but then the real pain started on the run."

"At that point, my ITB was so tight that I only managed to run 12km, resulting in a 30km walk of pure pain."

Send me your Tales of Pain

Sprint Reads

Subscriber Toby's Zwift hub acquired by Zwift Insider.

Widespread support for Daniela Ryf as she reveals news of her sexuality

Vincent Luis will be shooting for a gold in Tokyo!

The Zwift Academy tri team for 2021 is out now.

Does perfectionism lead to burnout in athletes? Yes, says the research.

Check out this list of factors that can affect your heart rate while training. Thanks, Ben.

This looks like a fun book, My Coworkers Think I'm a Pro.

Since when did all cyclists have to be skinny? I loved this video, All Bodies on Bike s. Plus, it’s shot in my home state of Oregon!

Apparently there is a fake doping conspiracy to hurt Kenya’s image

Here’s a cool group in the UK to get people swimming more, especially beginners

Follow me on Strava and Instagram and I'll follow you back.

None of the Sprint Reads are sponsored or affiliate links.

Home Massage from Addaday

If you're looking for a massage or recovery product, check out Addaday.

Turns out tri legend Chris Lieto is working for them and he set me up with an affiliate link.

They only ship to the US, for now.

15% off UCAN

If you are in the US, and you want a deal on nutrition, go for UCAN.

Get 15% off with this link: https://ucan.co/Share/IronmanHacks

Doing so gives you a good deal but also supports me.

Optimize your Nutrition

Want to know more about how food can support you with your performance goals?

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Reach out to Karelle Laurent Nutrition (DipION mBANT rCHCN), a registered nutrition therapist (and triathlete!) to get expert help around those topics, how to best implement changes in your everyday diet, and get the best out of your training.

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Alternatively, you can book a free 15 min phone chat here.

I have personally worked with Karelle and I can vouch for her. -Andrew