By Theoden Janes
McClatchy Newspapers
If the mere mention of the words "kids triathlon" makes you cringe, take a deep breath and relax: Kids triathlons are not designed to push children to their physical limits.
In fact, many of these swim-bike-run races are short-distance affairs that require almost no training and are over in 15 to 20 minutes. Flotation devices and training wheels are allowed if kids need them.
This accessibility is leading to a surge in the popularity of kids triathlons, according to data from USA Triathlon, the sport's governing body. As of March 2009, it had nearly 31,000 members ages 17 and younger, up 25 percent from the previous year.
Distances can vary. Huntersville's Birkdale Animal Hospital Kids Triathlon Series, one of the largest events of its type in the country, has relatively short requirements: 4- to 6-year-olds, for instance, swim 25 yards, bike three-tenths of a mile and run just 100 yards.
Meanwhile, the Kids In Training Youth Triathlon in Cary, N.C., the first week of June had ages 5 to 7 swimming 50 yards, biking 1.5 miles, and running half a mile. (Eight- to 10-year-olds went twice as long, and 11- to 17-year-olds covered three times those distances.)
"Our mission is basically to get kids and their families healthy," says Maylene Jackson, director of Cary-based Kids In Training, which this year will put on six triathlons statewide.
Says Kathy Goody, race director of the Birkdale events: "It's a safe way to get physical. The mission is really for the kids to have fun."
Fun, experts say, is important.
"We want it to be fun because we want exercise to be a lifelong habit for a child," says Daryl Rosenbaum, a sports medicine physician at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center. "If it's not fun ... they may not carry on this kind of healthy habit later on in life."
According to the results of a report by the White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity, one in three American children is overweight - and one in five is considered obese.
'Built-in cross-training'
As is the case with all youth sports, there is the risk of injury because of improper training. But parents and organizers agree that not much training is necessary, as long as the child has an active lifestyle (and perhaps is taking swim lessons - the water leg is typically the most stressful part of the race for families).
Even if kids do train, "with triathlon, you have built-in cross-training," Rosenbaum says. "It seems like everyone feels pressure to pick a sport by the time they're 6 and that's their sport - that's the one they do year-round all the time.
"The risk of that is you're doing the same movement over and over again: kicking a soccer ball every time, throwing a baseball every time. That can add up. The nice thing is triathlon is three sports. You're doing one sport one day, one another and then one a third day."
Also, triathlon being an individual sport, kids can take as competitive an approach as they wish. Often, how quickly they finish will be inconsequential the first time, then many realize that it would be fun to try again and go faster.