Running the NYC Triathlon in a Climate Crisis
My experience raised money, but the summer event might be unsustainable
On Sunday July 24, I completed the NYC Triathlon event for which scores of people sponsored me in support of Dayenu: A Jewish Call to Climate Action. (click here to give).
It was not the “olympic” achievement I’d hoped for because the heat meant that the organizers had to shorten the running and cycling courses from Olympic length. Indeed, it turns out that the NYC Triathlon hasn’t been able to run a full event since 2017 because of the direct effects of climate change (too hot in 2018, 2019 and 2022) and indirect ones (pandemic in 2020, river bacteria levels in 2021).
It was ironic that I faced climate grief (in an admittedly very privileged way) even while supporting an organization that — through its spiritual adaptation workshops — helps people come to terms with the fact that our world no longer has the same climate it had in the 20th century.
I jumped into the green and briny Hudson at 7.18 a.m., a little more than four hours after I first clambered out of bed. Indeed, dragging myself out of bed at 3 a.m. on a Sunday morning was definitely the first leg of the event!
One of the triathlon’s volunteer guides had suggested that the river would taste like “salt water and industrial waste, with just a hint of Jersey.” My main grouse was less the flavour than the lack of the much-promised current that was supposed to sweep us up from 81st street to 101st street. And, though it was no one’s fault but mine, my GPS tracker tells me that, for the straight-line course of 1,600 yards I actually swam a wobbly route of 2,100 yards.
I might have taken the scenic route, but it was beautiful to swim upstream in the shade of Manhattan, alongside a pathway I have often walked, run, and cycled. The maligned Hudson was warm and, mostly, free of debris. Plus, as of the time of writing, I have contracted no horrible diseases from drinking the water.
Even before the swim start, the morning had been eventful. The river temperature above 78F meant that wetsuits were “illegal,” so I had to reorganize the clear plastic bags I took from home to put by my bike in the transition area. One of the bags I packed just held six bottles of drinks to keep me hydrated.
Later, logistical problems with the swim landing barge , meant that the start was delayed for 40 minutes, so I didn’t finish until 9.20 a.m. when it was already 86F and very humid. And there were people finishing an hour after me.
After arranging my materials in the transition area in optimal pattern for quickly drying myself and jumping onto my bike, I walked a bottle, a banana, a pair of goggles and a swimming cap down to the start. It was 4.30 a.m.
Even though it was an hour before sunrise, it was warm and there was a steady trickle of participants walking down the lantern-lit path, past the occasional homeless person. One of the people who walked down with me remarked on how trippy the occasion was: a normal riverside pathway totally reimagined by the timing, the light and a thousand swim-clad people of all ages, genders, and colours magnetically drawn downtown.
By the end of the swim the sun was out and New York was awake. I ran up from the barge to my bike and rode it to the George Washington Bridge on the West Side Highway. The splendour of the occasion — usurping the gas-guzzling monsters that usually monopolize that stretch of road (indeed all stretches of road) — was only slightly spoiled by tens of cyclists on carbon fibre road bikes with impossibly skinny tyres zooming past me. My gentle green Giant more than holds its own on the wet, potholed, traffic-lighted streets of Gotham, but is no match for these sleek speedsters in a time trial like this.
I ran the bike back into transition and, without even stopping to untuck my shirt, headed out into the uphill heat of east-bound 96th street. I had quickly necked half a bottle of Gatorade before leaving and had in my hand another green bottle to drink plus a bottle of water for cooling. The street, largely shadeless, undulated up into Central Park. At the one mile mark, my wife and daughter cheered me into the park which marked the beginning of tree cover and also the end of the sustained uphill section.
For the remainder of the run I felt confident that, despite the heat and the previous 100 minutes of intense activity, I could easily complete the distance. I didn’t run it particularly quickly but, looking at the photos, maybe that’s because I didn’t actually lift my feet up!
I was happy with my performance. Though it wasn’t the physical challenge that I’d set myself, I finished feeling strong and as if I’d passed what in the end was a technical test to see whether I could stay cool enough and hydrated.
In an event that was itself threatened by climate change, I’m delighted to have raised awareness and about $1,800 for Dayenu — an organization confronting the climate crisis every day.
Thank you all for your good wishes and support.
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