Swim, Bike, and Run

Background:

A triathlon is a multiple-stage athletic endurance competition of three continuous and sequential events, usually long distance swimming, cycling, and running. Triathletes’ overall course completion time includes their time for each event plus their time for transitions between the three events.

Race organizers provide each participant a transition area where he/she can pre-position a bike, running shoes, performance gear and other equipment needed to transition from swimming to cycling and from cycling to running. An athlete’s time in the transition area (denoted as T1 for swimming to cycling and T2 for cycling to running) counts toward the total race time. The race begins with the swimming event and participants start the race in a sequence of waves of groups of swimmers at intervals of some number of minutes apart.