whats harder, a marathon or a triathlon?

[BobisMighty]

Posted this in the misc, got no response, lets see what you guys think.

This fat prop on my rugby team was arguing that a marathon is harder than a triathlon. This fat bastard claims to have run 3 marathons. Which, if true, is the dumbest thing i can think of for him to do as a prop. He has no arms and skinny ass legs. This doesn't help his game in the least and he brags about it constantly. meanwhile he has a sizable beer gut.

marathon is running 42.195 kilometers or 26 miles 385 yards,

triathlon is done at three different amounts of distances:
Sprint triathlon (750m swim, 20km bike, 5km run),
Olympic distance (1.5km swim, 40km ride, 10km run),
Half Ironman distance (1.9km swim, 90km ride, 21.1km run),
Ironman triathlon distance (3.8km swim, 180km ride, 42.2km run)

i've only done a sprint triathlon, did it in less than an hour.


discuss

[Philip81193]

I can't wait to do a sprint triathalon.
I think a marathon is harder than any triathalon olympic distance and below. After that, a triathalon probably takes more prep.

[SocratesTX]

No question, a triathlon. A 2.5 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride and a 26.2 mile run is going to be more difficult than a 26.2 mile run.

[SocratesTX]

Posted this in the misc, got no response, lets see what you guys think.

This fat prop on my rugby team was arguing that a marathon is harder than a triathlon. This fat bastard claims to have run 3 marathons. Which, if true, is the dumbest thing i can think of for him to do as a prop. He has no arms and skinny ass legs. This doesn't help his game in the least and he brags about it constantly. meanwhile he has a sizable beer gut.

marathon is running 42.195 kilometers or 26 miles 385 yards,

triathlon is done at three different amounts of distances:
Sprint triathlon (750m swim, 20km bike, 5km run),
Olympic distance (1.5km swim, 40km ride, 10km run),
Half Ironman distance (1.9km swim, 90km ride, 21.1km run),
Ironman triathlon distance (3.8km swim, 180km ride, 42.2km run)

i've only done a sprint triathlon, did it in less than an hour.


discuss

Btw, if you did a sprint in less than an hour, congrats on the win. You would beat out the elite athletes at my last sprint tri by 20 minutes. You must be a professional tri athlete?

[BobisMighty]

Btw, if you did a sprint in less than an hour, congrats on the win. You would beat out the elite athletes at my last sprint tri by 20 minutes. You must be a professional tri athlete?

really? mine was like 58 minutes. i did it on an unranked day, since it was my first one. a lot of people did it less than an hour though. this is the results from a day that was ranked
http://fasttrackcoaching.net/timing/...ETE.html#SHORT

[MadTriathlete]

My opinion is certainly biased...
However, if Olympic distance triathlons are harder in the training process (three disciplines compared to one) I think they're easier when it comes to the competition. Switching from swimming to cycling to running makes the whole experience less monotone if compared to a marathon.
But when it comes to Half-Ironman or Ironman that's a whole completely different story!

[KevinWatson]

No question, a triathlon. A 2.5 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride and a 26.2 mile run is going to be more difficult than a 26.2 mile run.

^ This

[gatovolador]

if you cannot swim, a triathlon is harder. I'd say a marathon is easier than a half or full ironman.

That said, it's all about intensity. Lots of people walk marathons and ****. If you aren't going all out, does it count?

[pakeeza1990]

nice and useful information you have share with us in this forum so keep it up

[COLONELMIKE]

If you went under an hour that's still a good time for this race... but you didn't do a sprint triathlon. Swim times average 15-20 minutes at that distance, with the leaders pushing 10-11 minutes. These times show less than half that (was this a 400 meter pond? lol). The bike times are also 10-15 minutes shorter, so that was maybe a 15k bike? Just seems odd that someone who trained for and ran one triathlon doesn't even know the distances he raced.

The correct order of difficulty is:

Sprint
Olympic
Marathon
Half-Ironman

Most competitive distance people would rank the half-marathon and olympic triathlon as roughly comparable. The full marathon is simply too hard on the feet and joints both in terms of training and racing to compare to short course triathlons. I can train daily for triathlons and not worry much about injury. That's simply not the case with a marathon, at least for me and most people I know.

[DCSpartan]

Evidently its even harder to NOT bump a question asked a decade ago. Seriously dont necro threads, its annoying.

[lucia316]

Evidently its even harder to NOT bump a question asked a decade ago. Seriously dont necro threads, its annoying.

But he gave us a definitive correct order of difficulty based on his subjective opinion. That's something, right?