I was more so saying if you’re that level of athlete 99% of local tri’s are going to be solo efforts. Strong swimmers that you’ll pass in the first half of the bike then by yourself. I’m just not sure how that helps your development better than being solo in the pro field?
Racing like that does very little to develop the ability to race in the pro field though as I’m sure you know. It’s totally different dynamics. Most BOP guys I know don’t want to spend $500 to solo off the front all day, or worse, get beat by a handful of AGers.
There were pros swimming 30+ mins and 1:25 half runs. Those athletes are no where close to being immune from developing at local events.
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As this issue really only impacts single loop courses, it would seem preferable to adjust/fix the slot in rule as that impacts all races and all pro athletes. The main issue a BOP pro seems to cause on a single loop course for the women is creating a longer train making it harder to move around them. Adjust the slot in rule that allows a person to pass and take over the position of the passed athlete without forcing them to pass the entire train would solve a lot of the problems. Put the onus on the passed person to move back not the passer to move all the way through the train.
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So I think there is a difference in the BOP pro who’s competitive and the BOP pro who I’m suggested should pick smarter races to race as a “pro”. I just skimmed some of the splits,when your swimmming 30+ mins and running 1:25+ for a half, your not too good to hone your racing skills, even if it’s a “solo” local environment (that ability isn’t world class, so your not going to be so far ahead that your bored, etc…we aren’t talking Frodo showing up to a local event and deciding to race it; we are talking fringe pro/top AG level). You’ve got weaknesses that are irrelevant to the race dynamics your in. Cus guess what, that same guy is racing “solo” in the pro ranks after 5 mins in a pro race.
So yes I’m 100% agree with you that the pro race dynamics and hte local off the front from 1st stroke are different. But I’m talking about the actual truly “BOP” pros that imo again are racing events that they frankly aren’t ready for.
Again the ITU does it correctly, but that’s their main jam. C level pros dont get to sign up and race just because they are a pro card carrying member. You have to produce to get into better quality races. So imo that’s essentially what I’m suggesting. Since IM won’t do it for the pros, you have to take some individual accountability for your race selection.
And for the life of me, if your a BOP pro or pro at any level, if your within the sport please follow Ben’s example and have a way the general public can know you. I cringe every time I see a pro hide behind some username on an site like ST (hell half the time you don’t even know they are a pro)…it’s like you have an audience right here who can follow/support you and your not even letting us get to know the real person. Ok sorry, rant over.
Are you saying the women are entitled to a clear road with no one in front of them but a competitor?
If so, start the women first. But then you’ll have a massive pack of men blazing over them all.
Race the pro women on their own race. But you’ll still have some fast age grouper issues.
Race all women on their own day. But then you’ll have economy of scale issues or have to charge triple the price on entry fees for women to cover road closures for such a small group?
So you have a pro man that gets caught by fast women. You tell him he needs to back up and stop trying so hard.
Ok, how about the fast age grouper who is gunning for the overall win and a pro slot and find’s himself passing pro women? Those women need to just back up and give him priority? Or is it always the women who get the priority regardless of circumstances?
For every “this is their job” I can point to a financial or emotional hardship on the other side. We can play who has it worst hypotheticals all day.
The reality is they are both on course. In this particular case the women caught the men and they could have and should have kept going. If the dynamics of catching that male pack motivated those males to race harder and now the women are racing in/with a draft zone legal bike pack, who cares what’s between their legs? Is it any different than if those women caught some other women and worked as a group? Is it a different than if some age grouper caught a back of pack pro male and then they worked as a group?
I’m an age grouper and passed a pro woman in the bike before. Was I wrong? She followed me for a bit and eventually passed me in the run. Am I supposed to see her and drop back? Did I complain about her interfering in my race?
As pointed out nearly all of these bike courses are looped. At some point everyone is dealing with it.
- If you have an MPro caught by a WPro either they’ll pass or they won’t. If they pass, just drop back 30m. This is not ‘backing up’ and if you’ve been chicked (+5 mins) then clearly the time doesn’t matter to the MPro.
- If a fast amateur catches a WPro then they’ll blow past. Not an issue. They’ve caught more than 5 mins already. The WPro needs to drop back out of the draft zone (obv). Neither athlete has “priority”.
- Well done: you were not ‘wrong’ and of course you are/were not supposed to see her and drop back. The WPro you caught and passed gained some advantage from what limited legal draft you left. Not an issue: she did not interfere in your race so nothing to complain about.
HTH
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These are some interesting ideas. One additional one that I was alluding to in the “too fast to be an AG and too slow to be a pro” is a new designation for IM. Kinda like the AWA thing where you have category thats say in the top 0.5% of finishing times. You start them all together (or try to encourage them to the front of the AG start), put thier transition all together, give them a colored bib number.
The only perk I would like to see for this theoretical designated group is allowing them to register later in the game than the average AGer
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Been calling for this. You also dissuade everyone registering for this group by holding the same rules as pros–no wetsuits, no slipstreaming, mass start, bike checks, etc. It won’t work with 600 people.
So you drop back 30m, and another female passes and you drop back 30m and another female passes and you drop back 30m. And that’s not backing up?! By this point another male pro or fast AGer passes. Do you race the male pro but defer to the fast AGer to not interfere in their race?
If a fast fpro catches a fast mpro, she should be able to pass him all the same. If her catching him clicks on a light in his head that says, pull it together have some pride and make the most out of the rest of your race, the elite consensus is that’s just unacceptable. You screwed up and now you have to sit back and race no faster than what’s in front of you?
Let’s just be polite and encourage everyone to race fair and respectfully. But it’s not fair or respectful to tell someone once passed you can’t pass ever again.
The women can also have biased emotion here and push more power than she might otherwise playing cat and mouse as the man tries to stay away.
Whatever the case, what I really object to is the assumption that a back of pack male pro can’t have their own goal of biking a few minutes faster now that they’ve been caught. Is Ironman racing only about the front group?
Can’t the same arguments here apply to front pack age group females catching mid pack age group males? Don’t repass, defer to them, give them extra legal spacing etc etc
But isn’t that the entire issue with the BOP male affecting the FOP female race? Isn’t that the same issue we face literally every race? So I don’t think it would necessarily be bad to setup rules to essentially require that situation for an athlete to “stand down” so to speak…to as you put it “be polite, fair and respectful”. And yes I think you could setup in a way that it deals only with specific situations while not also putting that same rule within m/f AG athletes, etc.
So if your asking me am I ok if a bop athlete had to be slightly lose (remember his pro standing/position is essentially over at this point beyond personal goals) in order to help the front of females and that then mean it was only for “front pack” athletes…yeah I’d be ok with that. We currently do that with itu and the lap out rule, so if your not good enough guess what your out. So it’s not even to that degree, and again we are talking about athletes who are out of the race by this point but now potentially having an impact on the front of another pro race. Why wouldn’t we want to improve that?
I think the 10 min solution needs more consideration. There were age groupers coming out of T1 when Kalinn was coming into T2 - these don’t appear to be run pacers as one guy clearly has a bib number.
Kalinn was 2:22 from gun to T2, and the max time you have for Swim is 1:10, which means it took over an hour to get everyone in the water. If we’re worried about road closures, maybe the answer is to give the WPro field another 5 mins and bring in a bit more hustle getting everyone in the water?
This course specifically is tough for getting more in the water faster as the swim swim goes through a narrow breakwater about 25 meters out from the start. It could fit more than the 3 they start with since many walk through the breakwater, but it does pose a challenge. They also announced this was the highest attendance at Eagleman so maybe they will add a 4th lane next year if attendance is still up.
I think the tides are turning though. Those “guys” that don’t wanna spend $500 are now starting to get beat more often than not by quite a few AGs. AG racing today, esp now w the limited KQs you’re gonna have to be a pretty darn good triathlete to get an AG KQ. Just my two cents as someone who coaches quite a few “top AG” people.
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I assume attendance was up due to it being a Pro series race. IM needs to take notice that age groupers want to race the races that the big name pros show up to.
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What Im really curious about is do they also see the same young lift in attendance. The largest AGs were the youngest and it wasn’t very close. If so the Pro Series is a huge win for them long term.
If the tide is right you can walk half the swim.
Is there a specific insurance requirement to how many people they send into the water at a time?
It seems logical that they’d the insurance company would base their rate on the swimmer to lifeguard ratio. Less swimmers in the water = less lifeguards, but also directly means longer road closures. I’d hope a corp like IM optimized the numbers based on the cost of road closure v number of swim guards.
It is crazy tho to think that 5-10 minutes extra is such a burden that they can’t open the gaps. I wonder how much of it has to do with the “TV Product”.
What’s changing is the tech, nutrition, coaching, race craft, etc that was once reserved for the pros is now accessible and encouraged for Top AGers. Pro status historically meant (I assume based on the dictionary) men/women who fully dedicate their lives and livelihoods to performance in the sport. Age grouper/amateur was meant to mean a weekend warrior type who gains nothing financially from triathlon and thus, invests far less time/$/effort in performance. Now there is a massive grey area. Pros with sub optimal equipment, no coaching, no sponsors lining up with Lionel sanders. And a AGer with a 14k TT setup, sponsored aero kit, with an elite coaching relationship training 20+ hours a week lining up next to Betsy the 60 year old math teacher.
Both scenarios seem kinda wrong, but to the general public the latter is clearly more “pro.” Yet the formal labels still carry those historical connotations. We want every pro to be an insane athlete like LCB and every AGer to be an average Joe
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at the end of the day who cares what the others think just do what works best for you and you cant win anyway.