Why IM Germany is easiest place to get a Kona Spot

Triathlon Forum
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For some reason on another thread someone was pointing out how the IM qualifying system is “Amerocentric”. Although there is some merit to that claim there is also a lot of bunk. Especially the attitude that the American’s qualifying for Kona are softer than the European’s. Rather than just make claims, I thought I would look at the actual data.

Data is from the 5 major European races and the 5 major American ones for 2006

Race Kona spots(AG) /finishers /% go to Kona

IMLP 72 /2045 /3.52%

IMCAN 72 /2175 /3.31%

IMFL 80 /2109 /3.79%

IMAZ 72 /1726 /4.17%

IMCDA 72 /1940 /3.71%

368 /9995 /3.68%

GER 113 /2080 /5.43%

SWISS 71 /1498 /4.73%

AUSTRIA 45 /2017 /2.23%

LANZ 50 /880 /5.68%

FRANCE 46 /874 /5.26%

325 /7349 /4.42%

Observations

  1. IM is way more popular in America than Europe. All N. American races are sold out for 2007, only 2 European ones are. That alone makes the US races more “competitive”, more competitors by about 33% and it is hard just to get into a race.

  2. In Europe the average participant has a much better chance of qualifying than in America.

  3. Of course someone will argue I have omitted the HIMs. Well there are only 3 that I know that still have spots (BSL, Eagleman, Kona). These spots are really hard to get (except Kona, where if you are a Hawaiin it is not too hard).

  4. The % of athletes qualifying does not necessarily indicate the quality of the athletes, but number do provide a metric about the amount of competition.

Any thoughts? The Euro numbers could be off a little bit. I got them from race websites as best I could, but the sites are a little hard to follow.

2

HalF VM has slots.

How the heck did Germany get so many slots?

3

Hang on dude…before you make the numbers do the talking (and we can make stats say anything), the ratio of racers to participants is much higher in Europe than North America. In Europe in general, people really compete, or they don’t enter races at all. The front end of races in Germany is 5x as deep at North America. So while there are more slots the competition is way more fierce!

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Hang on dude…before you make the numbers do the talking (and we can make stats say anything), the ratio of racers to participants is much higher in Europe than North America. In Europe in general, people really compete, or they don’t enter races at all. The front end of races in Germany is 5x as deep at North America. So while there are more slots the competition is way more fierce!

So you are criticizing me for trying to distort actual numbers. At least I am using actual numbers as opposed to making stuff up:

“ratio of racers to participants”

“front end of races is 5x as deep”

Are you serious? I agree there may be some truth to your statements, but there also may be some truth to bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster and some thread where Murphy’s Law says he is going to learn how to swim.

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I like the part about Loch Ness and ML learning to swim…are they both using the same lake?

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<< but there also may be some truth to bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster and some thread where Murphy’s Law says he is going to learn how to swim. >>

Hey now!! Easy there buddy. You are comparing known fact and utter fantasy. Everybody knows that bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster are real.

Dev’s right - in Germany, there is a 10hr SchnellTvitch (their version of ST, only it’s German, so it’s faster) poser cutoff for all IM participants. So in fact every finisher there went sub-10, and only the 113 really fast ones got to go to Kona.

(there really were a lotta German dudes in Kona)

I am Dieter, and dis iz Schprokets. Now ve danze!!! Vould you like to touch my monkey?

7

Actually, it’s pretty hard to qualify for our “own” slots in North America, as evidenced by the number of slots taken by Europeans at IMFL. In the largest male age groups, 30-34, 35-39, and 40-44, the vast majority of slots were taken by non-US competitors. There must be some reason people are traveling so far, besides the plethora of Waffle Houses in Panama City.

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I like the part about Loch Ness and ML learning to swim…are they both using the same lake?

Uh Oh ! Them sounds like Fightin’ Words.
Mike B- I hope you haven’t gone into ST hibernation yet as you can take this as Winter pool motivation. Damn!

T-Yoda…good seeing you at the race yesterday and awesome race bud ! Lets do Hatties sometime soon ; )

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of course there’s another reason…the airbrush t-shirts.

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“How the heck did Germany get so many slots?”

One word: ROTH

Haim
.

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Aside from the obviously wonderful experience of eating at a Waffle House, the main reason fast people show up for IMFL is to secure a slot for Kona a year in advance. When I was there in 2003 I think that half of the Sunbird was full of Hannes tour athletes from Germany making a trip to try and qualify early (which was the main reason I went there too).

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“So you are criticizing me for trying to distort actual numbers. At least I am using actual numbers as opposed to making stuff up”

Try comparing the last qualifier in each AG as a percentage of the OA winner’s time.

Haim

13

Yup, but the average European is MUCH faster than the average American! The times are much faster in Germany… in the US most people do 13hrs+ while in Germany most go under 11hrs… so to be top in your AG and qualify is much harder in Europe…

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Yup, but the average European is MUCH faster than the **average **American! The times are much faster in Germany… so to be top in your AG and qualify is much harder in Europe…

The average people do not qualify for Kona, only the exceptional. Average time is not an indicator of how deep the front of the race is.

Comparing times is not really valid in a lot of cases. Are all the people in Florida faster than those at Lake Placid? If you just looked at times the people in Florida would appear to be 20 - 30 minutes faster. Look at Hellriegel’s best time in Roth and look at this winning time from Lake Placid. Sure looks like the Roth course is about as fast as Florida (20 - 30 minutes faster than Placid). So explain to me how the fast times European’s do on short course in Germany, Austria and Switzerland have to do with anything.

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If you wanted to make things a little more interesting you could factor in how far the rolldown goes. Assuming an equal distribution of talent at all the races (which Dev is disputing) this would be more accurate.

You would have to count all of the people that had the opportunity to claim a Kona spot and declined in addition to those that actually claimed the spot … not sure if you’ve done that already, but it didn’t appear so.

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Stop now, you are embarrassing yourself. Is that really the best you could do? You’re a good example to offer students of the difference between data and information.

<<<“1. IM is way more popular in America than Europe. All N. American races are sold out for 2007, only 2 European ones are. That alone makes the US races more “competitive”, more competitors by about 33% and it is hard just to get into a race.”>>>

You have a weird concept of what “competitive” means. Most people would not say that opening up lots of races for slower participants constitutes greater competition than fewer races with faster competitors. Participation is not the same thing as competition.

<<<“2. In Europe the average participant has a much better chance of qualifying than in America.”>>>

Utter crap. You’ve based this on the fact that the national championship in Germany (a strong triathlon nation) has 100 spots, while the US has multiple second-tier races with 80 spots each, plus other races that are not even IM distance with another 255 spots, plus more than 200 opportunities to qualify without racing at all. You’re not even attempting to be logical.

<<<“3. Of course someone will argue I have omitted the HIMs.”>>>
Of course. And the lottery. And the ‘military division’. And the CEO division. And the celebrity spots. And generally the fact that you ought take a look at both the denominator and numerator when talking about odds.

<<<“4. The % of athletes qualifying does not necessarily indicate the quality of the athletes, but number do provide a metric about the amount of competition.” >>>

In this case it doesn’t indicate anything except your intellectual dishonesty.

The suggestion that “Germany is easiest place to get a Kona spot” is specious crap. In fact, if US citizens had to rely on IM Germany for a spot, there would be about 800 Americans who would not race Kona. However, virtually every qualifier at IM Germany would have earned a Kona spot if they repeated their performance in one of the US qualifying events.

If you want to compare the qualification standards of the different countries, why don’t you do as I suggested, and look at the event where they all raced head to head? (I know why - because you don’t like what the data shows).

Just for a couple of examples; consider the top and the bottom of the field.
In the top 40, Germany had 11 placings, including 1st and 3rd. Australia had 5, including 2nd and 7th.
The USA had 4.

In the bottom 100, Germany had 3, Australia had 3 and the USA had 80.

You can slice the Kona results any way you like, if you are honest about it you will get the same conclusion. The competition at the front might be international, but at the back, in every age group, it’s overwhelmingly Americans. How did they get to Kona? I’ll give you a hint. They didn’t take an ‘easy’ German spot.

This uncomfortable information isn’t bunk at all, it is just the way WTC would prefer it to be, for better (if you’re a slowish American) or for worse (others).

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Mr/Ms Bone Idol -

Data is data. Interpretation and conclusions are another.

If the data is so misleading, feel free to post your own findings and conclusions. In the classic sense of the phrase “Why IM Germany…”, Tri_yoda is correct, the largest % of partcipants qualify. The numbers do not lie, you are.

However, you certainly have valid statements, but are not providing the information to back them up. Matter of fact, the data you posted above states contrary to your theory and you are now trying to provide data for BOP finishers.

What are you trying to say?

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If you look at where the slots actually go (gender/age) you could potentially have a better chance of qualifying at a race other than IM-Germany.

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Data, data!!!

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http://www.ironman.de/english/hawaii.htm.