Let's talk about the Annual Asheville Triathlon taking place in Asheville, North Carolina at Asheville Recreation Park. The swim, bike, run - triathlon event will take place on Sunday, July 16, 2023.
Our Pre Event Guide video is a recording of our iDaph Events Podcast, and here we discuss what to expect on Race Day. Race Director, Daphne Kirkwood and Amy Silvers, Administrative Coordinator from the iDaph Team talk about the courses, packet pickup, parking, and more - along with many other important details.
We look forward to seeing you at the triathlon race in Asheville, North Carolina soon! For more info about the race and Course Turn-by-Turn directions and maps, please visit our website here - https://idaph.net/asheville-triathlon/
Let's talk about the Annual Asheville Triathlon taking place in Asheville, North Carolina at Asheville Recreation Park. The swim, bike, run - triathlon event will take place on Sunday, July 16, 2023.
Our Pre Event Guide video is a recording of our iDaph Events Podcast, and here we discuss what to expect on Race Day. Race Director, Daphne Kirkwood and Amy Silvers, Administrative Coordinator from the iDaph Team talk about the courses, packet pickup, parking, and more - along with many other important details.
We look forward to seeing you at the triathlon race in Asheville, North Carolina soon! For more info about the race and Course Turn-by-Turn directions and maps, please visit our website here - https://idaph.net/asheville-triathlon/
Hello and welcome to another iDaph Events podcast. I'm Amy Silvers administrative coordinator, and I have with me today, Daphne Kirkwood, our owner and race director. Hey, everybody. We're glad to have you with us today. Today we're gonna talk about the Asheville Triathlon happening on Sunday, July 16th, and I'm really excited to see this again. Last year was my first time ever seeing a triathlon and it just amazed me. So I'm looking forward to seeing it again this year. Yeah, this race is such a staple in Asheville. When I used to race all the time, this was one that I participated in. And so I'm grateful that it's been around and that it continues to happen. It's great. It's a great race for every single ability. We have people who've never done a try before. We have the veterans come out year after year and duke it out and competitive athletes too. So there's a good mix of people. It has a great local vibe, lots of camaraderie, a great energy. So if you're signed up, you're in for. Quite the treat. And Asheville School, they always do such a great job sending a group come out from Asheville School. They have so much energy that they bring forth and they're such a huge supporter of this event. So we wanna thank them too. Yes, I always love to see them. They always bring such energy, like you say, and enthusiasm. It's exciting to watch them. Yes, it's. Okay, so this triathlon is in Asheville. Where do the races start and finish exactly. Yeah. So I'm showing my screen. Can you see that Amy? I can see it. Awesome. These are all on ride with G P s. If you're looking at for the routes they'll be sent out in the event guide as well. This is Asheville Recreation Park. This is what it looks like and we'll go into more details on that in just a little bit. But it's off of Azalea Road, the nature center's up here. So that's the vicinity of where things start and finish. All right, great. Look forward to hearing more about that in just a minute. We typically have a charity or a nonprofit partner for each of our events. Who are we supporting with this one? Yeah, so we have the friends of the W N C Nature Center, our neighbors up there on the hill. And we're glad to support them in their programs for taking care of the animals. And so they are one of our partners. And then I Dream Athletes Foundation which is our sister nonprofit is also one of our partners. And the funds from. The race that go into I dream will be used for the coaching for the programs that like the swim league that we've been doing this summer for scholarships in our community for people who might need it for entry fees or for shoes or for bikes or for travel expenses. We just gave a scholarship to a couple girls to go to National Mountain Bike Championships. And so that's what I dream does and that's where the money will go right back into our community. Awesome. Great to be able to support those two charities. Okay. Let's talk about what people can expect on race weekend. Packet pick up and registration. Last year we offered pre-event shipping. We did it this year. Again, we had a really good number of people who elected to have their things shipped out to them early. That's just a convenient, super way to just show up on race morning, ready to go and not have to stand in any lines and stress over or making it in time and all that good stuff. Yeah. We don't have a pre-event packet pickup session. It is just on race morning, and that is from six to seven at the rec park pool. Okay. And make sure that when you are arriving, it takes a little bit of time to park and to bring all your things over to the pool, and you'll wanna do that after you park. Just bring everything with you. Then come to Packet, pick up and get your stuff. And so make sure and leave plenty of time. I know it's an early morning race. But we do that because of the heat and of the traffic. We wanna make sure everybody's safe. And just leave yourself plenty of time. Don't just show up at seven o'clock to parking. You won't be able to anyway because of the time limit on when registration and packet pickup closes. But just don't wait till last minute. Get up early. We don't wanna see you stressed and trying to get things all set up for yourselves. Exactly. And what about coffee for anybody that wants that little caffeine fix before the right? Yeah bare bones brujas Dan he'll be out there with his coffee cart. Serving up some caffeine before or after the event for you. So stop in and see him. Bring a cash or a credit card so that you can take advantage of that. Awesome. Yeah, I always look forward to that. Okay. Where can people park? Oh, first of all, let's say Registration. What time can they still walk up and register on race day? And what time does that start? They can do it on their phones. If you look up I D A f.net, Asheville Triathlon click the register button online. You can do that till 7:00 AM. But registration does close at 7:00 AM on, on the morning of. Gotcha. Okay. And now once people get there where, what are we looking at for parking? What's the best place? Yeah, so I'm just showing the map again here of the hub area. This is actually the run course that we're seeing. There is some parking and this lot up here that's behind the pool. So most people come in Azalea Road, go across the old bridge. And then come up this way on Gaseous Creek and they park in here. If you do park in here, just know that it's gonna be slow and somewhat difficult to leave during the race. The race courses all are on this part right here. So when you leave, you would head out this way. That's also part of the run course, so just keep that in mind when you're choosing your parking. This is the parking lot that's close to the first soccer field right here. And that's the one that's the most convenient and easiest to park in. Because when you pull out of there, you can drive on this road, which runners are on that road, but it's a le little easier to get out. You can also go out this way to Swan Anoa Road as well. But the parking here, if you park here, you're just gonna walk all your items you can push your bike and your ba have your bag on your back, and you would walk over here to the transition area. Those are the two parking options. Let's see. I think that's it on that. Okay. Can someone drop if someone, a family member or friend is bringing them, can they be dropped off somewhere or is that not a good no. Unfortunately, the way that the bridge, it's, you have to come across the Gaseous Creek Bridge. There's no place to just park and drop somebody off. Everybody, if you start doing that, everybody wants to do that and there's no room for it. Just be courteous to everyone and go ahead and park and have, if somebody's driving, you just have them take you to a parking lot. Even if they're just dropping you off, go to a parking lot, get dropped off there and gather your things to come to the race. All right, great. So we're parked. What's next? Next is get your stuff at packet pickup. If you didn't have your stuff shipped, which we just talked about there is no body marking. In a lot of triathlons, you'll get your numbers on your arms and your legs. We don't do that for this event. You will, if you have your things, you can go straight over to the transition area, put your bike there. If you don't have that yet, you'll go to packet pick up and then go to transition. And you the transition zone is first come, first serve, and so about eight to nine bikes per rack and you will put them zigzag on the bike rack. And and then there's also motion makers will be there on site if you need somebody to run through your gears or check something on your bike. They're not gonna be able to do a full blown bike operation on race morning get your bike service before you come. But they will be there if you have something that's just brief that you need help with. Awesome. Perfect. Okay, so let's talk about the courses. I understand there's been some difficulty in opening, getting the pool open this year. Yeah, the city, they went to put water in the pool and early summer, and they found that there were some issues with the structure of the pool. And so they've been delayed in opening it. We've been keeping in constant contact with them and just spoke with them again this week and they feel pretty promising that the permit will get finished this week and they'll be able to put water in it. So that's the next step. The repairs have all been finished and everything if something happens outside of their control or our control with that happening we will switch up the race format for the event. We won't cancel the event. We just won't be swimming, so Alright. We'll do it a little bit different. Okay. What's the plan for that? What would that look like? Yeah, so if we end up having to do something like that, we would do a run, a bike and a run. The first run would be a little over a mile, so it would be shorter than the second run. And about a mile is probably about the. Same time that it would take you to do the swim, maybe a little bit different. And it, so it would be a mass start. Let me pull up the map here again just to show in case this does happen. I believe I have on one of these tabs. Here we go. All right, so we'll publish this map if it comes down to having to do a run bike run. Right now, it's not where you can see it online cause we don't wanna add confusion. But the start would be over by the vendor area. This is where packet pickup will be at Tent Village, that sort of thing. Pool is here, restrooms are up here, up top by the finish, and then the transition is here. So it would be a mass star. Everyone would run this way at seven 30 and they would be following the run route until you get down past the first parking lot by the J B L soccer fields. At that roundabout, you would curve back and start heading back towards the finish. So this is the end of the 5K running route which is a nice shaded area. Then you'll run across the bridge and you will run down this way. We'll have cones and everything set up in the event that this does happen, so that the bikes can leave on the left side to go out on the bike. Part so that the fastest folks that are coming in have a lane to get out to go on the bike. And so you would go into your transition area and get your bike. So that's what it would look like in the event that we have to do something like that. Okay. All right. Good to know. Good to know a backup plan. Yeah. Okay. How about, let's talk about the traditional swim, bike and run courses normally, and we hope that's what we're gonna see. What can they expect? Yeah, so the swim this map is in rabbit g p s, so you can take a look at it. Actually that's not the right one. That one should be online, but basically you are gonna start at the shallow section for this event. Hendersonville tri, if you did that, you start to started in the deep section. You jumped in, dived in, did something fun for the contest for this race. Everybody runs through that shallow section and heads down that first lane to the deep section under the ropes and then back and forth through the pool. And the last lane you end up down here at this end of the pool and you pop out. You can hop up on the side or take the ladder and you run down the pool edge, hop down. There's a little bit of a jump there. So be mindful of that. And then you run to the back part of transition. Transition is here. You get your bike and you head out to the front of transition. And let's see. Let me show the bike map here. So this, again, just to orient you, there's the pool, you've come through the back of transition. Here is where you get your bike and then you're gonna head out straight ahead here past the soccer fields, the J B L soccer fields, and this is also part of the run course later as well. Go past the dog park. This is all Swan, Noah River Road. It's a mouthful. And then past mile two, you're gonna take a left on tunnel road and a quick right, and there will be police assisting helping you across to do that. This lower grassy branch road is your first hill. It is a little stinker. You wanna know where the stinkers are? I'll tell you. Yeah, we need know the stinker hills. That's one of'em. And you climb up that and then you will take a right here before mile four. And all of this will be marked with paint on the road and signs as well, so you don't have to try to remember this. However, I do suggest for this course because it, none of it's on the greenway, I do suggest if you haven't done it, that you. Drive it ahead of time, this week, this weekend. I would suggest that you do that just to be familiar. It is curvy and hilly. It has a nice flow to it, but I think that it would be helpful if you saw it. All right, so then you would take a left. This is Riceville Road, which passes by North Carolina Outward Bound School, if you're familiar with that area. And you just keep on trucking along. This is a sharp curve right here around where the fire department is at the Riceville Fire Department. You keep on going. This is all really beautiful area. Scenic and interesting. And then you will get to dollar stores over here, Parkway Crossing Apartment Homes. This is Tunnel Road. Again, you're gonna take a quick right, and that first left at the traffic light. We'll take you back down to Azalea Road, where you'll cross Gaseous Creek, and then you take your bike and you head back into transition. And drop your bike off. Let me see if I can find our run one. Here we go. So you'll exit transition from the back and you will run up the hill and you will run along the soccer fields. Out to the Blue Ridge Parkway Bridge overpass that's above you. And right beyond that is where there'll be a water station and the turnaround. Gotcha. And you turn around there, go back past the dog park, and I would suggest you stay on the right side of the road, going out and back. Just flow with traffic. When you're running, and then at this roundabout, you will take this nice little side road here, back across Gas's Creek Bridge, and then up above where the vendor tent area, where the bathrooms are. That's where the finish line is. Gotcha. Okay. All right. Easy peasy. Right? Easy peasy. Okay. Are the courses closed to traffic? No. Okay. Nope. And they're, typically they do have soccer happenings on race morning on Sunday. And so just be aware. Be mindful of that. It's up to you to pay attention to the traffic signs and the cars and that sort of thing. Don't be just hanging out in the middle of the road. It's important that you're attentive. Yes. And on that note, yes. You and I both run to mu to love to run with music. But might not be a good idea for this event. No. And actually we get our own insurance. We don't sanction this event through U s a triathlon organization for a variety of different reasons. But one of those rules that U S A T has for triathlons is no headphones and for this event with traffic. And I know at Hendersonville, we're more lenient because you're on a greenway for this one, you're not. And so I would highly suggest and ask that you not wear headphones for this event. Okay, great. All right. So we wanna pay a court pay special attention to the route markings. You said bike was pink and run is yellow? Yep. And you said we need to pay, not pay attention to the person in front of you. Yeah. Cause they might be going, making the right turns and correct. Yes. Okay. Yes. Don't be like a sheep, no sheep at this race. All right. Fantastic. Yes, definitely know the route, know which way you're supposed to go. Don't follow the person in front of you. Okay. Got it. How about restrooms? I think you mentioned it briefly. They're up top. Yes, at the, they're they're up above like the vendor village area, and there'll be a couple porta johns there. They'll have regular restrooms open at the pool. There's also some restaurant restrooms too. Okay. Okay, awesome. For the Hendersonville Tri, I know that some people chose to leave shoes under I think it was under one of the shelters, pavilions so they could run with them to transition. Do they need to do that for Asheville Tri? No. It's so close. The swim and transition for this event are much closer together than they are at the Hendersonville Tri. So I would. I would say no. I've seen some people slip on shoes, but really it's just such a short distance. You should be fine. The other thing is too, you definitely don't wanna leave anything in the pool because as soon as everybody gets out, they lock the pool gates, and. Your stuff is locked in there. And I don't think they open again. I don't know what their hours are this year, but I think last year it was like noon on Sunday. I did see people having to come back at noon to get things out of the pool that they had left in there. So just don't do that. No. Yeah, definitely not. Yeah. All right. How about swim warmups? Will they be able to do that before the start of the race? Yep. Those will start at seven and end at seven 20. So you got about a 20 minute window to do that. Okay. And this one, like Hendersonville try is also a time trial. Start with the wait. So how's that gonna work? Yeah. So we will, we'll post that swim start list according to what you entered for your estimated swim time. And so we will plan accordingly to whatever you submitted. And people will. Be in waves. Just so we can break it up just a little bit with the approximate time that you need to be standing in line. And then folks will go about every five to seven seconds depending on how many people we have. And so no dilly dium be ready to go. I know people are always like, I don't wanna be first in line, but if you're a fast swimmer you wanna be first. Or in that, that first section so that you have a better experience. We also have a YouTube video that I did a couple years ago that people can watch and I'm at the pool, I'm standing near transition and I'm just going through all those different areas on that video. It's called Asheville Triathlon Event Guide, swim Start Transitions Parking and more. And it was from 2021. So you know, if you haven't done this race before, that's also a good video to watch, just to familiarize yourself with how to get through the pool and where transition is and stuff like that. I found that video very informative for last year because for me, never have even seen a trial before. Yeah. It helped me understand how things worked and then I was able to answer questions, so that was, yeah. Great. Yeah. Yeah. I think the biggest thing is, when you put your stuff in transition, you just need the basics. You don't need to bring a ton of stuff with you. You need to make sure and. Have plenty of room for your neighbors to be able to put their stuff. And then as you're exiting transition on the bike, there's a mount and a dismount line, and you don't get on your bike until you get to that mount line. And then when you're coming back from the bike, that's where you dismount your bike. You don't ride it into transition. So if you haven't done a try before, that's one of the things to note that you definitely need to know. But I would suggest that watch the video. Yes. Okay. All right. So we've done the swim. We've done the bike, and now the last part's, the 5K run. Yep. How about race bib? Where does that need to go? The race bib, you just wear that during the run. You can put it on for the bike, that's fine, but you don't have to have it. Your ankle band has your number on it, and when you're in the swim lineup, we will ask you what that number is. Just look down at your ankle and let us know. The other thing too, I don't know if it was on our notes to talk about, but put a couple safety pins on that ankle band. I know at Hendersonville trial was handing those out to people just to make sure that they're secure on there if the water and air temperature. Are very different. The ankle band will lose its stickiness and basically fly off in the pool. And we don't want that to happen because that's your timing. When you go out on your run, you'll keep that ankle band on the whole entire race from start to finish. We don't need it back. You can throw it away when you're done. But that number. We'll have to be on the front of you, your bib number on the front of you when you come through that finish line for the run. So you can throw on a shirt, you can throw on a pair of shorts. Some people have number belts. It doesn't have to be super fancy guys. Just make sure you have that number on in the front. All right. And we have a water station. You did say on the course at the halfway point. What can they expect from that? Yep. We will have water and Gatorade and jam bars there. Maybe some fruit chews as well. But I always tell people, especially in a short triathlon, it's easy to just, throw some things, throw a gel. Have a handheld water thing that you're holding in your hand and you're carrying with you for the run? When I race, that's what I typically like to do just because, it's a mile and a half to get to that water station. And while it's great, sometimes coming off the bike, I needed something a little bit sooner than that. And some people don't need anything at all. It just really depends on what you like. But I would always. Plan on just having your favorite gel with you, whether you take that on the bike or before the run. Take that with you. Great. Okay. Good to know. All right, so we've done the swim. We've done the bike, we've done the run. We crossed the finish line. We did it. What can we expect at the finish line? Yeah, we'll have water from Mountain Valley Water there. We have Jessie coming from Fold Body Work Studio doing massages. You can sign up for that with her. And then we're so excited. We have Gourmet popsicles Rios coming to this event. And who does not want a Popsicle when they finish this triathlon? It's like perfect. Bring some cash or a card. We would love to have them come back if you guys like them, unlike them being there. So support them. Get some popsicles from'em and enjoy that. And then we also have Jay Canvas who's been leading a lot of our. Try local duo community trainings. He's also a multi-sport coach. He'll be there afterwards and so if you wanna talk to him about stepping up your triathlon game for future, he is such a wonderful guy. If you haven't met him yet, definitely stop and chat with him too. Great. Sounds like there's gonna be lots to do. Okay. Results and awards. Do we have an award ceremony and where can we find results? Yeah. Results are always at I D A f.net. If you go to Asheville Triathlon, you can. Scroll there and you'll just see a results tab. They'll also be on our homepage they're at race roster where you signed up for the event. And so we will do an award ceremony for just our overall winners at 10:00 AM and then after that award ceremony, age group folks can go to the merchandise tent and pick up their awards. We won't have an award ceremony for the age group categories. If you're not able to hang out for the awards you can pick those up the following week, starting on Tuesday after three o'clock at Fleet Feet, which is in Biltmore Park Town Square. Or you can pay to have yours shipped to you as well. So those are your options. Yes, and we have some pretty cool new awards this year for winners. Yeah, we've got some Asheville Triathlon Pint Glasses, which the Pint Glasses this year, the events that we've had'em have been such a hit. I know the Hendersonville Triathlon turned out just awesome. And then overall folks will also get a gift certificate from Fleet Feet too It's great. Great. Yay. And we're doing tri local duo medals. Yeah. Those who completed both triathlons, two triathlons in a month. I, that's just, yeah. That's pretty amazing. It is amazing. And this medal. I think seals not only an accomplishment for people, but hopefully folks will just have such a sense of pride as they see that hanging on their wall or in their rear view mirror or wherever they end up placing it. Because it is, oh, there it is. It's so sparkly. It's such a great accomplishment. And we had 75 people. That are going to complete this at the Asheville Try, which is just amazing. Yes. Yeah, that's, and we'll do that medal ceremony. At 10:00 AM when we do the overall awards. We want to get a nice group photo yes, as well. So we're not gonna hand those out early. So if you're getting one of those, please plan to stick around until we do that award ceremony. Yay. Yeah, that's quite the accomplishment. That definitely deserves to be recognized. Okay. And I hear we're doing a photo contest again this year. Yes. It was such a hit last year with the run strike a pose, photo contest across that beautiful bridge. And so come up with something silly and fun and we will vote and we'll have you guys vote and whoever wins gets a free entry to next year's Asheville. Try so there's a lot at stake. Besides bragging rights, you also get an entry. So be thinking about what you wanna do. We had some quite creative ones last year too at flips. Cartwheels. Oh yeah. Jobs, infants, yeah. Yes. We had a rot paper, scissors. That was a memorable one. Yeah. I can't wait to see what they bring this year. Yeah. Okay. We have the interactive event guide that folks can look for, that will have the maps, the cue sheets all the need to know racing information. What else can you think of that they might need to know or should look at to be prepared? Yeah, I would say the things that stand out the most to me are the YouTube video discussing the transitions and what that looks like. Staying on the side of the road when you're racing, whether you're biking or running, not taking up the whole road. Be familiar with the routes. Pre-write them, pre-run them pre drive them, just so you're familiar. I think that those are the top things that I would suggest. All right. And we mentioned it briefly about not following someone else because of the time trial start. So don't be a sheep. Right? Don't be a sheep. Okay. How about a photographer? We have somebody out there on the course. Yep. We'll have Allison will be taking the run photo contest photos and then we'll have another photographer out there taking some pics too. And we try to take as many as we possibly can and beautiful photos that you can enjoy forever. Unfortunately, we can't. Promise that everybody's gonna have one. That's just the way that it goes when we're moving and shifting positions during the race. So if you want a guaranteed race photo have a friend come with you to get that for you so that you have that for. And then we do a lot of resharing on Instagram. While the race is happening and afterwards. So if you're not already following us at I DAF events, at i d events do that. And then also we're using hashtag AVL triathlon or Asheville spelled out triathlon. So you can use those hashtags and then we can reshare those too if you don't tag us. Yes. Great. Awesome. Okay. We've mentioned several of our sponsors as we've gone through. Who else do we need to thank for the support for the supporting the Asheville? Try. Yeah. Asheville School, like I mentioned couldn't do it without them. Asheville Videography. We you have the coffee from Bare Bones, fleet Feet. Friends of the Nature Center Rio Gourmet Pops jam Bar, we mentioned them. Jaybirds awesome. He'll be out there with his coaching and chat with you guys. Motion Makers Mountain Valley Water. The full bodywork studio, wrong way campground. If you need a place to stay, that's a great option in the River Arts District, not too far away. So yeah, I think that's it. Okay. All right. Anything else you can think of? I can't, I think we covered everything that's important and we just can't wait to see everybody again. Yes. All right. Great. Fantastic. So thank you for joining us on today's podcast, and we are excited and looking forward to seeing everybody at the Asheville Triathlon on Sunday, July 16th. Thanks everybody. See you soon. Thank you.