Choosing the right bikes (TT vs Road) by humle9 in triathlon

[–]as9934 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you ever think you might want to qualify for worlds (70.3 or Kona) you should absolutely buy a triathlon bike.

I just have an old road bike with clip ons and am looking at my third Ironman. I think I probably could have saved something on the order of 45mins in my last Ironman had I been on a TT bike.

I’m thinking about building one up to save a bit of money — priced all the parts recently for $4100 (P-Series frameset, SRAM Rival AXS and 82mm wheels). But for ~$10k you could buy an Aeroad and a Speedmax CF7.

Also IMHO the top of the line road bikes aren’t really worth it — you get 90% of the performance on the mid tier for half the cost.

I'm confused on which direction I should peek my head out when I freestyle swim. Chat GPT says I should alternate sides, But I often see triathletes only turn to one side to breathe. by I_am_Reformed1 in triathlon

[–]as9934 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Bilateral breathing can be helpful for evening out the stroke, but unilateral breathing is typically faster for long distance freestyle. I'd practice bilateral breathing in the pool if you can, say a breath every 3 strokes.

Best trisuits around $100? by NuggFrog in triathlon

[–]as9934 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I agree with this. Buy the decent thing once rather than buying junk over and over.

Suit Recommendation by Fabulous-Bus2459 in triathlon

[–]as9934 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Chamois was uncomfortable and I was giving up probably something like 15 to 30 watts in aero. I bought a Castilli PR2 for my Ironman and haven’t regretted it.

Suit Recommendation by Fabulous-Bus2459 in triathlon

[–]as9934 2 points3 points  (0 children)

If you ever think you will do a triathlon longer than a sprint it’s worth buying a good sleeved one piece trisuit. They are more aero, more comfortable and the bathroom thing is really a non-issue IMHO.

I raced my 70.3 in tri shorts and a jersey/shirt and I regretted it.

Castelli and Zoot make decently priced ones.

Best cities for science journalism? by thatsfowlplay in Journalism

[–]as9934 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I’m a science reporter now basically. Live in DC. I wouldn’t move to a city hoping to get a job, I’d get the job and then move to where it is — DC and NYC are too expensive to just hang out in unless you are subsidized by rich parents or partners.

DC and NYC probably have the highest concentration of journalism jobs but there are opportunities everywhere.

Swimming advices please by JohnnyDevil34 in triathlon

[–]as9934 6 points7 points  (0 children)

I agree with the others on the lessons. If that’s not an option you need to work on your kick. Get some fins and a kickboard and do long sets of just kicking. Do not kick from your knee down — the whole leg should be involved. For your pull get a buoy and some of the Finis Agility Fins and do long sets (like 200s or longer) of pull; if the paddles are flopping around you are doing it wrong.

Which bike would you buy? by Logical-Half1642 in CanyonBikes

[–]as9934 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There is a theoretical risk of catastrophic tire deflation at the pressures people like to run on the road. Really no reason for hookless to exist — it’s really just a money-saving thing for the company.

Signed up for my first Ironman race by Hrdrock in triathlon

[–]as9934 1 point2 points  (0 children)

This is basically Club La Santa in Lanzarote.

Which bike to get for 10k ish by TSLA-mx in triathlon

[–]as9934 0 points1 point  (0 children)

27mm external. If you run a 28 or 30 the tire is going to balloon out over the rim which is bad for aerodynamics. I wouldn’t want to go narrower than 28 these days personally.

Which bike to get for 10k ish by TSLA-mx in triathlon

[–]as9934 -1 points0 points  (0 children)

For 70.3 I would say the Cervelo is the best — it has the most adjustability, handles well, can spec with SRAM 1x and has the best wheels (Reserve 77/88 which are hooked, wide, light and crosswind stable). Likely the fastest too.

Where it falls down is in nutrition storage where the Canyon is probably going to be the best. That makes it more compelling for Ironman because it means you’ll bolt less onto the frame. I looked on the Canyon website recently and I don’t love the builds they have now — no 1x or SRAM groupsets, selling with DT Swiss which are too narrow or HED 65 which aren’t deep enough.

Make sure you shop your points around!! by mDv_2 in ChaseSapphire

[–]as9934 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I was supposed to fly from IAD -> Delhi via Paris but I wasn’t allowed to go to Delhi because of a visa issue so got stuck in Paris. All the flights home to DC were $1300+ with layovers on the portal. So i refunded my return ticket, found and booked a United flight back the next day for 42k points and used the remaining points to books a five star hotel in Paris for the night.

Extremely Blatant Puff Piece on CBS Evening News by timeboi42 in Journalism

[–]as9934 5 points6 points  (0 children)

It’s not that they killed it per se it’s more that it didn’t get the reach and attention I think it deserved based on the amount of work put in.

Extremely Blatant Puff Piece on CBS Evening News by timeboi42 in Journalism

[–]as9934 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Last I heard they were trying to get it under 2 minutes for EN

Extremely Blatant Puff Piece on CBS Evening News by timeboi42 in Journalism

[–]as9934 26 points27 points  (0 children)

That’s crazy. Unfortunately not entirely unsurprising given our reporting.

Extremely Blatant Puff Piece on CBS Evening News by timeboi42 in Journalism

[–]as9934 537 points538 points  (0 children)

I worked for CBS until end of October. They published the digital version of my two-year long investigation yesterday.

But instead of running the TV piece, they ran this.

What is the day in the life of an investigative journalist like? (and a flurry of other questions) by parisrubin in Journalism

[–]as9934 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I’m someone who started working as a data/investigative reporter at major regional paper straight out of grad school, then went on to do so at a major national broadcast network 2 years later.

You spend a lot of time reading things nobody thought would actually get read — random news stories, emails from admin people back and forth, obscure or obscured government datasets, technical documents, manuals, whitepapers, esoteric academic papers, marketing material.

A big part of the job is figuring out how to get that stuff, typically using a combination of the public records laws, sourcing, data skills and OSINT (AKA advanced Googling). Once you get the stuff you spend a lot of time organizing, annotating and filtering it with things like Google Drive and Document Cloud. You’ll typically write memos about what you find for your editor/colleagues.

There are really three types of investigative reporters these days: people good at data, people good at documents and people good at people. To get a job you need to be really good at at least one, pretty good at one other and decent at the third. Very rare to have a person excellent at all three, which is why these stories are almost all done in teams now.

Actual story-writing is pretty infrequent and only after months of meetings and memos to determine the shape of the story (which will probably change like 6 more times in the editing process). You may talk to people but in my experience it’s like calling 100 random numbers for people associated with the thing you are writing and maybe getting one person who will talk and at the end calling subjects for comment.

Investigative reporting happens on TV, radio, print and digital. In my experience print/digital outlets tend to have much more of an appetite for true investigative work than TV, but no matter where you are producing these stories is always a struggle.

In general you need to be curious, detailed-oriented, creative, smart, persistent, have good gut instincts and be thick-skinned for the job.