Two athletes died while swimming in the Irish triathlon

Despite being pushed up a day early due to a storm, the swimming competition on the morning of August 20 took place with strong winds and big waves on Claycastle beach in Youghal.

These extreme weather conditions are considered to be the cause of the accident of two athletes, Ivan Chittenden, a 64-year-old Canadian, and Brendan Wall, 45, an Irishman who has lived in the UK for many years. Authorities immediately stopped Ironman 70.3 Cork 2023 - a tournament with a scale of 3,000 athletes - after this incident and opened an investigation.

The event is controversial about the validity of the contest. The Irish Triathlon Federation (TI) said it did not permit the swimming part of Ironman 70.3 Cork 2023 due to weather concerns during the competition time frame, but the tournament organizers decided to keep the schedule.

Speaking to Sky News after the two triathletes died, TI CEO Darren Coombes confirmed that TI had surveyed and assessed the safety level before the competition, and recommended that Ironman 70.3 Cork 2023 should postpone the swimming competition. But the organizers of the tournament - Ironman Ireland - ignored, letting the athletes plunge into the water to compete.

In the previous announcement, Ironman Ireland confirmed that it had done enough testing procedures and found that the race met all safety standards to take place. Ironman Ireland only announced the adjustment, shortening swimming distances as a precautionary measure, noting that this allows athletes "to be able to swim with the help of more favorable currents and high tide after 100 metres." Firstly".

However, according to RTÉ, despite the announcement of the shortening, the swimming distance of the last Cork tournament is still 1.9 km - exactly the same as the normal distance of the Ironman 70.3 tournaments including 1.9 km. swimming, 90 km cycling and 21.1 km running.

Treasury Secretary Michael McGrath, who is a member of the Central-South Cork region, called the deaths of the two triathletes swimming "a terrible tragedy" and said the competition took place in "severe underwater conditions. particularly challenging". He called on the functional units to collect information on the death of two triathletes and conduct a comprehensive investigation. Cork County Mayor Frank O'Flynn also considers this a tragedy, and sends condolences to the families and friends of the two athletes in distress.