Hi Dan- I wanted to post here an article I wrote for witsup about the formation of the #50womentokona movement. It was published on March 26th, just before we launched TriEqual. I talked to many people before writing and I feel confident about its accuracy: http://www.witsup.com/...omentokona%e2%80%ac/

If you want to inject TriEqual into that timeline, we started to get organized in late February, a little before the push on International Women's Day.

Obviously, the topics on TriEqual's agenda are not new. For whatever reason, some momentum has been created as of late, and we organised and are trying to find ways to make a tangible difference. We have been open about our goals, have continued to add new board members and have a long list of volunteers who want to help our cause.

I agree that we have a huge hurdle with regards to Ironman's ownership structure which is why I feel its important to create networks, listen to the views of others and find the best path forward. I do look forward to chatting with you more about this.

As for the question at hand, I do not think there is a strong link between TriEqual and the Boulder meeting besides the desire for similar changes for the female pros. Similar agenda, different people.

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2x Ironman Champion. PhD. Coach. Writer. Advocate for Women in Sport. Mom to the best girl ever. Sponsored by: http://www.zootsports.com http://www.rudyprojectusa.com http://www.rotorbike.com http://www.drinkrumble.com http://www.fortstreetcycle.ca

Hi Gary- You ask a good question, and one that I know many are interested in. TriEqual is hoping for more media opportunities to be clear about our goals and our intentions moving forward. Of course, we believe that equality is of prime importance, but taking the slots from the pro men is an issue we would need to discuss with them (and obviously the WTC). I personally, can't stand up and say "Pro men, we want to take your slots". I think good lines of communication can help us find the best answer and that those lines are being created by TriEqual and other groups (with the help of the media).

I know that's not a juicy answer, but its where we are at I think. Thanks.

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2x Ironman Champion. PhD. Coach. Writer. Advocate for Women in Sport. Mom to the best girl ever. Sponsored by: http://www.zootsports.com http://www.rudyprojectusa.com http://www.rotorbike.com http://www.drinkrumble.com http://www.fortstreetcycle.ca

i slept (or failed to sleep) on it, got up this morning, and had already commenced writing something that expresses regret for the line i drew between the boulder meeting and TriEqual that ran right through the month of december and the letters to the justice dept. i find no evidence that this direct line exists. yes, a nexus of associations exists today and, yes, i do believe TriEqual has both prospered, and suffered, from the groundswell of support (the vocal support has been helpful, the mood of the support has not).

but that's beside the point. i can't find any good evidence to refute your historic recounting, and i'm not motivated to try to find evidence. i would rather just bend over, take my swat, confess my wrong impression, correct the effect of my wrong impression.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Actually, ignoring the law was hurting people. It was hurting the people who wanted a shot at Kona but were not willing to throw money away on a 200:1 shot at it. If the lottery had been legal, these people would have participated. Their odds may have fallen to 1000:1 or worse, but they would not have been forced to throw money away in order to participate in the slim chance at winning.

The only people punished by the lottery abiding the law are those who were willing to throw money away and now have to dilute their lottery chances with those who were not.

Hi Dan- Thank you for your openness and your willingness to get to the bottom of these issues. I took a swat myself over a misunderstanding regarding the Boulder meeting that I had to apologize for a couple months back. You have been nothing but reasonable throughout our conversations. I look forward to chatting more moving forward.

Best,
Sara

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2x Ironman Champion. PhD. Coach. Writer. Advocate for Women in Sport. Mom to the best girl ever. Sponsored by: http://www.zootsports.com http://www.rudyprojectusa.com http://www.rotorbike.com http://www.drinkrumble.com http://www.fortstreetcycle.ca

I think that is a reasonable argument, however, I would guess (based on gut reaction only) that the number of people who weren't willing to enter the pay "lottery" is relatively small. Moreover, I would also suggest that the number of those who felt "aggrieved" by the situation is even smaller.

However, as noted, I think you raise a valid point.

Regardless, it seems pretty clear that this issue was raised not out of a sense of outrage, but solely as a way to stick it to WTC and ego. (Not related to TriEqual...I am speaking primarily of Dark Mark and TRS).

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Chicago Cubs - 2016 WORLD SERIES Champions!!!!

"If ever the time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." - Samuel Adams

You are probably right. But, the bitter motives of DarkMark and rheisler do not change the fact that WTC was illegally benefiting by the order of $1m per year and thus should not be tolerated.

fwiw, I think the Kona lottery should be legal. They have an asset and have chosen to monetize it via a game of chance rather than auction or direct sale. I have a lot of faults with how WTC runs its business, but I never faulted them for the Kona Lottery. However, learning that it is illegal makes me believe that it should be terminated. And, those who are up in arms over this should instead take up their fight with the Gambling laws, which are ridiculous, rather than going after DarkMark and rheisler. Hell, it is legal to buy puts and calls on options that expire in a few days, which means you are either gambling or have inside information. Why is this "investing" legal, but what WTC did to monetize their Kona slots is not?

So, I am certainly not aggrieved by what WTC had been doing. But, I was definitely one of the many who was not just going to toss WTC money for a negligible chance at a Kona slot. And, my guess is there are many like me who would have participated in a free lottery but were not going to throw money away on a paid lottery.

Agreed, except for your point re: gambling laws and DM / TRS / rrheisler. I can have disdain for both.

As Dan noted, the lottery was no se secret and even a US attorney knew of it. There is no evidence that it was designed to fleck people or was created out of dishonesty. It appears to have been an oversight as a result of their relocation.

There were many options available to resolve the situation besides the path chosen, IMO.

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Chicago Cubs - 2016 WORLD SERIES Champions!!!!

"If ever the time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." - Samuel Adams

It's a motivation tool (hence the brass ring reference) but your attitude is one that I disdain that dismisses the slow no chance of ever qualifying people like me. Triathlon is the only sport that gives the weekend warrior a shot (the equivalent would be a lottery that any golfer could enter for a spot in the Master's. You don't think people would golf a little more if they had to play X number of rounds to maintain eligibility?)

It's an easy question. What did TriEqual hope to accomplish by going to the FEDs? help it or hurt it?

The way I read the thread, it had nothing to do with Tri Equal.

You are correct. It has nothing to do with TriEqual. It has to do with a handful of individuals that will do anything to trash WTC OR to gain notoriety by trashing others. It just happens to be some of these individuals are also associated with TriEqual.

When I hear people like Rachel talk about TriEqual, I get it. She pulls me to the cause. She is great.
Others have the exact opposite effect. If TriEqual were smart, they would distance themselves from these people.

You can count one for sure. I've been doing IM's since 2002. I refused to send them an extra $50 to enter the lottery with unknown and long odds.

Though I don't think a completely free lottery will work either. If you charge nothing and open it to everyone you will get thousands of people who have never done a tri and only kind of half ass want to do one who all get together at the office to enter. They may enter but the chances of actually racing would be slim and those who really want to do the race will have even longer odds.

It wouldn't surprise me if you end up getting something like one entry for every 70.3 and two for every 140.6. Anything they can do to try to further corner the market on 1/2's and fulls.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

This is what it sounds like when the nail is hit on the head.

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Gary Mc
Did I mention I did Kona

I like that idea....have no idea on the feasibility / legality, but I like it.

marcag's post above was spot-on, IMO, as well.

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Chicago Cubs - 2016 WORLD SERIES Champions!!!!

"If ever the time should come, when vain and aspiring men shall possess the highest seats in government, our country will stand in need of its experienced patriots to prevent its ruin." - Samuel Adams

there are 2 ways to look at TriEqual's involvement with "lotterygate." first, whether it directly had a hand in it. the story i wrote debunks that idea entirely. second, that it created a mood that helped influence the lotterygate actors. my view was that yes, it did, because the august meeting of athletes, where this issue was raised, contained a number of current TriEqual prime actors, so this movement, born in august, bore the fruit of what happened in december (letters getting penned and sent to justice). this, even tho TriEqual was not formally formed until february.

the problem is that, upon reflection, i can't find any actual evidence supporting my thesis. i didn't only insinuate this thesis in the first post of this thread, i overtly stated it. but i can't back it up with any evidence. further, the person who wrote the letter to justice denies that the women's issue had anything to do with it, and i don't see any reason to doubt him.

so i've apologized to sara gross directly, and i've written a public apology, walking back the nexus between TriEqual and lotterygate, it's in the queue to go on the front page, and you'll see it.

you and i can decide what we think about the lottery program, whether it's good or bad, whether it's good but bad if it's at a cost, whether it was a good or bad thing to have alerted Justice to it, what the true motives were of those who alerted Justice to it, whether motive makes a difference, i just think it's important that, when i run aground, i captain my own ship back off the shoals. as regards any TriEqual involvement, i argued poorly. there isn't any involvement.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

.....one in the same in my view. They are grinding on the same axe

I am the Vice-President of TriEqual and one of the very first people to suggest and form our group. We have never discussed the now illegal Ironman lottery. Ever.

Most of us on TriEqual are some of the top customers of Ironman. We believe we can improve our sport by achieving equality for women professional triathletes and our new Fair Starts Protocol.

I apologize for the delay in responding as I was off the grid in preparation for racing Ironman Texas.

Rumor has it the top pro women at IMTX were overtaken by age group men. Perhaps this would be a good story for the Slowtwitch front page. Our pro women deserve clean races too. The Fair Starts protocol make that possible.

Thank you.

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Blog:
http://www.FeWoman.com/

AG men catching pro women is not news. this has been a problem for probably 30 years. i've been complaining about it for 25 years. i wrote about the obvious, easiest, most workable solution, which was not my idea but someone else's (smarter than any idea i came up with) here, and here, and in many other places. not enough people cared much about this until recently. i'm glad the problem is getting attention. if you come to loggerheads with ironman over start times, you might consider the solution murphy reinshreiber came up with. it's brilliant and solves the problem in my opinion.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

Except that TriEqual did not go to the Feds. Are having trouble keeping up? This is my understanding -

1. Ryan Heisler <sic> and others were trying to get information about the finances of the WTC last fall for some reason*.
2. WTC refused to divulge the information they were looking for.
3. Dark Mark sent a letter to the government detailing why the lottery was illegal under Florida law.
4. DOJ opens an investigation.
5. WTC settles investigation without admitting guilt; but they did pay a criminal penalty and agreed to stop the illegal lottery.
6. Because Ryan and Dark Mark and others in this group also happen to support TriEqual, slowman et. al (me included until I started hashing out the facts), thought that the motivation for sending out that letter was to retaliate against the WTC for not giving pro-women 15 extra slots at Kona.
7. The timeline of the events doesn't fit that analysis, however. There's no evidence that one was connected to the other.

So basically, you're wrong.

*I don't know why they were trying to do this. I suspect it's been said somewhere, but I haven't read enough material to find it or maybe I glossed over it.

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My triathlon training blog

It was the finances of the Ironman Foundation we had questions about, based upon items discovered in their audit sheets and publicly available 990 returns.

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Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

While it may be true that TriEqual never discussed the lottery, people on it's board and associated with TriEqual were behind reporting WTC to the feds which directly resulted in the demise of the current lottery.
To simply say TriEqual didn't do this sounds like the response of every organization who has a member cought with their hand in the cookie jar. " We are not responsible for the actions of our members". It doesn't really pass the sniff test.

What did TriEqual hope to accomplish by trying to hold a meeting at the Ironman Texas host hotel other than embarrassing WTC?

Questions regarding the Fair Starts Protocol: How do you propose addressing races that don't allow for your start gaps due to daylight limitations?
Does the Fair Starts Protocol have the potential to hurt older/slower age group athletes, especially females?
How does the Fair Starts Protocol balance the wants and needs of professional females with those of the field as a whole?
Thanks

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Gary Mc
Did I mention I did Kona

To me this still falls under..."But Why?"

Is the answer..."Just Because"

Or was a specific reason(s) (or was tipped off to potential wrong doings) why you chose to go thru IMF financial records?

To my understanding, it was because the loans from IMF to WTC and the quid pro quo behavior didn't pass a sniff test.

I thought they found that stuff after getting the forms, not before. Unless someone had tipped them off about those loans otherwise I have no idea how they would have known about them.