Stinging Jellyfish Attack New York City Triathletes

Stinging Jellyfish Attack New York City Triathletes

Though it reads like a seedy headline from the National Enquirer, this time, the truth was floating and bobbing in the warm waters of the Hudson River on July 20 for the annual New York City “Olympic Distance” Triathlon. This year I arrived much earlier for the swim start, and was much less panicked due to the efforts of my niece who also raced on Sunday. Looking out onto the river, men in my group leaned over the edge and noticed the bobbing pink-red lion’s mane jellyfish, and said with great confidence, one of the wise swimmers said, “Oh those guys, they won’t sting. You believe me right?”

I wanted to. I really wanted to, as I still have some residual trauma from a man-o-war sting operation off the coast of Miami when I was a kid. The pain was so intense, so shocking, that I was sure I’d been chunked in two by a shark. But the overconfident triathlete was wrong this time. They did sting. And they stung hundreds of the swimmers, but luckily, I did not irritate any of the jellyfish, and had actually forgotten them as I was trying hard to keep up with my own swim strokes as well as swinging arms and legs to my right, my left, my rear, my feet, and way too close for proper lane etiquette. The early swimmers (I started at 5:59 a.m.) had a stronger current, so I recorded a WR of 23:57 though in the pool where I train, the same swim sans jellyfish would have taken 45 minutes minimum.

Unfortunately, one triathlete, from Buenos Aires, was pulled unconscious from the Hudson. An initial autopsy was inconclusive, but many of the triathletes wondered if he was stung multiple times, or had an allergic reaction, or simply was overheated in his wet suit waiting for his start time. I’d never heard of deaths in triathlons, but of course they occur in longer leg races, with one dying earlier in the year in the New York City marathon trials for the Olympics. Surprisingly, five others have died in triathlons this year, all in the water. Oddly, I did not know any of this was happening until I was visiting with my step-nephew who was also in the race.

The transition area (one of two) had about 1500 look alike bikes, so we had to practice what our area would look like when gasping for air with half a wet suit clinging to the bottom half. In Transition One, the trick is to get the wet suit off, the helmet on, the shoes on with or without socks, and run with bike until a nice volunteer says you can mount for the ride. Try doing that when you are out of breath. Races are often lost in the transition area, and of course, I was a bit slow, but once out on the West End Highway, I started to remember the climbs and descents (nothing like the Tour de France, of course, but a climb for an old guy is still a climb). My niece and I concluded that the Department of Transportation had actually altered the terrain since last year, and even the year before as it was much hillier than either of us remembered. But I sense the road was just the same, our memory just a bit poorer as we are placed into older and older age groups. This year, I wasn’t as terrified descending one of the long climbs at 35 mph, but I still wondered about what I would do if I hit an unidentified object and began to sail away from my bike. But that didn’t happen, so we both pushed as hard as we could through the route, and finally came back to our transition area (again!) to dismount, and get ready for the run to Central Park.

This was the most grueling part of the race, as who wants to run their best time after a long swim and an even longer bike ride, but the stakes were high, as I was trying just to match my time from last year, or improve by a second or two. Just as with the bike ride, the route seemed longer than last year, but I sense it was just fatigue and exhaustion setting in, and of course, the temperature was in the mid 80’s for most of the triathletes. A far too cheery volunteer greeted us at mile 3 and said this was “his hill” and it felt much more of a demanding grade than last year, but I knew that if I could get to the north end of Central Park, then most of the remaining kilometers would be a descent, but that also was a fuzzy memory. Someone passed by me (actually hundreds passed by me on their way to the finish), a young woman who saw my Wisconsin triathlete outfit, and said she was from Wauwatosa, a suburb of Milwaukee. How often does that happen?

But the person that kept me on pace faster than maybe last year was actually my niece who started about 15 minutes after my start, and our agreed upon signal was hearing “Hey Uncle De I’m right behind you.” Then we would sprint into the finish line together as champions. So when the flags started appearing, and the well wishers’ whoops got louder and louder, and I heard no “Uncle De…,” I decided I had about 2 minutes of sprint air left, so I picked up my pace from a fast jog and decided to try and pass a few ahead of me. What a thrill that was, as I was usually the person who heard “passing on your right” most of the route. It’s quite amazing what a race like this can do. I ran across the finish line a little better than last year, and was greeted with a medallion (everybody gets one), an icy cold towel, and a commemorative ball cap and the best cold bottle of iced water I’ve ever tasted. What a great way to see 31.93 miles of New York City in three hours, thirteen minutes and 50 seconds!?