First Triathlon check list for parents.

1. Does your child want to race?

2. Does your child have endurance?

3. Can your child swim? We know that seems to be an obvious and silly question but you would be surprised.

4. Can your child put on their own bike helmet? Does that helmet fit properly?

5. Can your child ride a bike the distance that is indicated for their age group?

6. Can you child run? We once again know that seems to be an obvious and silly question but you would be surprised.

7. Athetes 6 and up will get no or very little assistance in the transition area changing from one sport to the other. Can your child do up shoe laces or use lace locks and get dressed while wet? Often is recommened that this be practised a few times before race day.

8. Does your childs bike work? Are the tires in properly conditioned and inflated properly? Does the bike fit your child? Is the seat at the proper height, not too low and not too high? If the bike has gears, does your child know how to use them properly and are they all working? Athletes 10 and up will be climbing and need to be able to change gears quickly and properly othewise they may get very tired very early and end up frustrated.

9. We encourage all triathletes to lay a towel down in their transistion area to whip off any pebbles or dirt before putting on socks and shoes. Some place baby powder in the hear area of the shoe to assist in slipping in quickly.

10. We will race in any kind of weather including pooring rain and heat. How will your child deal with racing in the rain or the heat?

11. Eating and drinking. We naturally encourage healthy eating all of the time, especially prior to our race. Please ensure your child has had a good well balanced meal the evening before and pleanty to drink the day before also. In 2009 the humidty was very high, so drinking along on the course was very important.

12. Does you child have a healthy attitude about racing and competition. Winning and loosing. If your child has been succesful before in other sporting events and feels triathlon should also bring them the same amount of success, please for warn them that the morning could be tougher than they think and that their success needs to be measured on the fact that they arrived and entered, not based on their position in their age group against members of the opposite sex.

13. Is your child willing to train for this event? You may feel your child is in great shape, plays lots of sports, eats well etc. This is first and foremost an endurance sport. Kids in our triathlon run farther than they are often allowed to run on track and field day or at a cross country meet. On average youth in the age group of 12-13 will be racing non-stop for over an hour! This is no hockey game or soccer game. Our sport is fast and for the kids sometimes feels never ending. We recommend that prior to race day each triathlete can easily cover the distances for each of the three discplines. They may have not had the chance to combine all three into practise but hopefully they have been able to practise a bike and run combination.

These are the 13 most important points to consider before entering your child into a triathlon. Not just ours any triathlon across the province for kids. If you have never seen a kids triathlon run before get on www.youtube.com and search one out. Who knows you may find ours.

-Derrick McKay Race Director