An Alternative Way Forward for Kona Slots

[Lurker4]

@devashish_paul

Have a “floor” to the women’s field size calculated and published in advance. If this number is not being reached by June 1, add women for tri slots in June/July/Aug Ironmans and give the slots out in the order of women placement in the performance list after all the “normal slots” go.

So what makes women more important than under 30 males? Societal goals? Younger men don’t need something to provide focus on their lives? It would appear that for whatever reason, men are drawn to long distance triathlon. To the degree that it conveys benefits to men, wouldn’t it ideal for society if we got more men involved? It might be old fashioned, but I’m of the opinion that if we have more men pursuing goals they require them to do hard things, everyone benefits.

Surely the same goes for women too, but that’s up to them to choose those hard things. Not us to exclude the men lined up and up more women.

What if this obsessive focus with attracting more and more women to long distance triathlon was akin to trying to convince plumbers they really ought to take up an interest in being hair dressers? Sure we can move the needle a bit by reducing slots for women at cosmetology school in favor of more men, but aren’t we ultimately disadvantaging those who have the natural greater interest it?

Is there ever a realization that “maybe she’s just not that into you”?

Or is the goal really that we don’t care if women’s numbers grow in long distance triathlon, we just want equal numbers of them at the championship regardless of how comparatively “easy” (never is) it is to qualify?

[rrheisler]

Right now there is the catchall “Open Division,” which comprises anybody who doesn’t select M/F age group categorization during the registration process. It includes trans women who do not currently meet the eligibility criteria to compete in the women’s category; non-binary athletes; people who just opt into that category.

Non-binary can be a competitive category in IM competition (remember, rulebook is separate from WT’s). So it could be there.

The problem with not offering roll down is that it would make the awards breakfast a scarce ceremony…and that roll down is part of the classic “magic” of IM post-race.

[Billabong]

No matter the solutinon someone will be upset.

There is an episode of The Big Bang Theory where they are tasked with developing a plan to get more women in to The Sciences. Sheldon’s answer was you cant get them interested in the Sciences in College you do it in Middle School. The same applies here, you don’t get more women into triathlon by saying hey do the hardest one day event in the world, one where even the best athletes have failed to finish. You grow the sport at the Grassroots level not at the top of the sport.

[Bryancd]

@Billabong

You grow the sport at the Grassroots level not at the top of the sport.

Also something I have been saying over and over and over…

[timbasile]

@timbasile

I don’t have any data to support this, but you could also argue part of the issue is that the age groups who have shown up most prominently in the performance pool (namely Men 50-65) are also those with the time and disposable income to take advantage of the opportunity.

Coming back to this, I figured I’d take a look to see if this hypothesis is true. And it is - The changes in demand that we’re seeing also impact age, not just gender. I believe that the IM system does have a bias with respect to older men’s categories due to the Kona course, Legacy and XC slots, but I hope to show below that most of the issue for M50+ actually has to do with who is showing up.

I took a look at IMCA, and highlighted 4 age groups: M30, F30, M55 and F55, over the last 4 years. Its one location and one set of age groups, but I think it shows well enough what’s going on.

Here are the top 10 for F30 and F55 for the years 2022-2025, by finish time and position. The impact of Women’s only Kona slots has been well attested. Both of these age groups had their fastest year in 2024, though the front few positions in both women’s age groups also did well this year.

Now for the men. Here’s M30-34. Other than the top 2 positions, when we compare this year’s results we see that Kona slots do in fact impact the speed at the top of the age group - though in this case M30’s fastest year was actually in 2023 (apart from the winner this year).

For M55, the story is the opposite - this is the fastest year, though the age group winner was slower than vs 2023. Here we have 11 athletes go sub 10! Compare vs other years and you find only 2 in 2024, 5 in 2025, and non in 2022.

So what does this all mean? Well, it shows that out of these 4 age groups, M55 was the one that showed up in absolute strength. Does this mean that they should be getting 8/55 while M30 only gets 3/55 in the performance pool? Not yet…

I took a look at how these performances play out vs the 2022-2025 course record in that particular age group. Remember that the fastest M30 was this year, while the fastest M55 was 2023. For note, the fastest F30 was 2024, while the fastest F55 was also this year. Because the course records are scattered across multiple years, it does make comparison easier.

Here are the two men’s fields for this year, compared to the 2022-2025 course record:

Notably, you can se a very clear kink in the M30 performance. They’re fast up to position 3, and then fall off. Meanwhile, M55 is much deeper in terms of performance, and the 10th ranked M55 actually is faster vs the course record than the 4th place M30. As it happens, 3 of the top 55 slots in the performance pool go to this age group. The 3 guys who did well got rewarded, while 4th and beyond didn’t have the same kind of performance. Meanwhile, M55 just killed it.

So, what does this all mean? At least in these races - it shows that the depth of field in M55 was considerably deeper than the other 3 age groups that I looked at. Correspondingly, they were the AG that secured most of the slots. While I still do think that the system does favour M50+, at least here, it does show that those who got Kona slots performed best on the day.

Oh, and here’s the chart with the women added back in. Notably there’s a big gap between 2nd and 3rd in F55 (and they got 2/55 slots in the performance pool, so fair). The athlete who’s really got a case here is actually 2nd in F30 (and maybe 3rd?), who also does well proportionally vs the age group record, but is ranked 122.

[synthesis]

Is the awards ceremony a money maker? People love awaiting the letter qualification from BAA

[spudone]

@synthesis

Is the awards ceremony a money maker? People love awaiting the letter qualification from BAA

Money for the towns who partner with ironman and want people to stay an extra day.

[devashish_paul]

You make some super important points about young men and you and I were young men at some point in life. Kind of related to your points but their is a magical window when we have our max physical performance capability, somewhere between 19 and 35 for most things physical. It is also the time when young men are largely limited elsewhere in society. The access to the top jobs don’t typically come till late 30s and 40s while experience is accrued in professional pursuits. Sporting opportunities for young men is actually a really good thing, while they do their time elswhere (I remember being a young 25 years old Captain, in the RCAF and I could clean the clock of every Colonel and General in running and triathlon and that was kind of fun…then we went back to work and they put me in my place on the the flight line in the pecking order totem pole).

So yes, I do think that slots going to 45-59 year olds at the expense of 18-39’s is a bad thing (which is what is really happening, women are not losing slots proportionally, they are losing slots relative to 2025 and 2023).

My gut feeling is outside the top 20 percent at Kona the fall off in performance in 18-34 is a lot. The pointy end people have pro like speed, but the “pack fodder guys at Kona” are a lot slower. Whereas in 45-59 my gut feel is the pack fodder 21-100 percent at the back of the field are closer to the 1-20 percenters at the front of the field, so all those 21-100 percent guys (I have always been that guy in Kona and 70.3 worlds) benefit more in the older age groups.

[Bryancd]

@synthesis

Is the awards ceremony a money maker?

IM is interested in making the entire expo experience better and this keeps folks around and extra half day. Merch tent is still open and the rolldown ceremony has a lot of buzz around it.

[trailblazery]

Remove Top 3 and slope is the same though for m30 vs m55 imca , so i would not say deeper, there is 3 outliers in m30 (should/could be pros?)

[timbasile]

Removing the whole podiums as outliers is bit much. You could argue that 1st in M30 is an outlier (sets the M30 Course Record over that span, and wins the whole race). The others aren’t significantly outside the norm for what’s been shown for the podium.

Even if you remove that one performance, 4th in M30 is still behind 9th in M55 as a % of the course record for that AG. And given that top 55 in the performance pool showed 3 to M30 and 8 to M55, this still mostly tracks.

(If that guy’s not there, then the course record only goes up by 1% since it would have been set in 2023)

[synthesis]

Did that work for st george, Cd’A, Arizona, etc, etc…

[Bryancd]

@synthesis

Arizona

That wasn’t the city of Tempe, they wanted the race to continue. It was the Reservation who said no more, or better said asked for too much $$$ and IM couldn’t do it.

[KingTitus]

Looking through all this awesome data as the guy that finished 7th in the M30-34 field at IM CA…I guess I just need to keep building my run to get that KQ or go pick a course like Lake Placid where I can exploit my bike and really gain time on the field that gets the age graded advantage on me.

[Bryancd]

Even in the previous system you needed to be top 3 to be sure to get a slot in that AG. Great job regardless!

[Lurker4]

Although at that age, you’d probably give him about 50% chance of a roll down. Now with the slots mostly accumulated in the older groups, I suspect they don’t roll much either.

[KingTitus]

Oh without a doubt. Just great to see the data laid out like it is above. Can’t lose 20-30 minutes on the marathon to the top guys and expect a Kona slot. Gives me a lot of motivation and direction to things I need to workout on going into my next IM. As this was my first, I went in with a goal of sub 9 and hoped it’d give me a chance at Kona. I knew Kona was a long shot as it’s a fast course and theoretically would benefit the older age groups a bit more. Got my time goal, but missed on a KQ. Plenty of opportunity to grow as an athlete and will without a doubt make it so much sweeter when I do get a Kona slot one of these days.

[Kipstar]

Fantastic analysis much appreciated.

[deantrives]

why people don’t have your attitude is beyond me. Well done to you

[TheStroBro]

@Bryancd

@synthesis

Is the awards ceremony a money maker?

IM is interested in making the entire expo experience better and this keeps folks around and extra half day. Merch tent is still open and the rolldown ceremony has a lot of buzz around it.

Some awards ceremonies are legit events, the IMAZ one seemed so casual, or at least 2021 was. Come by for Breakfast Burritos and see if you get a roll down slot!