Following on another post regarding declining race participation and elimination of many local races, I looked at the USA Triathlon ranking website to get idea on the trends. It's not pretty.
If you look at race results/participation in the five year period between calendar year 2013 and CY 2018 for age groupers between ages 25-64, total triathlon participation dropped by 58%. More troubling, the drops in race participation are worse among younger age groups, lowest in the older age groups. For example, in the 25-29 age group, race participation declined 76% between CY2013 and CY2018. In the 30-34 AG it dropped 71%. In 35-39, down 65%. In the 60-64 AG, it was a drop of only 4%. It's a very clear trend with younger AGs (newest to the sport?) showing larger declines while the older age groups (longest tenure in the sport?) showing smaller declines as the the age increases.
The declines are not quite as bad for total ranked triathletes but still nasty. Ranked athletes in age groups between 25-44 all declined about 45% between CY2013-2018. 50-54 declined 18%, 55-59 actually increased 4% and the 60-64 AG increased in ranked athletes by 26%. If you've wondered why you can't win races as you get older, there's a clue...those older racers don't quit the sport...they just get older and continue to beat your ass.
This would certainly suggest Triathlon as a casual sport is in trouble. Younger age group athletes aren't joining the sport and are dropping out sooner. Maybe the big races continue to draw and the local sprints and Oly's are suffering the most? Hard to say, but I'm thinking when M-Dot goes public I should probably short the stock.
If you look at race results/participation in the five year period between calendar year 2013 and CY 2018 for age groupers between ages 25-64, total triathlon participation dropped by 58%. More troubling, the drops in race participation are worse among younger age groups, lowest in the older age groups. For example, in the 25-29 age group, race participation declined 76% between CY2013 and CY2018. In the 30-34 AG it dropped 71%. In 35-39, down 65%. In the 60-64 AG, it was a drop of only 4%. It's a very clear trend with younger AGs (newest to the sport?) showing larger declines while the older age groups (longest tenure in the sport?) showing smaller declines as the the age increases.
The declines are not quite as bad for total ranked triathletes but still nasty. Ranked athletes in age groups between 25-44 all declined about 45% between CY2013-2018. 50-54 declined 18%, 55-59 actually increased 4% and the 60-64 AG increased in ranked athletes by 26%. If you've wondered why you can't win races as you get older, there's a clue...those older racers don't quit the sport...they just get older and continue to beat your ass.
This would certainly suggest Triathlon as a casual sport is in trouble. Younger age group athletes aren't joining the sport and are dropping out sooner. Maybe the big races continue to draw and the local sprints and Oly's are suffering the most? Hard to say, but I'm thinking when M-Dot goes public I should probably short the stock.