I’m old enough to remember my Mom doing the race and Transition was over in Keauhou. Not sure returning to “The Pit” would provide more space but maybe it could help space out the bikes leaving T1 better.
Here’s my prediction:
- 1 day Kona 2026 and forward
- 2026 70.3 worlds goes to Nice
Closer then France though.
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Never mind 2026, what about 2028?
That’s a 2027 problem…
You’d have to extend the gap between the pro waves to more than 5 minutes, otherwise LCB is catching Sanders et al before they even get to the bike.
Glad I could influence you Steve 
guess we will have to wait and see.
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We have another two threads discussing the future of Kona, that theory has been the leader in the clubhouse for a while and one I suggested after hearing you guys discuss it. I do think that makes the most sense. Make Kona Hard to Qualify for Again.
Agree 5 minutes is not enough, 10 enough, but still potentially Long gets out with LCB.
Unlike regular season races there will (surely) be no male Pros who are both weak on the swim AND weak on the bike. So any 55+ male swimmer will power past any female fish ahead of him, and away, with no effect on the WPro race.
It’s likely that on the way home on the QK we might see a suffering MPro being caught by the WPro leaders (assume Knibb and LCB) but the women will ride on by (and the MPro can/should drop back 50m as he makes his way home).
Effect on the race: nil, apart from optics on the broadcast (and commentators taking time to realise )
(I looked at 2022 and if the races had been run on the same day, Ryf would not have caught the slowest SB MPro on the road.
I’ve been saying 1 day kona for while Kyle…
You’d still have to finagle the age groups so that the the top AG men don’t interfere with the back of the women’s race. Even in the 2022 race, there was an age grouper who was 18 mins faster than Sodaro. He likely wouldn’t have impacted the front of the race, but considering the Top 10 is 9hrs, this guy is still running (and maybe biking) through positions 11+
Interestingly enough Matthew Marquardt was 3rd on the day - before he turned pro, and would have also chewed through the back half of the women’s field.
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As David mentioned they did use the parking lot in 2011 when the pier was damaged from the tsunami. Much smaller field back in 2011 than the current 5,000 people they want to run at the IMWC nowadays. That’s also one hell of a distance from swim exit to the parking lot.
Regardless, using the parking lot presents a problem. I’ve stayed at the hotel 3x. The parking lot was always very full. I’m assuming it’s jammed full during race week. You say folks can go to offsite parking… where? There’s nowhere to park around there. Also, the hotel sits at the bottom of the Palani hill. Are you going to make the hotel guests park their cars up Palani somewhere?
That’s one possible location. There are other options. You guys are making it sound like for $30 million over 10 years it’s just too hard to come up with a practical solution. If I said you have 30 million on the line to come up with a solution would you really just say, “we can’t make them run a kilometer” or "we can’t figure out hotel parking”, or we can have multiple transition zones, etc?
Come on… There’s 30 million reasons to find solutions that aren’t impossible. Anything is possible is their mantra. They literally went on this boondoggle Nice experiment to make that extra money. Cities have exercised imminent domain for less than we’re talking.
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After the experiment with doubling the number of tourists one year, Ironman is lucky the government didn’t kick them off the island permanently. They won’t risk that again.
Hawaii likes tourism money but doesn’t love tourists.
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Every option also has an community impact, and isn’t that the whole reason we are here to start with? There basically is no “practical solution” likely within this relationship, yes? (nvm see @spudone above)
Kona is a limited resource race location, full stop. That’s the whole reason why you can’t just throw a bunch of money at it and solve the problem. In George Costanza terms, IM has “no hand” likely right now when dealing with Kona.
There basically aren’t. As Brooks said it’s a limited resource location. There’s nowhere to feasibly locate a 4,000-5,000 bike transition area near the swim exit.
The only other option I’ve ever thought of, and I’m sure there’s a reason it’s not been implemented beyond it being where the finish line is, is there’s a very wide sidewalk that runs along Ali’i Drive that could hold a bunch of bikes. See pic outlined in green. But that’s where the finish area is.
I wonder what you guys would say if someone proposed shutting down the road to all traffic for the first time.
You know they literally shut down the roads. And you act like there’s just no space and can’t find space and can’t make people upset.
Care to share what those options are with specific locations?
Look for black places on the map with shiny colored rectangles.
Got it. So you are just shooting from the hip and expect everyone else on here to do research without you doing any on your own.