You rarely hear athletes at the X Games raving about Red Bull events. It's just being pro.

I'm not touching the Macca exclusion.

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They probably wanted to skip video of the first Macca win since his top was unzipped & there were sponges sticking out everywhere.

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Pink? Maybe. Maybe not. You decide.

Why would WTC want to give any free advertising to their number 1 competitor? Although Challenge failed miserably when they tried to expand into the United States, there are still many, many people who consider Challenge Roth to be the best 140.6 in the world. They certainly don't want their top pros talking it up.

I completely understand IM not talking about Challenge from a business standpoint. My observation was more that they seemed to have restricted what the pros could say. I was wondering whether this was contractual and whether there were penalties for actually mentioning Challenge. Either way, seems petty when Ironman has the obvious upper hand.

Side note: IIRC I remember one of Macca's last trips to Kona as a racer he had announced his relationship with Challenge. I think he wore a Challenge shirt at the press conference and ruffled some feathers.

Pushback from the WTC for mentioning Challenge just makes them look petty and vindictive.
But, this isn't surprising...

Wait, you mean Ford wouldn't want people talking about Honda at a Ford event? That's ludicrous!

By this logic, why does the WTC allow non sponsor logos on kit? Why isn't everyone riding a Ventum?

Good question. I bet they clamp down on that soon as well.
M~

Did they skip Macca because of the allegations against him in Kona last year? trying to keep peace with the locals?

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Yellowfin Endurance Coaching and Bike Fits
USAT Level 1, USAC Level 3

There are no contracts for pros to race at Kona.
As it stands now, WTC doesn't care THAT much about pros to give more money than what's offered in the prize purse. There may be some appearance bonuses or similar, but otherwise...

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Group Eleven – Websites for Athletes / mikael.racing / @mstaer

For promotional materials one year, they did photoshop off Rev3 logos.


Some of the pros poked fun at it at the underpants run (2011)

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ECMGN Therapy Silicon Valley:
Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

totally agree on the prize purse issue. 10 deep is poor form.

so was Frodo just being "nice" by not specifically referencing Challenge Roth. If I were a pro (especially of his stature) and there wasnt a penalty/fine for mentioning Challenge, I sure wouldnt have said "the race that cannot be named..." It seems like WTC must have made a point about it.

I wonder how much time the Challenge people spend talking up Ironman/ WTC events.

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Take a short break from ST and read my blog:
http://tri-banter.blogspot.com/

They don't talk it up. But they don't pretend it doesn't exist

 Daniela Ryf at the Pro Media Conference spoke of winning the "Triple Crown" and Roth. At about 1:36 http://www.imtalk.me/

Good catch, I missed those earlier. They don't mentioned Challenge, just the generic "Roth." FWIW, two of those Triple Crown races were WTC branded - Ironman 70.3 World Championship and Ironman 70.3 Bahrain (and Dubai became WTC in 2016).

All in all, I just found it a bit strange and petty on WTC's part (especially if they told the pros not to mentioned Challenge, which by Frodo's comment it looks like something was said).


Regarding Macca, I think he was removed not for the allegations, but because he represents Challenge.

During the live broadcast when discussing Daniela's season, they mentioned her DNF at Frankfurt and then her sub 9 at Zurich. Roth was never spoken about, nor the fact that she had done two ironman distances races in eight days. So a substantial omission as many of us thought that she would suffer from such a heavy season (glad she proved me emphatically wrong) which was so noticeable as only tri-nerds are watching the broadcast and what isn't said becomes a rather large elephant in the room. Shame on the WTC, shame on those who agreed to play along with this travesty.

SteveMc

Shame on the WTC, shame on those who agreed to play along with this travesty.

Steve,

Not a comment about this, in particular, more generally about live-streaming, live race coverage.

I'm starting to do more and more of this kind of work for my clients. I've worked with Ironman in the past hosting the live-stream broadcast for Ironman Canada when it was in Penticton, and this past year I have worked with both Athletics Canada and Cycling Canada, on live-stream coverage of various races and events that they have run.

Unlike, network broadcast TV/cable coverage, that is being done and produced by a 3rd party broadcaster, live-streaming coverage of races/events, is most often paid for or significantly supported by the race/event! Thus, they can control the content and what get's said. Now, I've never been told what I can or can't say , by a race/event client, but I can certainly understand if that is the case to protect, brand, brand-marks or certain rights.

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Steve Fleck @stevefleck | Blog

I would call it just silly more than a travesty. WTC just makes itself look weak and defensive with such tactics. They'd come off much better competitors like adorable little kids races than super scary things that we can't talk about.

Thanks for your frank assessment Fleck. However in this case is was blindingly obvious that the broadcasters had been told that they could not mention *anything* about Roth. I would have understood if they had used some quaint euphemism such as "a long distance triathlon", but deliberately omitting to say that Frondeno had put down a 7:35, and Daniela got very close to Chrissie's record for a "long distance triathlon" is, alas, reminiscent of Soviet style crass photo manipulation. Basically, what they were saying was not the whole truth...

SteveMc