Hence, the reason I admitted the strange discrepancy between my being 22 in the world, but 80th in the U.S.
I am unaware of a world ranking for amateurs other than AWA. Does ITU have one?

Hey we agree!!!!!......I like Huffandpuff idea of "cash back program"........i do like the, at times, better racking spots....i also feel slightly ashamed of being gold as well but if i could get cash back on races instead of "early entry" to all these races in Asia, now we would be talking. I will be racing less in 2017 due to costs of races and travel, so much for a dentist thing i have going for me.

I don't think you can definitively show that across the board for the AWA Gold rankings. I doubt you've even looked into correlation vs. causality for AWA Gold vs USAT AA rankings.

What aspect of the USAT AA rankings rewards quality more than WTC AWA Gold? Where does AWA Gold reward quantity more than USAT AA? Do you have specifics? Both programs use a participant's top THREE race results (though USAT requires 3 tri race results and AWA will rank you with less than 3 races). USAT AA uses the top 10% of AG rankings (I think this used to be 5% with the next 5% receiving AA Honorable Mention) while AWA Gold uses the top 1% AG ranking. Both score participant race results vs. race winner results.

The differences between the programs is that WTC has made the choice to recognize additional levels of participation and performance by including silver (top 5% of AG) and bronze (top 10% of AG). They also break out AWA between all WTC, WTC IM and WTC 70.3 races. So what? As I mentioned above, USAT used to have two levels of All American rankings and then made it easier to achieve AA rank. If this encourages participants to complete more races or work to improve their standings so what? Slowman is always pointing out that our sport is in decline. Any efforts to boost participation are probably a good thing.

I will say that I never paid much attention to USAT rankings. I feel the same way about AWA. However, I will say that WTC goes out of their way to provide these rankings to participants and celebrate their achievements, while USAT publishes this information once a year in a magazine that most of us aren't even interested in receiving. Basically another case of USAT just going through the minimum necessary motions for members.

In the end I don't see a lot of difference between the two ranking programs at the AA and Gold level. The generalizations made about one being more performance oriented than the other haven't been backed up with results data or criteria comparisons. The extended rankings of the AWA levels does reward participation, but I don't see the downside to encouraging more participation in this sport.

Well, you can actually "game" either system. With the USAT system, you can add a 4th USAT race of any distance to jack up your rating. I say that as someone who only did three triathlons last year.

Not really. What makes USAT tougher is that it it averages your top 3 scores and you are only ranked if you have 3. AWA just adds points together from your top three regardless of how many races you do. You have several people that only do 1 or 2 WTC races that are "ranked" lower than people much slower than them because of this. You can't really "game" your way into getting a USAT score of 90+. Three times.

You can look at USAT rankings and get a good idea of who you can beat and who you can't. That is not true AT ALL for the AWA ranking system.

I am personally embarrassed to be a part of this club -- it reveals how much money I've let WTC leech out of me in the past year.

Do USAT rankings give more points for longer distances?

I got silver, just missed gold.
I know you wanted me to share that with you.
Have a nice day!

The AWA could be much more meaningful if they used the point system as one way to qualify for a Kona slot!

Don't you worry. I think that is exactly where this thing is headed...

Don't you worry. I think that is exactly where this thing is headed...

I only have a BJs and it really blows

the equation is slightly more complicated than that. It is more about how many people racing were ranked the previous year, and how race times compare to a calculated "average time". You end up getting more points at a big long course race because there are more previously ranked racers, many of who drag down the "average time".