At my age I am the pack.
1 Like
Iâd go with 30%s (or thirds of the finishers)
Top 30% fop
Mid 30% mop
Bot 30% bop
Remaining ~10% DNFs
Right, from my perspective the 65+ crew are BOP but from their perspective they are FOP.
For me when it comes to defining our position in the pack, unless you actually start in an age group wave, you have to define the pack as whatâs in front of you.
If youâre passing virtually everyone in front of you (or thereâs no one in front of you or almost no one passing you) then youâre front pack.
If youâre holding your own against most people behind you, but still get passed pretty frequently, youâre middle pack.
If you get passed by most people, and rarely pass others youâre back of pack.
2 Likes
lightheir
I think it varies a little as well from local vs big wtc races. Iâd say top 10 percent for local races and top 15 percent for wtc events.
Or, it could just be that there are some people who are MoP at big wtc races who are FoP at local races. 
I think it is an individual definition - for most our definition depends on where we want to find ourselves. If we think we are a MOP athlete then I guess people tend to make the FOP band narrower, if they are on the cusp of FOP and want to think of themselves as such, then they widen the band a bit - each to their own.
To me it is more about the goal of the race than the % split.
FOP: Racing for a position / WC spot, completion time is less important than position and during the race you are not really caring about your total time, but really care about splits to your competitors.
MOP: Cares about overall time, this group is trying to set a PB, trying to break a certain time (5 hours, 4:30, a 2:30 hour bike split etc.) but not really competing with anyone but themselves.
BOP: Does not care about time - it is all about finishing (ok finishing within the cutoff).
You can be a FOP athlete at a local race, but a MOP athlete at an IM race - to me it is more how you are approaching the race than your percentile, although they tend to be related.
5 Likes
The average for the WHOLE FIELD is 5:51 in a 70.3.
So, while you might argue that 5:51 <> 6, one point I was making is itâs not just the 65-69ag. Itâs ALL AGE GROUPS.
MOP is âMIDDLE of packâ⌠I guess you could redefine âmiddleâ and say something like FOP is 1%, MOP is 2%-20% and BOP is everyone else. But then, youâd be redefining âmiddleâ.
Yup, thatâs the exact point I was trying to make.
1 Like
If you want to take the statistical route, you could say the back of the pack is everything minus 1-2 standard deviations and beyond from the mean, and the front of pack is everything plus 1-2 standard deviations and beyond from the mean.
The middle would be everyone else.
Then itâs really just a question of debating if you go 1 or 2 std dev to set your dividing line.
2 Likes
That makes the lines too stringent or too easy. 1 SD is like 68%, and 2SD is like top 95%. Top 95% for me is like FFOP for all but triathlons aimed mainly at beginners. Top 95% at a WTC event and youâre probably going to Kona soon!
FOP - everyone is chasing you
BOP - you are chasing every-one
MOP - the rest.
Any idea if finishing times are normally distributed? Iâd be interested in knowing something about the higher moments. Probably about 30 years ago I reviewed a paper for the Journal of Sports Economics (a peer reviewed academic journal) that analyzed triathlon race data but I donât remember if it actually got published or not.
Doubt it. I havenât seen it for triathlons, but in marathons thereâs a clustering effect near round numbers. Iâd imagine itâs similar here and even bigger at the very back due to the less lenient cut-off time.
2 Likes
From coachcox for IM Frankfurt 2019, as an example:
2 Likes
In case someone is wondering why 2019 Frankfurt was slow, that was the year it was extremely hot.