How common are we?

As far as I know I am the only one at my work of about 700 people, but I don't know them all obviously!

My Boss and 2 co-workers have all done IM's. After next Sunday I'll join that group. I also work with another 6 dudes that ride A LOT. That's in a facility that has about 500 or so people.

True--I think the numbers are pretty high in the Pacific Northwest for outdoor endurance sports. Around here....not so much. I think I know three other women in Saigon who sometimes do triathlons. (A few more have come and gone over the years.) Two are my colleagues! Only one of them really identifies as a "triathlete", though she doesn't race very often. Unfortunately she's much slower (8 hour+ HIM; to her credit, she did finish), so not a potential training partner, although we sometimes swim together. One of the others is more a cyclist/ runner and the other mainly a swimmer. Also have a colleague who's a pretty good runner, (former NCAA All-American) but she's not very consistent--both health and motivational issues.

Last year at IM Vietnam, a company was giving a run bonus to the top men and women in three categories, pro, age-grouper, and Vietnam resident. I won the latter.....with a horrible 2:13 run. I think there were three "contenders". (I was really sick at the time and it was 105 at the end; that's the slowest I've ever run 13.1 miles!) So it's obvious the field here isn't very deep. Since there are about 7 million people in the city, of which at least 3.5 million are probably women, it might be safe to say I'm just about "one in a million"!

Edited by Hot Runner 2015-11-06 5:39 PM

I'm an ICU nurse, and a couple of my colleagues have done a few triathlons, and one is down in FL right now for about his 7th or 8th IM. And the ED docs at my hospital are REALLY athletic...I want to say about 1 in 4 do triathlons, or endurance running or cycling!

Wow... that sounds great. I am jealous

>>>>LOL.. sounds like it!

Would love to see the stats on Vietnam. For the country as a whole, it would be way over one in a million, even counting the expats. I think I've met only a few locals who've completed a tri. There are pretty active local cycling groups here (almost all men only), and running is becoming much more popular in urban areas with both genders, but surprisingly for a wet country with a long coastline, very few people can swim, and those who can do so proficiently (beach boys, windsurfers, pool swimmers) don't usually ride or run. My guess, if you took the total population and Vietnamese citizens completing one of the very few events in country (individually, not on a relay, which is more popular), would actually be about one in ten million.

Short course there's many around that have at least done one or two. Long course it's a little more spread out. We have a pretty large multi sport community around me. Part of that IMO is from a multitude of local races. Not sure which causes which but I am sure they are tied together.