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LVTC Happenings!
A monthly report of events and resources for our passionate, growing local multisport community.
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Spring Forward: Level Up Your Training
As we shake off the chill of winter and dive into longer days, this is the perfect time to assess, focus, and level up. This issue is packed with tools and inspiration to help you do just that.
In the Prez Corner, John Mercer talks about refining your routine - whether you’re training for your first race or you are an experienced triathlete. Past President Shawna Glasser shares tips on how to apply progressive overload without burning out. Coach Hilary Mauch offers three fresh ways to elevate your training while staying balanced. Operations Director Bob Gamble gives great advice for new triathletes eager to make gains while avoiding common pitfalls.
We also continue our Stronger Together Member Spotlight, featuring Julie Marschner, whose dedication to the club shows the power of community. Candace McCutcheon joins our Vegas Experts series, and we highlight the Legacy Scholarship—a meaningful way we honor our community.
Get ready to spring forward with purpose—we’re stronger together, and this season is just getting started!
#strongertogether #fearless #lvtrifamily #enjoythejourney #thrive #thatsthevegasway
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Club Hashtags
Use these hashtags in your social media posts to help share the Las Vegas Triathlon Club themes and highlight our endurance community culture:
#strongertogether – This theme reflects the essence of our triathlon community: achieving more through unity, supporting one another, and celebrating the shared journey of multisport life.
#fearless – This represents the beauty of taking on challenges of multisport and enjoying the rewards!
#thatsthevegasway – We made this theme as a way to point out the things that members do (e.g., loaning bikes, helping others, ...) that promote our club culture.
#enjoythejourney – This theme was selected to emphasize the importance of enjoying training and the overall process of preparing for an event/race.
#lvtrifamily – This theme was to emphasize the importance of our endurance community and to recognize that, even though triathlon is an individual sport, we never do this alone!
#thrive – This was our 2023 theme that was selected to emphasize that triathlon should bring value to all aspects of our lives.
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Sponsors
The Las Vegas Triathlon Club is a 501c(3) organization that is 100% operated by volunteers. Our annual operating budget is about $10,000-$12,000. Sponsorships are incredibly helpful for us to meet cover our operating costs and keep membership prices reasonable. You can read more about sponsorships HERE:
A huge thank you to each of our 2025 Sprint Level Sponsors!
- CORE Mental Health Services
- Elevate Sports Performance & Healthcare
- Elevation Physical Therapy
- Respect The Distance Coaching
- UNLV Kinesiology & Nutrition Sciences
- UNLV SPEED Lab
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2025 Membership
Joining the Las Vegas Triathlon Club (LVTC) offers a wealth of benefits designed to enhance your triathlon experience, regardless of your skill level. Our membership options are tailored to meet diverse needs, providing exceptional value through exclusive events, training opportunities, and community engagement.
Membership Benefits:
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Exclusive Club Events: Members enjoy access to four complimentary races at Lake Mead throughout the year, including one Aquabike and three Triathlons. These events foster a supportive environment for both newcomers and seasoned athletes.
Our multi-sports events are typically between 50 and 75 athletes. We are not ‘… just another triathlon.’ Instead, we have a great ‘grassroots’ feel to our events during which members can get to know members.
All levels of athletes are welcome at our events. We have athletes completing their first event and have even had professional triathletes in our events!
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Training and Social Opportunities: Participate in various triathlon programs, skill clinics, and group training sessions. Our summer open water swim workouts at Boulder Beach in Lake Mead are particularly popular, offering both training and socializing opportunities.
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Club Merchandise: Purchase club-branded gear to showcase your LVTC pride during training and events.
Membership Options:
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Single Membership: At $75 per year, this membership includes all the benefits listed above.
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Family Membership: Priced at $95 per year, this option extends all single membership benefits to up to four immediate family members residing in the same household, making it a great value for families.
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Student Membership: Full-time students can join for $40 per year, receiving the same comprehensive benefits as single members at a reduced rate.
Additionally, for those interested in race timing, LVTC offers timing chips for purchase. Once acquired, the chip is yours to keep for all future club races, ensuring accurate race timing and personal record tracking.
By becoming a member of LVTC, you're not just joining a club—you're becoming part of a vibrant community that supports and celebrates each athlete's journey in the sport of triathlon.
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Las Vegas Triathlon Club Events
Save the dates! The tentative dates for the 2025 season are as follows (membership is required for each event):
| | | 4/26/25 | Saturday | Sprint Triathlon
Swim 750m; Bike 20km; Run 5km | | 6/15/25 | Sunday | Sprint Triathlon
Swim 750m; Bike 20km; Run 5km | | 7/12/25 | Saturday | Aquabike
Swim 750m; Bike 20km | | 8/10/25 | Sunday | NEW EVENT!
2X Super Sprint Triathlon
Swim 300m, Bike 4km, Run 1.6km, Swim 300m, Bike 4km, Run 1.6km
YES! 2X Super Sprint!! | | | We also have a variety of events throughout the year! Here are some of the upcoming events this spring: | | | 4/5/25 | Saturday | Intro to Triathlon Clinic | | | |
We’ll post more information about each of these … and watch for more events!
You can view the calendar of events at this link:
Las Vegas Triathlon Club Calendar
Continue to check our Facebook Group for other happenings in our endurance community.
Here are the results of our 2024 events:
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Socials/Training Events/Education
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Check out and subscribe to our calendar feature (a continuing work-in-progress):
Las Vegas Triathlon Club Calendar
Here are the tentative dates for our 2025 Club events (we are submitting permit requests for these dates):
- 4/26/25: Saturday - Sprint Triathlon
- Registration opens March 1st
- 6/15/25: Sunday - Sprint Triathlon
- Registration opens May 1st
- 7/12/25: Saturday - Aquabike
- Registration opens June 1st
- 8/10/25: Sunday - 2X Super Sprint Tri
- Registration opens July 1st
Sprint Triathlon: Swim 750m; Bike 20km; Run 5km.
Aquabike: Swim 750m; Bike 20km.
2X Super Sprint Triathlon: Swim 300m, Bike 4km, Run 1.6km, Swim 300m, Bike 4km, Run 1.6km.
Continue to check our Facebook Group for any additional get-togethers that may be happening, and for locals who are training in town or down at Lake Mead. Post your workouts!
Thanks everyone!
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Past President
How to Level Up
If you want to "level up" your training, it’s all about pushing yourself just enough to keep growing without burning out. The key? Progressive overload—gradually increasing intensity, volume, or complexity. But it’s not just about lifting heavier weights; it’s about being intentional with your workouts, tracking progress, and giving your body the recovery it needs.
1. Challenge Yourself, But Be Smart
Progressive overload isn’t just about adding more weight (though that helps). You can also:
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Increase intensity: Lift heavier, do more reps, shorten rest times, or try advanced techniques.
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Increase volume: More sets, more exercises—just don’t overdo it.
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Increase complexity: Try new variations or more challenging movements.
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Progress gradually: Avoid injury by making small, steady improvements instead of big jumps.
2. Keep It Interesting
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Switch up your exercises: Your body adapts fast, so mix things up.
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Play with rep ranges: High reps, low reps—each has its benefits.
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Try different intensities: Adding HIIT or circuits can break plateaus.
3. Prioritize Recovery
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Sleep and rest: This is where the magic happens—muscles grow when you rest.
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Active recovery: Walking, stretching, or yoga can help you feel fresh.
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Listen to your body: There’s a difference between pushing yourself and pushing too far.
4. Track Your Progress
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Keep a workout log to see how far you’ve come.
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Set goals to stay motivated.
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Celebrate wins, no matter how small.
5. Stay Motivated
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Find a workout buddy for accountability.
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Reward yourself for hitting milestones.
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Ask for help if needed—trainers exist for a reason!
Push yourself, stay consistent, and enjoy the process. That’s how you truly level up!
~Shawna Glasser
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The New Triathlete
Up-Level Your Training
By this point in this season’s training, you’ve started building a solid base of aerobic fitness. You know two things about this base: for one thing, you know that the majority of your training should be done at a comfortable pace and low heart rate in order to build an aerobic engine by increasing the size and number of mitochondria in your muscles and improving the circulation of oxygen-carrying blood to them. You also know that the broader you make this aerobic base, the higher you’ll be able to raise your performance. Unfortunately, however, new triathletes are dealing with a double-edged sword: While you have an abundance of enthusiasm and energy, you’ve also got the patience of a lit firecracker – you want speed, and you want it now.
With this in mind, I’m going to offer two tips for moderating this enthusiasm with the hopes of preventing injury and helping you reach your potential. First, realize that your muscles and cardiovascular system will develop and improve faster than your tendons, ligaments, and joints. This is a commonly overlooked fact that gets new triathletes in trouble. As you become stronger and fitter, you will be tempted to push your body harder than your joints and connective tissue can handle. This is how overuse injuries start. To prevent this, you must consciously “hold back on the reins” and increase your workload gradually enough for your whole body to adapt, even though you begin to feel stronger. Secondly, and just as important, is to remember that your training is not a competition. The goal of your training is to stress your body enough to elicit an adaptation, but not so hard that you OVER-stress it and exceed your body’s ability to recover. One big way that new triathletes hurt themselves is to try to go faster every day; to try to beat “yesterday’s time” as though they are constantly in competition with themselves. This will get you in trouble and cause over-use injuries. Training should be controlled, adaptive stress, not the stress of competition. Save competition for races. Coax yourself into fitness; don’t force yourself into it.
I have made every rookie mistake that could be made, and I have learned well because of it. Smart triathletes learn from their mistakes, but smarter ones also learn from the mistakes of others. Train smart. I’ll see you at the races.
~Bob Gamble
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Prez Corner:
Spring Forward: Level Up Your Training
Spring is here, and it’s time to spring forward—in more ways than one! Daylight savings has us moving the clocks ahead, and with longer days and warmer weather, there’s no better season to shake off the winter rust and level up your training.
If you’re new to triathlon, you might have your very first race coming up in April or May. Now is a great time to assess your training and make adjustments. Focus on becoming comfortable with all three disciplines - and the transitions. Know the course, especially if it’s local, and get out there to ride and run it. As the water warms up, start adding open water swims to your routine. Most importantly: be consistent, and arrive at the start line healthy and confident. Success for the first race is best defined by how much you enjoyed the process of getting to the start line and how much you enjoyed the race experience.
For the veterans, this is your opportunity to refine and reset. Maybe that means adding interval work to your runs, incorporating shallow-water plyometrics, tweaking your bike fit for comfort in aero, or simply dialing in consistency. Consider mixing up your race schedule or trying a new training method to keep things fresh and challenging. That being said, sometimes the best approach is to simplify training – reduce and remove roadblocks to training consistently.
Remember, training smarter doesn’t always mean training harder or having complex training sessions. Prioritize recovery, fuel properly, and be intentional with your workouts. And don’t go it alone - join group workouts, attend club clinics, and participate/support our club multisport events. We grow stronger together.
Make this a season of momentum, progress, and personal bests. Spring forward with purpose - and crush those goals!
#strongertogether #thatsthevegasway #fearless #enjoythejourney #lvtrifamily
~John Mercer
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Coach's Corner:
Spring Forward: 3 Ways to Level Up Your Training This Season
As the clocks spring forward, it’s not just our schedules that shift—it’s time to shift our mindset, too. Whether you’re gearing up for your first triathlon or chasing a PR this season, spring is the perfect time to plant seeds that grow into race-day success. So, how can you level up your training without leveling yourself?
Here are three coach-approved ways to spring forward:
1. Refresh Your Routine
Been doing the same workouts since December? Time to shake it up. Add intervals to your long rides. Swap out one easy run for a brick session. Or try a new swim drill that challenges your form. Variety doesn’t just keep training interesting—it wakes up your muscles and your motivation.
2. Gear Check = Game Changer
The weather’s warming up, which means it’s time to assess your gear. How’s your wetsuit fit? Are your bike tires race-ready? Is that run shoe overdue for retirement (yes, I’m looking at you, 500-mile warriors)? Prepping now can prevent problems later.
3. Level Up by Slowing Down
Wait, what? Yes—because true progress includes recovery. Spring is notorious for athletes pushing hard and then fizzling out by summer. Don’t skip the strength work, mobility, and proper fueling. You can’t level up if you’re sidelined.
Let’s make this spring your strongest season yet. Respect the distance. Respect the process. And hey—don’t forget to enjoy the ride.
~Hilary Mauch
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Have you met these Coaches?
Triathlon race season is here. Do you have a coach? Are you looking for one? Well, the Las Vegas Triathlon Club is going to try to help make some connections.
Earlier this year, we sent out a google form to try to capture our local coaching expertise. We had a number of coaches (all are members of Las Vegas Triathlon Club) respond and we have featured them on this webpage:
Las Vegas Triathlon Club Coaches
We are going to continue to highlight coaches on our web page – if you would like to be part of that, please fill out this form.
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The Evidence-Based Triathlete
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Where in the World Has Our TRI Club Raced?
Check out the map below to see where our athletes have raced!
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Stronger Together Member Spotlight - Julie Marschner
In this new feature in our newsletter, we highlight a member that exemplifies our club theme: Stronger Together. This month, Julie Marschner is our Stronger Together Spotlight!
You’ve been recognized for your contributions to the club - what motivates you to give back and help fellow members?
I’ve been competing in triathlons for over 20 years now and can fully appreciate that a race is only as good as its volunteers. I’ve volunteered at some larger races and it can feel like complete chaos at times with the number of athletes racing that you’re helping to support during short windows of time. I love volunteering at the club races with the small race field where you’re able to give more individualized attention to the athletes. And of course, volunteering is much less stressful on race morning than actually racing but you still get to be part of the action.
Can you share a memorable moment when you felt the power of the endurance community and/or your friends supporting you or others?
There have been so many races I’ve done where friends and family have cheered me on all day. I’ve spectated at 70.3 races and know it’s exhausting and can only imagine what it’s like for full Ironman races. I have to give a shoutout to Colleen Takahashi, Matt Olson and Rick Stenehjem who were super supporters during the Ironman World Championship that was held in St George in 2022. I saw them cheering all over the course throughout the day and Matt and Colleen even found time to go pick up my dog from the dog sitter and bring her out on the course for me to pet during the run which gave me a huge boost.
What advice would you give to someone new to LVTC about getting involved and making the most of the club experience?
Just show up! If you’re brand new to triathlon the club’s race series is a great way to ease into the sport before tackling your first race. The club races are the perfect place to learn from other local athletes who are there to get you to your first finish line. If you’re injured or not ready to race, then volunteering at one of the races still keeps you involved and can be incredibly rewarding when you see you were a part of someone else being able to finish their first race.
What does the phrase ‘Stronger Together’ mean to you in the context of triathlon and the LVTC community?
I’ve raced quite a bit all over the US and around the world. While I love a good solo trip, some of my favorite “racecations” have been those where other racers from the club are also racing. It’s fun to hang out together in between making final race preparations, cheering each other on during the race, and sharing stories post-race of what we each experienced. And there have been times where I haven’t felt prepared leading up to a race or reached a low point during the race where seeing a friendly face of someone I know from the club gets me through it.
What are your next big goals in triathlon?
I’m hoping to get back to the Ironman 70.3 World Championship again this year that’s being held in Spain. My planned races to try and qualify will be in Oceanside and Victoria, BC. And I keep telling myself no more Ironmans after finishing my 11th last year, but am hoping to try to get an entry for Challenge Roth (an iconic Iron-distance race in Germany) next year.
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Vegas Experts - Candace McCutcheon
We have some fantastic local triathlon expertise. In this regular feature, one of our local experts provides some advice for triathletes. Our expert this month is Candace Mccutcheon, Certified Nutrition & Weightloss Coach / Triathlete! Not only is she a top-notch triathlete, she is owner/operator of Evolve Kickbox & Fitness (https://www.evolve.vegas/).
Spring Forward: Level Up Your Nutrition
Tri season is here, and while many of us are upgrading gear, dialing in pace strategy, and chasing PRs, one of the biggest performance tools is often overlooked—nutrition. It’s the secret weapon that can fuel your next level, and far too many triathletes are missing the mark.
As a coach and competitive triathlete, I see it constantly: too much fat, not enough carbs or protein, and a whole lot of confusion. Let’s fix that with a few simple basics to spring forward the right way:
1. Build balanced plates: Aim for each meal to have a palm-sized lean protein (chicken, turkey, tofu, 96% ground beef), a healthy carb (oats, potatoes, rice, fruit), and veggies.
2. Don’t fear carbs: They’re fuel! You need them to train hard, recover strong, and stay energized.
3. Watch fats: Fats have over double the calories of carbs. Limit high-fat “healthy” foods like nuts, peanut butter, and cheese to 1-2 thumb-sized portions a day.
4. Eat enough: Race season is not the time to diet. Under-eating leads to fatigue, poor recovery, and even weight stalls.
5. Fuel your workouts: Any session over 80 minutes? Bring carbs like gels or dates. And always eat protein + carbs within 30 minutes after training.
6. Hydrate like it’s your job: Half your body weight in ounces minimum daily.
Nutrition isn’t about perfection—it’s about intention. Get this right, and your performance, recovery, and endurance will skyrocket. Don’t guess. Don’t copy your friends. And don’t fear food. Let this season be the one where you train smarter—and fuel like a champion.
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The Las Vegas Triathlon Club Legacy Scholarship
On 12/10/20, five Las Vegas athletes were killed when an impaired driver ran into a group of cyclists. The athletes were Tom Trauger, Erin Ray, Aksoy Ahmet, Michael Murray, and Gerrard Nieva. These five athletes are endearingly referred to as TEAMG (Tom, Erin, Aksoy, Michael, and Gerrard).
Following their deaths, there has been an upswell of community support for the families and survivors directly affected. There has also been a renewed call for action to create a safer environment for our athletes to train here in the Greater Las Vegas Valley.
The purpose of the Las Vegas Triathlon Club Legacy Scholarship is to honor the legacy of TEAMG as well as any local triathletes who have been killed or injured as result of distracted driving. The Legacy Scholarship is designed to encourage involvement in triathlon by new athletes, youth athletes, and/or continuing athletes in special need.
More information about the scholarship can be found at this page.
The list of our Scholarship Awardees can be found at these pages:
2024 Winners
2023 Winners
2022 Winners
This scholarship continues thanks to a generous donation by an anonymous donor.
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