The First Annual Mission Bay Triathlon Happy 50th Birthday on 25 September 2024

The First Annual Mission Bay Triathlon

Happy 50^th Birthday on 25 September 2024

John and I heard about a “triathlon” before swim practice on a Monday night and did that on Wednesday night instead of our lap-swim workout. The “triathlon” in San Diego’s Mission Bay Park was on 25 September 1974. Our swim group was CMA, Coronado Masters Association, organized in the Fall of 1973 by Coronado’s Aquatics Director Stan Antrim. CMA swimmer Flo Squires had joined the San Diego Track Club (SDTC) to train for the Boston Marathon. Flo read to our group from the September 1974 SDTC newsletter:

“Run, cycle, swim: Triathlon set for 25th…Bring your own bicycle. (It)…will start at the causeway to Fiesta Island at 5:45 pm… “Approximately 2 miles of running will be barefoot on grass and sand.”

A “run,cycle,swim” sounded like fun. I liked the barefoot part. Our swimmer children would like the novelty. John and I said our whole family would enter. John, Judy, Kristin and Michael Collins were ages 38, 35, 13 and 12. Coronadans Flo Squires, George Moore and Reuben Collins would drive to Mission Bay too. We 7 would skip the Wednesday, timed, 3 mile run around the perimeter of the Golf Course in the late afternoon. We would also miss our 6 o’clock swim workout.

The 10 leg Mission Bay Triathlon (MBT) numbers turned out to be just under 5 miles of run, a little over 5 miles of bike and about 500 yds of swim. There would be 10-12 legs, a little over 10 miles in all. The finish times ranged from 55:54 to 94:51. There were “47 in ’74.” There were 46 starters, 46 finishers, 46 dollars from entry fees, but 47 people. One name was a relay team, Pain/Gervais, m/f.

The Mission Bay Triathlon (MBT) Co-Founders were Jack Johnstone and Don Shanahan. Johnstone chose the word “triathlon” to name the run-bike-run/swims event, Betty Johnstone was the Recorder. Johnstone family and friends were volunteers. Don Shanahan was the bike leg advocate. Jack Johnstone finished then joined Don Shanahan at the finish line. The two took finish times and handed out numbered popsicle sticks. The numbers indicated the athlete’s finish order to the Recorder.

On Wednesday 25 September 1974 we drove over the bridge to Mission Bay Park, San Diego, California. The MBT start and finish were close to the dirt parking lot by the causeway to Fiesta Island. We were ready to run and bike and swim dressed in running shoes, shorts and shirt over a bathing suit. We parked our car and unloaded our bikes – 3 Schwinns and a Peugeot, all with kickstands. We crossed a road, paid $1 each to someone, ran 2.8 miles on a loop toward Sea World and back. Then we bicycled across the causeway, did two counter-clockwise loops on a 2.5 mile course and bicycled back to the parking lot.

The barefoot part, the run-swims were next. We ran across the causeway, turned right on the road until it turned, then right onto a beach. We stripped to our swimsuits, put our shoes and clothes into a plastic bag then entered the water. The swim was across the channel back to the Park. Some of us landed on a sandbar and ran the length of it, then swam the channel. We ran north on a slippery shore then across grass to swim across Leisure Lagoon, then up to a path to run left. We circled a small building to reverse course. Back we ran to swim the lagoon again and to run up and over grass back to the shore. The last run was south on the mucky slanted shoreline to the inlet to Tecolote Creek.

Almost done. I looked across the open water to see where to go in the dark. Then I swam to the finish line. It was a narrow beach that was lit by a bonfire! The Timer shouted my time and handed me a numbered Popsicle stick. He told me to turn it in and to give my name to the Recorder. She was up above us in the parking lot. I climbed up a steep dirt bluff to get in line to check in. About half the field finished in the dark. Car headlights and a flashlight helped the Recorder to see to write our names.

We told our triathlon stories as we ate Mexican food back in Coronado. John mentioned his cool time, “1-1-1.” John said that now he knew he would be able to run for help for 1 hour and 11 minutes if he had to. I said I had never tried to keep going so fast for so long. I had really liked swimming at night. A runner had described a little red-headed girl who was coming “clear out of the water” on the swim. Kristin said she had decided to swim butterfly on the first swim leg to loosen up after swim practice.

Michael has never forgotten the steep dirt bluff we all had to climb in the dark. He had been handed a numbered popsicle stick by the timer who had shouted his finish time on the beach. He thought he was done. But no, there was more to do after the finish. He had to climb the crumbling bluff, barefoot, turn in his finish-order popsicle stick and give his name to someone in the dark who was up above somewhere. John told us that night that he did not get a popsicle stick. But he did stand in line to give his name to the Recorder.

That was the night I started to map out a Coronado triathlon in my head with ocean swims. On Friday night I would tell our swim coach that running and biking and swimming for over an hour at the MBT was more fun than doing a long pool workout. I would tell him Coronado would be a better place for triathlon than Mission Bay because we could do our swims in the ocean and our runs on the beach.

Our Swim Coach Stan Antrim made harsh fun of the ten-leg “triathlon” when I told him the details of why we had skipped our Wednesday evening practice. He shouted, “That is not a sport!” Then he surprised us by organizing the four-leg Coronado Optimist Triathlon for 27 July 1975. It was 5 ¼ miles..A bike ride, an ocean swim and 2 runs on the sand. Kristin and Michael were in it. Our family moved to Honolulu a few weeks later. Three of us did the 1975 Waikiki Rough Water Swim, 2.4 miles. Two of us signed up to train for the 1976 Honolulu Marathon, 26.2 miles.

In 1977 I mapped out a long distance triathlon to connect the Waikiki Rough Water Swim and the Honolulu Marathon with a bike leg. John suggested the bike leg be about 112 miles of the annual bicycle course around the island. Ours was a three-leg triathlon because we connected three annual distance events. We launched our Hawaiian Iron Man Triathlon on 18 February 1978. CMA swimmer and MBT finisher Flo Squires did the Boston Marathon on 17 April 1978. The 5th Annual Mission Bay Triathlon in 1978 was the last MBT.

Our family’s 50 years of triathlon began with Flo’s Track Club announcement at the Coronado pool. “Run, cycle, swim. Triathlon set for 25^th…Bring your own bicycle” (!)

Thank you, Flo. Happy 50^th birthday, Mission Bay Triathlon.

Judy Collins and John Collins

Founders: Ironman Triathlon 1978

Portobelo Extrémo Panamá 1998

Members: Ironman Hall of Fame 1998

USA Triathlon Hall of Fame 2013

Website: thiswastriathlon.org

See also: “Triathlon Comes Full Circle” on this site