Treat the qualifying process just like the Olympics does with the ‘Olympic Trials’. or how the 2014 USAT Olympic distance AG Championship in Milwaukee was the only way to qualify for the 2015 ITU Worlds in Chicago. A track athlete, for example, knows he must race in the trials, on a certain day, and be in the top #xx to earn his spot to the Olympics, no other way around it. Unless he wins the olympic lottery, or “Timex gives him a spot”.
For Example:
1- Each Region hosts qualifiers North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia Pacific,
2-To qualify for Championship 5-10 entire AGs race a qualifier (M18-24, M30-34, M65-69, F25-29, F55-59) wide range of AG abilities to spread out the field. 5-10 different AGs race another qualifier.
3- Allocate spots, perhaps based on lasts years WC starters: M30-34: 165 spots F55-59: 43 spots etc. (the 165 and 43 slots would be divided somehow between the 4-5 regions)
4- If the venue cannot handle the amount of registrants, place ‘WC Trials’ standards (sub 2:10 olympic, sub 4:30 70.3, or something)
5- The top xx% finishers in the AG qualify. period.
6- You’re truly racing your competition for a spot. No loaded fields at one race, and slower guys qualifying at easier races.
7- Or maybe just much stricter standards to qualify for the qualifier (top 3% in AG at another race) and every AG can race the same world championship qualifier?
8- If you’re worried about the idea of an ‘age group world championship’ the pros race whatever AG they are, in the designated qualifiers (add the number of pro starters last year to the amount of slots), they’ll take the top #xx of spots, and the remainder go to the fastest age groupers. They won’t have to race 5 times a year to get points and will be more competitive at the world championship.
It’s dumb in almost all the ways… Even your analogy doesn’t work. Olympic trials aren’t against the same people you race in the Olympics. Why are you setting up a race that pits the same contestants against each other 2 times in a row?
One venue per age group is financially prohibitive… ugh… I’m not going to waste any more time telling you all the painfully obvious reasons why this is dumb, but I definitely want to point out that nothing about the age group race could reasonably be considered a world championship as long as the pro field contains members of the age groups in question.
So what you are saying is that anyone in a certain AG globally has to travel to one particular race if they have a desire to race Kona? So for example, a Kiwi has to first travel to Texas to qualify so he can then travel to Kona? Yeah ok.
Triathlon is so different than the Olympics. The Beijing olympics cost US$44 billion. London cost $15 billion. The influence and the resources are not at the same level. A huge part of KONA comes out of the age groupers’ own paycheck. If KONA was only 85 pros then it’s much smaller and not sustainable.
Not to mention the fact that the ability to qualify for Kona at any Ironman event is what gives them some of their ‘prestige’, even if 99% of the field have no chance of contesting those positions.
WTC aren’t going to wilfully deconstruct the business model and event structure that they’ve worked hard to promote and that rakes in millions of dollars for them.
Treat the qualifying process just like the Olympics does with the ‘Olympic Trials’. only see this being done with a “one AG Qualifying Event” (to make it possible with the massive amounts of athletes across the board). A track athlete, for example, knows he must race in the trials, on a certain day, and be in the top #xx to earn his spot to the Olympics, (just like the 2014 USAT Olympic distance AG Championship in Milwaukee was the only way to qualify for the 2015 ITU Worlds in Chicago) no other way around it. Unless he wins the olympic lottery, or “Timex gives him a spot”.
For Example:
1-To qualify for Kona the Male 30-34 race Ironman Texas (3000 athletes, all M30-34) (or maybe more realistically each event is for 4-5 AGs M18-24, M30-34, M65-69, F25-29, F55-59)
One of the stupider things spewed on to a screen lately. A scenario like you predict above means that the F55-59 have practically no chance to qualify. For example, the top finisher in F55-59 at IMAz this last weekend finished 646 overall.