Scott Berry said when he arrived at his first duathlon, he was completely overwhelmed.

“I am so out of place here,” he said he thought that day. “I don’t belong here. I really don’t belong at this race.”

Berry, a facilities manager at Vesuvius in Charleston, said he thought his first duathlon in Marshall would be a piece of cake.

“I thought, ‘Well, shoot, I can do this. I’ll probably go down there, and there’ll be all these farmers. I’ll do really well at this,’” he said.

When Berry arrived at the start line, he found competitors with expensive racing bikes, aerodynamically shaped helmets, spandex outfits and specially designed shoes.

Berry said after almost heading home, he convinced himself to stay and participate in the race.

“I did OK on the first run. Then I got on the bike,” he said. “I must have been passed by 50 people on the bike, because I wasn’t a cyclist, but they obviously were.”

After he finished the biking segment and started running, Berry said he felt like something was wrong with his legs.

“My legs had been so engorged with blood from the cycling effort,” he said. “They didn’t work right. They felt like they were full of sand and had lead weights tied around them.”

Berry said from that moment, he decided he would train harder on the bike and got hooked on duathlons.

Duathlons are an athletic race that involves three segments of two sports.

Berry said they usually have running and cycling as the two sports but can also involve other sports, such as canoeing.

“Triathlons have settled into the run, swim, bike (pattern),” he said. “Duathlon has a little bit more flexibility.”

Duathlons will traditionally start with a running segment followed by a biking segment, and they will end with another running segment.

Berry said a duathlon class was started at the Charleston Parks and Recreation Department so people who are interesting in the race are able to receive necessary information on duathlons.

“I always felt like we needed to do something for the community, to help more people get involved,” he said. “I remember back to my first one and how I almost walked away from that. Had I had known the level of intimidation I was going to feel when I got there, I would have walked away from it. I wouldn’t have even gone.”

Berry, who is the instructor for the class, said he goes over all the basics and more to anyone interested in duathlons.

The one-time class costs $5, and those who complete the class receive a $5 off coupon for the Charleston Challenge Duathlon.

He said he encourages people to take the class in the winter or spring so they can train and work on the skills they learned throughout the summer.

The class covers how to find races, race registration, required equipment, setting up your transition area, start-line etiquette, general bike leg rules, race volunteers, officials and rules.

Berry said a demonstration he does for the class is showing the different types of equipment people can use.

“I’ll have one of my high-end triathlon bikes then I’ll have my regular road bike then I’ll have my original bike that I rode my duathlon with,” he said. “All these bikes are more than adequate to do this type of race if this is what you have.”

Berry said the local duathlon race started after he started consulting with the Parks and Rec deptartment to help them improve their races.

He said one year for the Friendly City Five race, they had 40 volunteers with only 11 participants.

“That was their common theme—they had more people showing up to help with this race than they had run it,” Berry said.

He said the city would lose $500 every year the race was put on.

“So I met with Dianne Ratliff (Charleston tourism and special events supervisor) and Brian Jones (Charleston recreation director) and told them what (duathlons) were all about,” Berry said. “They thought that’s the stupidest thing they’ve ever heard, because again, they’re not runners. They’re not cyclists.”

He said eventually the three of them would start three Charleston Challenge races — the 40-mile relay, the duathlon and the mid-winter classic, a 5k, 10k and 15k race.

The first year the city hosted the duathlon, they had 40 participants, Berry said.

“(It was) double what they had been having at their Friendly City Five,” he said. “People just loved it.”

Berry said having better amenities helped with the success of the races.

“We had Carl Sandburg (school),” he said. “We had plenty of parking. We didn’t have to rely on porta-potties.”

Although there is currently no one signed up for the class, Berry said if he can help one person get into the sport of duathlons, he will be happy.

“If I can make that much difference in one person’s life, and I look back at the way my life has been over the last 13 years, it’s been nothing but positive—running and cycling and meeting new friends,” he said.

Amanda Wilkinson can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].