SF triathlon changes starting procedures 1 year after competitor was paralyzed

The annual Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon has changed its starting procedures for this year’s race, the first year after a competitor was paralyzed by a collision at the start of the event.

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It’s been exactly one year since Jose Perez, a firefighter from Chicago and veteran triathlete, jumped into the water to begin his race, only for another competitor to land directly on Perez’s head. The strike instantly paralyzed him, leaving him floating in San Francisco Bay for what “felt like an eternity” before he was safely rescued, which he recounted to SFGATE last summer while recovering at San Francisco General Hospital. 

Before this year’s race on June 7, SFGATE sought an interview with Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon officials last week through a public relations firm helping with the race. The spokesperson said race officials were “unable to accommodate” an interview but sent an unattributed statement on behalf of the race.

“Athlete safety is central to the planning and delivery of the Escape From Alcatraz Triathlon,” the statement read. “Each year, the race team reviews its operating procedures with the relevant state and federal agencies, and the confirmed swim start procedures for 2026 have already been communicated directly to participants through the Athlete Guide.”

The statement continued: “For this year’s race, athletes will be organized on the start vessel by age group and released in a time-trial format, with start signals tied to clearance of the landing zone. The swim will be supported by approximately 100 watercraft across the Bay.”

Within the Athlete Guide, a full page is devoted to “The Jump,” which is how triathletes start the three-leg race (swimming, cycling and running). The swim has been the first leg, with all the competitors loading onto boats, sailing out to the middle of the bay to the starting boat and kicking off the race by leaping into the water from the boat’s edge.

Under a bolded banner asking participants to “review the below Swim Start procedures carefully,” Escape from Alcatraz says there will be a “starter” at each of the boat’s three jump locations and tells competitors not to jump into the water until they are signaled to do so by the starter.

What’s described is quite different from how the start was run in prior years — SFGATE found an  that only has a couple paragraphs of instructions about the jump, with most of them focused on overcoming any hesitation competitors may have — and especially so from last year’s race. After the 2025 edition, triathletes took to social media to criticize the race’s organization at the start, with an initial post saying race officials were “yelling like drill sergeants” when instructing people to get into the water.

Kevin Edwards,a veteran triathlete who has done the Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon before, told SFGATE that “it’s never been as chaotic” as it was in 2025 and said race officials weren’t checking the water before encouraging competitors to jump off the boat. (Perez, for his part, told SFGATE that the race was “one of the least organized races I’ve probably ever been a part of.”)

The Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon account also posted multiple videos of the start of the 2025 race on social media, all of which seemed to confirm the triathletes’ experiences. While one of the videos has since been removed, a roughly 90-second video remains up, showing racers leaping into the water without any signals to stop them from jumping in and no assurances of a cleared-out landing zone. 

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This year’s race will be the first run by MARI, a new live events company started up by Hollywood superagent Ariel Emanuel. In November, MARI bought up the arts and entertainment division of IMG, the company that had previously owned and operated the race. MARI has kept the Professional Triathletes Organisation as a co-operator of the races.

But IMG, PTO and others involved in running last year’s Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon are being sued by Perez for gross negligence, negligent design defect and a failure to warn. In a case that goes back to last September, Perez’s legal team filed an amended complaint in February, and San Francisco Judge Ronald Quidachay denied the defendants’ motion to strike the complaint in April. The next step in the case is a management conference later this month.

When reached by SFGATE, Perez respectfully declined an interview, citing the ongoing litigation. He did provide SFGATE with a letter of gratitude he’s written, profusely thanking all of the people who have helped him in the last year as he’s gone through his recovery — with an extra focus on the firefighters in both Chicago and San Francisco. He ended the letter with a story about his family.

“My son recently celebrated a birthday. I remember telling him that morning, ‘you have no idea how lucky and grateful I am to be able to share this day with you,’” Perez wrote. “I honestly thought this wouldn’t be possible again. This is what you all helped get me back to. Then, in typical teenage fashion, he responded with, ‘Yea… I know.’”

One of his lawyers, Nicholas Kohan, declined to comment about the case when reached by SFGATE. Escape from Alcatraz officials also had no comment on the ongoing litigation.