History is not a fact.
Different voices cover different events which inevitably yield to different accounts. As in war, politics and social life, the same applies to triathlon. Over time, various interpretations will emerge over a number of events. What seemed like a seminal moment at one point will not look that way to another observer. One generation’s Greatest Of All Time athlete will be argued against by a future one.
As triathlon continues to grow and expand, it will accrue more and more of these histories. What happens will always be in the record, but what these events mean will likewise always be a source of contestation.
Take winning a race. Crossing the line first means that the athlete won that race on that day. Yet the meaning of that race can be interpreted in radically different ways. Did they only win because a rival was absent or crashed? Was their win at odds with the rest of their career? Is it even remotely comparable to the races of future generations?
The how and the why are always open to interpretation.
Even in its young state, a distinct historiography is emerging around triathlon. More specifically, the historiography centres on the origins of the sport.
When we talk of triathlon history and the start of triathlon, though, to what are we referring?
Straight off the bat, this becomes a battleground of historical interpretation. To some, triathlon in a modern sense started with the birth of the WTCS. This certainly would be analogous to histories of the modern and pre-modern society. What came before existed, but it certainly bears little resemblance to the world we know today.
Another interpretation would be that triathlon started in its fullest form when it debuted at the Olympic Games in 2000. Under this model, Olympic status would be the defining feature of the sport.
What is now World Triathlon (formerly the International Triathlon Union) was founded in 1989. Perhaps that could be a logical starting point. As an interesting aside, the ITU drew a large part of its structure from the pre-existing European Triathlon Union and emerged largely out of resistance to being absorbed by Modern Pentathlon.
With that in mind, did triathlon start in 1989 or did it actually become the sport we know today at a later point?
Before that, triathlon is often attributed to having American foundations, particularly when viewed through a long distance perspective. In this respect, we can add another layer of historical analysis.
What even is triathlon anyway? What defines the sport?
One could look at the basic format – the swim-bike-run – and take that as the crux of it. Perhaps that fails to navigate the fault lines between short and long distance triathlon, though. Given the differences in the disciplines, maybe governance or rules (such as those around drafting) shape the sport. A case could equally be made for the structure of the sport being the defining feature. Through that lens, the creation of the WTCS can be seen as bringing about what we understand as triathlon today.
Within triathlon at least, everyone can have their own interpretation. Unlike other spaces there is no real space for harm to be caused. After all, there is little scope for revisionist historiography to stir up problems such as between 1921 and 1939.
However, one person’s interpretation does not make for fact.
The Paris Olympic Test Event provides an ample opportunity to present another interpretation of the sport. Rewind back through the years, to before the WTCS, before the Sydney Olympics, before the fetching/terrifying retro outfits of the 1990s.
Turn the clock all the way back to the start of the 20th century.
The interpretation that will be presented here, is that triathlon actually began over one hundred years ago and that its spiritual home is France.
In 1901, the town of Joinville-le-Pont hosted an event called “Les Trois Sports” (The Three Sports). Alongside a run leg and a bike leg was a stage on a canoe. Twenty years later, in 1921, the event in Joinville-le-Pont had transformed and a swim portion replaced the canoe part.
It is here that triathlon may have truly begun.
The 1921iteration of the race involved a 3km run, a 12km bike and the a swim across the river Marne. The disciplines were held consecutively and reflect the modern guise of the sport, just reversed.
If the format of the sport defines it, then a run-bike-swim does not quite match up to a swim-bike-run. However, the argument here is that the Joinville-le-Pont event captures the spirit of the sport. It brings out the multisport quality, the sense of transition and the concept of challenge.
Throughout the 1920s similar events emerged in other cities. One notable instance was “La Course des Débrouillards” in Poissy. A century later, Poissy Triathlon is now a dominant force in the top division of the French Grand Prix.
As a result, a French origin history of triathlon has a clear lineage from past to present.
The sport never really grew beyond France in this period and the swim-bike-run format later reappeared in a more concrete fashion in America in the 1970s as the Ironman product came to fruition. However the original concept was alive and kicking in France half a century earlier.
There will never be a single point of proof as to when triathlon started, just as there will never be a single point of proof as to what anything in the sport really means.
To some, the triathlon of the 1990s is closer to that of the 1970s than it is to the contemporary iteration of the sport. Others see no difference at all (except, of course, the funky outfits). Every reading is valid and none are objectively true.
Nevertheless, the interpretation of the French origin of the sport has a certain pertinence to it. With attention now on the Paris Test Event and next year’s Paris Olympic Games, France has once again become the centre of the sport.
Looking at the history, there may thus be a simple argument to be made.
Triathlon might be coming home.
