With Roth coming up, I’m wondering if the Challenge series of races could grow and expand and be as popular at WTC/Kona/70.3 Worlds if they followed a similar AG qualifying for Championship races (ie Half and Full Distance). Roth seems like the perfect race to make it a “By Qualification Only” race.
Surely this idea has been kicked around before. The main issue would be the multiple “World Championship” title, which I guess WTC has the strangle hold on. Would be difficult to call Roth a world championship race when we already have one in Kona.
It just sort of seems as soon as you make a race more difficult to get into, the more people want to do it?
No WTC does not have a hold on World Championship on anything. It is only the ITU under IOC that has. Once again it is typical that on this side of Atlantic they call everything Worlds…It is not. WTC is not an international governing body of the sport of triathlon. ITU is.
No WTC does not have a hold on World Championship on anything. It is only the ITU under IOC that has. Once again it is typical that on this side of Atlantic they call everything Worlds…It is not. WTC is not an international governing body of the sport of triathlon. ITU is.
The WTC has it in name only. Challenge seems to be quite popular in Europe and I can see the idea taking off. Once they expand a bit more into the US you might very well see competing “championships” for the full distance.
Felix has sated that he does not want to make a Roth a qualification only event … he prefers to keep it open so that anyone that wants can have the opportunity to race there
As someone said, Felix has no interest in making Roth a world championship. Anyone who can get signed up can race.
Do we really need another arbitrary world championship? No.
No, but my point is that I wonder if the series would grow and be even more popular if there were full and half distance qualifying events. If they don’t want to do that (which I don’t think they do), then that is fine. I agree we certainly don’t need two WC races, seems dumb.
As someone said, Felix has no interest in making Roth a world championship. Anyone who can get signed up can race.
Do we really need another arbitrary world championship? No.
No, but my point is that I wonder if the series would grow and be even more popular if there were full and half distance qualifying events. If they don’t want to do that (which I don’t think they do), then that is fine. I agree we certainly don’t need two WC races, seems dumb.
Sure, it might, but then it would be just like the WTC races… and that would ruin everything people like about Challenge.
As someone said, Felix has no interest in making Roth a world championship. Anyone who can get signed up can race.
Do we really need another arbitrary world championship? No.
No, but my point is that I wonder if the series would grow and be even more popular if there were full and half distance qualifying events. If they don’t want to do that (which I don’t think they do), then that is fine. I agree we certainly don’t need two WC races, seems dumb.
Lots of series have “championship” events. WTC’s championship events are in Kona and Tremblant this year. Our local XC ski clubs have season long events and then championships etc etc. I think Challenge could have a series championship at Roth, for say 1500 folks via qual and then leave the rest open to general entry. The general entry sells out instantly, so the championship through qual would give people a way to get in via their local Challenge event, and thereby drive some additional traffic to the local events for the people who decided “later” that they want to do Roth. I think this may also help grow some of the new event. Even if it brings in 50 extra athletes, that’s 50 more than zero extra athletes.
It’s been 21 years since I did Roth, and would like to go back some time, but don’t want to commit a year out to it. Same reason I won’t do Frankfurt or Austria.
No WTC does not have a hold on World Championship on anything. It is only the ITU under IOC that has. Once again it is typical that on this side of Atlantic they call everything Worlds…It is not. WTC is not an international governing body of the sport of triathlon. ITU is.
The WTC has it in name only. Challenge seems to be quite popular in Europe and I can see the idea taking off. Once they expand a bit more into the US you might very well see competing “championships” for the full distance.
I don’t see it. Challenge will always be the cute little brother to Ironman. The large majority of people want to go to Kona vs Roth. The fastest pros are going to race Kona and treat it as the World Championship. I’ve never heard anyone say that some athlete who didn’t compete in Kona is the real world champion.
I don’t see it. Challenge will always be the cute little brother to Ironman. The large majority of people want to go to Kona vs Roth. The fastest pros are going to race Kona and treat it as the World Championship. I’ve never heard anyone say that some athlete who didn’t compete in Kona is the real world champion.
Things may change with Challenge Bahrain. 500k Price purse and I bet they will up the purse for Roth as well in the next years. The start list this year is the best you get outside of Kona - only a hand full of top level guys are missing. And since the Pros need to make money they will for sure migrate to the races which give them the highest cash. Kona is becoming more and more unattractive for AGers and it might not take too long until the Pros don’t give a damn either. Roth has a bigger media attention in Germany than Kona gets.
No WTC does not have a hold on World Championship on anything. It is only the ITU under IOC that has. Once again it is typical that on this side of Atlantic they call everything Worlds…It is not. WTC is not an international governing body of the sport of triathlon. ITU is.
NO ONE has a hold on a World Championship and there is no such thing as a “real” world championship despite any organizational claims to the contrary. All that exists are world championships of various degrees of credibity, and that credibility is earned based on the quality and depth of the competition that actually shows up. When you have the best athletes then you are the recognized world championship. Kona currently meets that test for iron distance races; the ITU doesn’t even contest the distance, and their long course “world championship” isn’t remotely as competitive as Kona. ITU has no say on this. Let Challenge set up their own world championship, raise the prize money and let us see over time which has the more credible competition.
“Kona is becoming more and more unattractive for AGers” Really? I don’t see it that way.
$500K prize purse for Challenge Bahrain? Where does that money come from (certainly not from races with a few hundred entrants) and how long will they be able to keep doing that? I hope they don’t over-extend themselves and go bankrupt.
NO ONE has a hold on a World Championship and there is no such thing as a “real” world championship despite any organizational claims to the contrary. All that exists are world championships of various degrees of credibity, and that credibility is earned based on the quality and depth of the competition that actually shows up. When you have the best athletes then you are the recognized world championship. Kona currently meets that test for iron distance races; the ITU doesn’t even contest the distance, and their long course “world championship” isn’t remotely as competitive as Kona. ITU has no say on this. Let Challenge set up their own world championship, raise the prize money and let us see over time which has the more credible competition.
Challenge is a much much bigger deal in Europe and thats where they make the money. Roth sells out within minutes and therefore much faster than the IM in Frankfurt with 100 Kona slots (which is still open a week after opening). Challenge has a hard life in North America because of the people saying “Well, it’s not a real Ironman”. But that’s not the crowd they want to target anyways.
Kona is now 825$ entry fee. In a couple of years we will be approaching 1000$. Not the best will go but the ones which have too much money on their hands.
Is that why more and more people apply for the lottery every year?
Is that why the legacy program has been greeted with a lot of applause?
Is that why you see a lot of posts on here asking what the rolldown for race X is?
Is that why you see a lot of posts on here asking what the Kona slots AG breakdown or number of Kona slots for race X is?
Is that why folks come on here and ask how come they don’t expand Kona by a few hundred slots?
I don’t see it. Challenge will always be the cute little brother to Ironman. The large majority of people want to go to Kona vs Roth. The fastest pros are going to race Kona and treat it as the World Championship. I’ve never heard anyone say that some athlete who didn’t compete in Kona is the real world champion.
Things may change with Challenge Bahrain. 500k Price purse and I bet they will up the purse for Roth as well in the next years. The start list this year is the best you get outside of Kona - only a hand full of top level guys are missing. And since the Pros need to make money they will for sure migrate to the races which give them the highest cash. Kona is becoming more and more unattractive for AGers and it might not take too long until the Pros don’t give a damn either. Roth has a bigger media attention in Germany than Kona gets.
Then explain to me how come Challenge Copenhagen doesn’t sell out, but when Ironman took it over and it sells out? I did Challenge Copenhagen the year before they sold it to WTC. Race still had slots until the week of the race. WTC takes over the following year, and the slots are all gone.
In Europe, outside of Roth, can you tell me what other Challenge Races sell out? On top of my head, the following WTC races sell out over there … Frankfurt, Sweden, Copenhagen, Austria.
Challenge is a much much bigger deal in Europe and thats where they make the money. Roth sells out within minutes and therefore much faster than the IM in Frankfurt with 100 Kona slots (which is still open a week after opening). Challenge has a hard life in North America because of the people saying “Well, it’s not a real Ironman”. But that’s not the crowd they want to target anyways.
Kona is now 825$ entry fee. In a couple of years we will be approaching 1000$. Not the best will go but the ones which have too much money on their hands.
$500K prize purse for Challenge Bahrain? Where does that money come from (certainly not from races with a few hundred entrants) and how long will they be able to keep doing that? I hope they don’t over-extend themselves and go bankrupt.
Are you clueless? It comes from Bahrain! The prince probably has several cars worth more than that… pocket change.
Sure Challenge can have their own “world’s” just like WTC has “world’s”. I think it’s a great idea and I think they should cockblock WTC as much as possible and have their race at some similarly stunning location. How about Maui? Then get CBS or ABC to produce a motivational TV program about it…
