How much money does a journalist make? Are you talking about CNN's Christiana Amanpour or a small town journalist?

Most cycling and triathlon pros do not make a lot of money, there are only a few ones who do quite well.

H

A vast majority of the pros are just scraping by trying to rack up frquent flyer miles, eating powerbars for breafast lunch and dinner, and are always happy to get a free pair of shoes. After the cost of travel/race entry and whatnot most guys make less than 15-20K yr. they do it for the love, not for the girls, drugs or money.

There are probably a dozen or so that make 300k+. The top few over 500k..There are probably another 20 that make between 100k to 300k, and another 30 to 50 that make 50k to 100k.. The rest make less than 50k, and many much less than that..This is my guess world wide, and includes sponsor dollars, race director payouts, and prize money....Not much change from 20 years ago, except for the top couple earners......

I'd guess that for the top earners most of the money doesn't come from race winnings but more from sponsership deals and rep jobs for the products that they represent.

A lot seem to do coaching, trianing etc. Another guess would be that most have some form of second income either from parttime or allmost full time work or other sources outside of long distance triathlon.

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seems a bit high to me but i respect your judgement. of course like you said that's over the whole world, so factor in all the top Aussies and Germans alone and that number per country starts to dwindle real fast!

I'd suggest that for the vast majority of pros out there, their main sponsors are families/spouses, with part time jobs and "working sponsorship agreements" making up the rest of the grocery bill. Most of these guys are busting ass to try and make it, and winning enough money to buy groceries is a big deal.

There are certainly a few with lots of disposable income now that they've made it big, but I'd be willing to bet that they went through several lean years as well, barely scraping by and doing without what most normal people consider basic necessities.

No-one gets into tri for the money, but thanks to a lot of generous individual contributors, the up-and-comers can often hang on long enough to make the equivalent of a fairly poor salary doing what they love. Some of them may eventually make a comfortable living, and some may even make a lot of money - but most just barely get by.

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Macca and Stadler.

It was rumored that Stadler's deal with that investment bank or whatever was 7 figures.

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Portside Athletics Blog

Ironman.com had a story about Macca last year and they said he made deep into the 6 figures, and has for years. I dont know how much 'deep into 6 figures' is though.

What about the Bennetts? And I just recently heard from someone in the industry that Macca's UnderArmour sponsorshipe deal is huge. I'd have to ask again, but I thought that it was 6 figures or close to it.

But, really most of the guys are just trying to break even with racing and are working other jobs that allow them to train at will. Only the top guys and girls are making enough to buy fancy houses, cars, etc.

Greg Bennet supposedly made over 500k this year, plus his wife brought in a nice chunk too. He made 508,000 this year, and his wife Laura made 200,000 at HyVee. Not a bad year for them....

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SIC VIS PACEM PARA BELLUM

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the bennett(S)? because for for them to qualify, they would have to make 1,000,000 total.

and as far as i know, 6 figures = 100,000.

i just want to see the 1040 form of any tri pro that made over 500k.

maybe, but i really doubt it. and if i am wrong, there has gotta be at best 1 or 2 in the world.

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Where would you want to swim ?

I don't think they have 1040s in Germany, but do some research on Stadler's deal.

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Portside Athletics Blog

I think you are correct. Only a handful are making a true living off of triathlon alone.

Reminds me of a great joke:
How do you get a professional triathlete off your porch?

Pay for the pizza.

Gary Mc

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Gary Mc
Did I mention I did Kona

My philosophy teacher used that joke, except about philo majors.

Yeah, but my point was Greg alone made 508,000 just off of winnings, that doesn't count his endorsements....

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I have an interesting interview with Greg Bennett that'll most likely go up on ST tomorrow. i actually asked him a couple money questions. :-)

H

what races gave him those kind winnings?

and if that is the case (which perhaps it is), what was his salary the year before that, and the year before that?

any pro's out there making over 500,000/year over a span of multiple years?

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Where would you want to swim ?

yeah but what are the details on the Stadler deal? is that even in US Dollars? isn't it over several years, and for several team members? those factors alone can cut it down real fast

considering all the hype around the Bennetts being the richest in tri, and only Greg made over $500k, and only this year, i don't think many guys are making that much.

they even talked about how at the start of the year they had extremely little sponsorship-wise, and this is considering both of them are best/close to best in the world!

i think it's more like maybe 5 in the whole world make over $100k, a few make around $50k, and most others struggle to eat!

lifetime fitness series: http://www.ltftriathlonseries.com/prizes.pdf
60K MN, 60K Dallas, 8K NY, 10K Chi, 10K LA, 300K series bonus

the title of this thread is an oxymoron.

As others have pointed out, Greg Bennett won over 500k in one series of races. That does not include all his other races, sponsors, and start fees. His wife probably made close to 400k+ in prize money and endorsements, she made 260k in one race in prize money alone..Norman's deal with one sponsor is close to the 500k, and that also does not include prize money, other great sponsors, and start fees..Macca probably made close to at least 400k, he has over half that in prize money...Those are the few that are off the front in $, then there are many of the top ITU people doing well. Snowsill, Gomez, Fernandez, and a few others are probably in that 200 to 300k range...

Hope that answers your questions, most of this stuff is common knowledge.....

Khai - I think you really describe the life of most pros very well. I think many are very very unrealistic about what a "pro" athlete can/should earn. I think it's easy to get caught up in how much you train and how fast you race when you are a triathlet because our sport takes so much of our time and mental focus. My opinion is that if you want to be pro and do the ironman you better be able to go under 8.30 if you want to get some income from "just" being a triathlete. Now there are of course ways in which you can get an income because of your skills in the sport but this takes that you develop a plan and purpose of why you do triathlon and then try to communicate it to people outside our sport - this could be weight loss, healty lifestyle etc. In our sport many age groupers sacrifice as much as many pros and why should they pay a semi fast athlete to chase his/her dream when what they are doing is not that different than what the age grouper does. That's at least how it is around where I live - the age groupers here in Denmark ride in the rain and cold just like the pros and some of them go very very fast. I don't see why they should pay my gear and trips to nice places :)
So with the pros I know their income vary very much and is not always because of the level they race at but their communicating skills.

i think we're also talking gross revenue here and need to factor high expenses.

when you end up paying a couple grand to fly to and stay at events around the world you're talking a couple grand per race, and doing so often. plus if you're making huge money like that you're most likely going to be paying minimum 15% of it for a sports agent. plus often a website designer. plus often a seperate PR agent. plus massages several times per week, etc, etc.