Well someone has to go last, so only thing that changes is the title of your thread, right?

And racing on a Friday or Saturday(weekend), seems like a no brainer to go with the Saturday if you only have one day. I like how they mixed up the age groups to allow more separation during the races. Besides the time between waves, they have much slower ones wedged inbetween to help with bunching up on the bike. Most faster athletes will blow past folks in those groups and packs will not form. And having all the women go in a row also helps with gender separation. And in general, women do better in the heat than men do, so could be the reasoning of having them go a bit later.

As long as the same AG get to race head to head in the same exact conditions, and all steps have been taken to help insure that they will not be interfered with by other AG's, I think they did a pretty good job in how they set up the start waves..

1) Saturday vs. Friday: All men and Women had to be in town from at least Thursday and leaving no earlier than after the race on Friday. Many women had plane tickets to leave on Saturday and checking out of hotels on Saturday morning. Those all had to changed. Many Airbnb's and VRBO s were past cancellation dates so the women could not arrive a day later and had to pay for an extra night, and had to pay airline change fees. If they held the race on Friday, no men would have had the same issues since their reservations had to cover those dates anyway.

2) you can't think of any way to accomplish those things you want in a start order that does not include just slapping the women in at the end? Not only does it make them all race in the hottest part of a HOT day, including the 70+ age groups, it really does convey the message that they are second class citizens.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

You're doing a lot of complaining there ED, how would you have set up the waves so that no one had to race in the later waves?(and thus being screwed as you pointed out) I gave you my objective synopsis of their strategy and why they might have done what they did, are you just going to just keep complaining, or put forth a more logical alternative?

Well, how about if they're going to consolidate to one day, Friday, the day that won't cost anyone extra money.

Then, if you have to do a 2.5-hour AG wave start, go oldest first, youngest last which provides the greatest safety for the athletes most vulnerable to the heat and who will be out there the longest anyway. It will actually end up with LESS chaotic passing as currently they have 35-39 starting directly behind 70-74, 75-59 and 80+. Then they have 30-34 starting right behind 65-69. Then 25-29 right behind 50-64.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

Such a tough situation for a RD. I can understand why the community and volunteer coordinators pushed for the race to be consolidated to one day, but it sure would have saved a lot of problems to stick with the plan. Just seems to be another Covid related obstacle. I'm racing and it wouldn't have negatively effected me to race on Friday, but my travel plans were pretty easy as I am driving. Hoping most the ladies adapted, moved past it, and are race ready. Can't help but thinking the further the roll down the squeakier the wheel, but maybe that's bias from a way down roll down, ha.

Do we know if the move to condense into one day was a voluntary move by Ironman (to make the finish line more "lively") or was it that they literally couldn't host a two day race (insurance, town pushback, COVID precautions, etc.).

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@floathammerholdon | @partners_in_tri

 I suppose it's because it's the WC, but if a full Ironman can release 2000 swimmers into the water in less than an hour, as they do with chutes, don't know why they need several hours here.

Yes, self seeding does change the conditions under which age groupers in the same category compete

Is there a differential that is paid out for events that occur on week days vs. weekends? I would also imagine that it would cause a greater disruption to the community during the week. I would imagine that it would be easier if it were an off road event such as a trail run, mtb race, etc.
I hear you that it sucks to race in the heat; but this is the reason why I don't race where/when it typically gets hot (that and I don't have the cash...but that is another thing alltogether).
Stephen J

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I believe my local reality has been violated.
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Happiness = Results / (Expectations)^2

If it's anything like Age Group Nationals the transition will close at 6:55 and the last women's wave will get to sit around for three hours before race start (9:51). Not ideal especially on a warm day in the sun!

If they wanted to be fair they would figure out how to have two separate transitions - pros/men and women - and have shuttles that will allow the women to get to the swim start later in the morning and close their transition at 8:45, thus, not have to stand/sit around for three hours. While not as ideal as two separate days of racing this would minimize the impact of starting later.

Hopefully, this is what they plan on doing but since they have not communicated this it is probably unlikely.

Rumor is that the race was consolidated due to the insistence by leaders in the community. Not sure if we will ever know the true story.

Do they have to be done with transition setup at the same time as everyone else? Typically that'd be the case, but if not, I'd personally much rather race at 9 than 7.

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Dimond Bikes Superfan

Officially transition closes for all athletes at the same time. Some are speculating this will change due to the massive differences in start times. Stay tuned. I'm in the last wave of men, so I will certainly find out.

My guess is they did it because few enough people were going to make it that they were able to save money by consolidating to one day.

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Ed O'Malley
www.VeloVetta.com
Founder of VeloVetta Cycling Shoes
Instagram • Facebook

I know exactly what you mean.

Take the wetsuit with you out of transition and put it on 20 minutes before swim start. I made that mistake once and never again. My wave started at 10:30. It was HOT.

So you are worried about chaotic passing, being the WC champs, I would worry more about big packs forming. Yes that's right, when you get 100 person pelotons there isn't much passing going on, so which is it for this WC race?

As for Friday vs Saturday, probably 1000's of locals that have to drive those roads to work, on the busiest day of the week, will appreciate the Saturday start. Have to imagine the city officials also had a big say(if not the final one) in which day would suit them best. Not always about the athletes and their needs ED, we need to keep these venues happy too, so that we get to continue to have these races year after year. And yes, I know they had a Friday all slotted in months ago, but once it became apparent it would be just one day, there was surely a lot of local pressure to have it be the weekend, rather than the busiest weekday...

Thanks for your support on this, Ed. As someone in the very last wave, who had to rebook all travel, I am more than a little angry with Ironman at the moment. Like you said, they have done little to show they care about the women’s race.
I find it interesting how many/most of the comments about “well someone has to go last” and “it is what it is” are all coming from men. You start the race at virtually 10am and let me know how you feel about it. I was in the last wave at Age Group Nationals a few years ago and while it sucked waiting around to start, the worst was feeling like you were inconveniencing the volunteers who were hot and tired of being out there and drinking warm Gatorade.

There is a solution for that. ;) Take it off again.

Don't you think it is a bit unfair to go straight to "are all coming from men"? The thread was literally started by a male.

This sucks and I see why you are angry. I would be too. I would like them to explain their thought process. They know they are in hot water after moving the women's race (even if it was not their call) and now they risk drawing the ire of all females with the later start? My hunch is that they believe this is the best way to mimic a 2 day event where it is mostly women racing with women on the course (see the 13 min gap between the last male swim start and the first female wave). I also think they are erroneously thinking that that is a better trade-off than the alternatives, hence the thread.

The "Racing on Friday" idea would imply that Ironman had sway here. If they did, the probably would have stuck with the original plan imo. Weekday racing doesn't make sense for a host community for so many reasons.

Having AG start together is meaningless IMHO. I think the self-seeding based on expected finish time for the swim is much better and you don't have to put 5 minutes between groups, people just stream out.
I found that to be far better than AG seeding or mass-start.

For normal events, I agree. Here, they are trying to create 30 individual races. The difficulty comes in the fact that even at WCs, the variability in swimming performance is likely to be huge within an AG.

Agreed... thanks for being thoughtful and supportive, Ed.

I just went through 4 years of racing in W45-49 AG and we have been the last wave for at WC 70.3 every single time... It's agreed someone has to go last but IM can and should do a much better job of mixing up wave orders year over year... I understand that they have a system to manage athlete density through T1 but, for example, they could easily swap W40-44 (which go first) with W45-49. Being shuffled out of transition HOURS before the race start is very challenging, especially when the weather is either hot or cold.

Ironman have definitely screwed the AG women's field a LOT with the last minute changes. I understand that the city council forced them to consolidate so even though Ironman couldn't do much about it, they could do a much better job around communicating the changes, offering athletes options... and frankly just saying that "we're sorry..."

I don't think it's a lot of complaining. Fairness is discretionary and worth discussing. Ethical discussions are not complaining or a waste of time - I'm glad you've weighed in, for example, that's not a waste of anyone's time. It sounds like you have an issue with Ed being concerned with fairness towards women. Do you think that gender equity means toughening up and women having more equity means dealing with tougher race day circumstances? That's how your posts read, so feel free to clarify.

You ask what other solution is there: we've seen that solution many times this past year and it's a self-seeded swim start based on projected time. From what I've seen, that gets people into the water quickly and when we're talking about 100+ degree temps, I think that should be a priority. I also propose mix-gender swim waves with the stipulation that there be twice as many race officials on the bike courses specifically looking for drafting but also aggression from male athletes towards female athletes - it's a thing we've all seen. For me, that's a more fair solution. Standing around for 3 hours in the blazing sun to start a race that finishes 3 hours later than everyone else does not have the smell of fairness.

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wovebike.com | Wove on instagram

Not sure what the solution is for this. But as someone who has been the last wave to go off in the F45-49 twice in the 70.3 WCs, it does stink having to go off later in the morning. And after the men this year, that makes it so much later and so much warmer to race. It's really too bad they had to combine the races.

If I was the RD for this, I might turn it into a rolling start and get folks into the water as quickly as possible. Either way, someone is not going to be happy. But as a female who as raced a couple of the 70.3 World Champ races, it is not ideal to go off so late. In Chatt the water current due to the Electric plant got stronger as the morning went along. By the time my AG went off (we were last) the current was pretty interesting. At least in Utah, you won't have to worry about that! But the heat sounds like an issue.

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Death is easy....peaceful. Life is harder.

The projected temp at the last swim wave is mid 70s. Not sure I follow the blazing sun logic. Sure the waiting sucks if they are required to show up before the pro men start like everyone else, but by no means is it going to be blazing at that time of the morning. Now later that afternoon is a different story.

With that said, the whole situation stinks. I was hoping for a 2 day event and be able to take the family out on the course to cheer all the ladies on Friday.

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Cheers, Ray