New Ironman Qualification System

Ironman unveiled a new qualification system for the World Championships last week, and if you have tried to ask anything about a different subject on a triathlon forum in the past week or so I’m guessing your question has gone unanswered, given the gnashing of teeth and wringing of hands that is going on out there about the changes.

But I am here to allay your fears: not much has changed from a broader perspective. Sure, if you’re a dude in the 30-49 year-old age groups, you have seen some slight changes to the qualification numbers, but honestly things haven’t changed that much. If you read to the bottom I’ll give you some thoughts about Ironman’s goal with this change AND what you need to do in order to have your best shot at qualifying in the new paradigm.

But first! A caveat, because these are trying times to say things on the Internet. I am not a statistician, and most of these calculations (and all the ones being banged out by keyboard jockeys across the world) would not stand up to the scrutiny of a professional pollster or statistician. I have done my best to analyze the situation as thoroughly as I can given the time I have available to address what is happening here.

My Method

You can read all about Ironman’s new system here, and I am not going to reprise it in detail: I am assuming that, if you are reading this, you’ve got the broad strokes of it, but basically we qualify under a handicap system that is age-graded. Ironman seems to have used a fairly solid data set to arrive at their age gradings, but, as Kelly O’Mara put it in her excellent newsletter last week, “you can make an algorithm do whatever you want it to do.” Beware when a corporation that has a history of missteps and PR fumbles comes to the table with an algorithm that is ostensibly “fair.”

I looked at Ironman Arizona 2019, since that was the last “normal” year before COVID changed everything, and that edition of the race had 40 slots, which is the number of slots most Ironman races will have going forward. I applied the new age-gradings to the results and looked at what changed from the old system to the new. Also, since both sexes tend to cherrypick data to prove their respective points, I created a “competitiveness” metric for every age group, where I measured the drop off in time from the age group winner to 5th place in the age group. I did this because one of the things that gets leveled at the other sex in this totally unnecessary skirmish of the sexes is the claim that “YOUR field isn’t as competitive as MY field.” I went with the top five because, ostensibly, these are the athletes who will be battling it out for slots. Yes, if we wanted to examine competitiveness across the board we would want to analyze a larger segment of the age group fields, but I think the top five gives us a good glimpse into what we’re dealing with.

Finally, due to time I am only examining one race, with a few details pulled from another race. Why Ironman Arizona? That race has long been a race athletes target for qualification because it is fairly straightfoward and easy to pace due to the mellow nature of the bike and run courses. The swim is straightforward too, it’s an easy travel, and comes at a point in the year when heat stress is low. Other races will have different effects that might spread the race out a bit more. Since I am only considering one event and one data set, however, this is not a watertight analysis—it would NEVER stand up in a rigorous statistical analysis, but, as far I can tell, nor would any of the other analyses barging around the Internet right now.

It’s Not That Different

Despite the gnashing of teeth I reference above, here’s the deal:

Not too much has changed. I also looked at the difference in qualification numbers between Arizona 2024 and the new system, and here is a real doozy:

Despite the fact that there were 60 more slots at Arizona in 2024 than there will be this year, the exact same percentage of athletes would qualify: 65% of slots went to men in 2024, and 35% went to women, broken nicely into, well, 65 and 35 slots, respectively. Isn’t it great when the total number you’re dealing with in a percentage is 100? If we applied the new qualifying standards to the 2024 race, we’d end up with 26 men getting slots and 14 women, which is still 65/35. As O’Mara points out, not too much is going to change with this new system, except for the fact that real-time racing isn’t a thing any more. It really hasn’t been since the beginning of the rolling start system, but now you really have no idea who might be close to you while you’re out there.

Let’s turn, now, to the 2019 and 2024 numbers.

Ironman 2019 By The Numbers

Total Field Size: 2619
Female/Male Breakdown: 982/1637, or 37/63%
Old System Male Qualifiers: 25 (63% of qualifiers, just like the field %)
Old System Female Qualifiers: 14 (37% of qualifiers, ibid)
New System Male Qualifiers: 26 (65% of qualifiers)
New System Female Qualifiers: 14 (35% of qualifiers)
Women’s Competitiveness: 9.75% average drop across all age groups from 1st - 5th place
Men’s Competitiveness: 9.25% average drop across all age groups from 1st-5th place

First of all, at least at this race, we can dispense with the whole “who is more competitive” thing, as both men and women display a very similar drop off from 1st to 5th. Yes, averaging can be misleading (if 75% of elementary students want cake for dessert on average, in every classroom of 20 kids there are five real children who prefer ice cream), but if statistical granularity is the thing you’re after in your endurance hobby, then…I dunno, maybe take a chill pill? I ran this computation mostly because I suspected the two sexes are more similar than different in their competitiveness.

Ironman 2024 By The Numbers

Total Field Size: 1645
Female/Male Breakdown: 389/1256, or 24/76%
Old System Male Qualifiers: 65 (65% of qualifiers)
Old System Female Qualifiers: 35 (35% of qualifiers)
New System Male Qualifiers: 26 (65% of qualifiers)
New System Female Qualifiers: 14 (35% of qualifiers)
Women’s Competitiveness: 10.1% average drop across all age groups from 1st - 5th place
Men’s Competitiveness: 11% average drop across all age groups from 1st-5th place

OK I said I would only do one race but I just ran the 2024 numbers, too. If you’re REALLY looking for something to worry about, I would say that it is the 1000 competitor drop at a formerly popular race in just five years. Even more than that, I would be alarmed at the 60% drop in female participation. Sure, the men go down too, but only by about 25%. Who is leaving? It’s the women in the middle age groups: 35-45, which dropped from 238 in 2019 to 90 in 2024. Ironman, I know you are not listening, but this is NOT the demographic you want to alienate. These are women at the height of their earning power and the population that can be defining the sport for those younger and older than them. I’d want to run a better analysis, but I think I would listen to what Feisty Triathlon and O’Mara have been saying for years: if you do not make a space for the people who participate in your sport, they will go elsewhere. There are plenty of other places for athletes to spend their sweat, so why would you want to spend upwards of $7000 per Ironman to be ignored and, in this particular scenario, gaslit about your athletic abilities and goals?

On the bright side, both the women’s 18-29 age groups increased in number, growing from 45 to 57 or about a 30% increase on the women’s side and from 103 to 247 (58% increase) on the men’s side. These are our future athletes, so this is good, but there is an obvious disparity in men’s versus women’s growth (12 is different than 144 by a factor of, well, 12—percentages can be a bitch).

Floaters and Sinkers

Let’s not use “winners and losers,” here, OK? There is enough competitive figurative language out there already in this particular arena, so let’s dust off the toilet humor and talk about whose prospects improved and whose went down. Again, I would say that the changes are statistically insignificant, but I also understand that if you are one of the people who lost a slot (or, honestly, lost the chance at a slot—NOTHING is guaranteed in sport, folks: “it’s why we play the game.”) then you might be feeling some feelings. I dunno, welcome to the inevitable disappointments of adulthood? Isn’t facing adversity in a relatively safe space one of the reasons we engage in hobbies?

Change in Number of Slots by Age Group and Sex

Numbers here are the change from 2019 qualification system to 2025 qualification system

Women’s Age Groups:

18-24: no change: gotta win your age group
25-29: no change: gotta win your age group
30-34: +2 slots from 1 to 3
35-39: -1 slot from 2 to 1
40-44: +1 slot from 2 to 3
45-49: -1 slot from 2 to 1
50-54: -1 slot from 2 to 1
55-59: no change: gotta win your age group
60-64: no change: gotta win your age group
65-69: no change: gotta win your age group

Net gain/loss = +0 slots

Men’s Age Groups:

18-24: no change: gotta win your age group
25-29: +2 slots from 1 to 3
30-34: +1 slot from 2 to 3
35-39: -2 slots from 3 to 1
40-44: -2 slots from 3 to 1
45-49: -1 slot from 4 to 3
50-54: +4 slots from 4 to 8 (dudes, this is where you focus your ire, if you’ve got it—something is off in Ironman’s weighting)
55:59: -1 slot from 2 to 1
60-64: no change: 2 slots
65-69: no change: gotta win your age group
70-74: no change: gotta win your age group
75-79: no change: gotta win your age group

Net gain/loss = +1 slot

Where is that additional slot coming from? Apparently in 2019 there were only 39 automatic qualifiers, but in our imaginary scenario there are the full 40. So the +1 slot across both genders is administrative, not performance-based.

The big takeaway here is that very little is going to change. Ironman is going to have to look at the weight they are giving to the men’s 50-54 age group because that change is the headscratcher of the bunch, or, as actual statisticians would say, “it’s a real outlier.”

OK, so let’s dig into the why. I’m fairly cynical about Ironman/WTC’s motivations, but it’s important to remember that WTC is a corporation, not a public service. Corporations aim to squash competition in order to maximize profit, so maybe we shouldn’t hope that they’re going to act for the benefit of the public, and if you don’t like that you have a real option: don’t keep giving them your money. Participating in a monopoly and slagging the realities of that economic scenario at the same time is the height of hypocrisy. And we are seeing women voting with their feet and wallets, soooooooo…

But to get on with motivations. If you’ve ever taken a rhetoric class or participated in debate, you’ll know something about the ways one tries to manipulate/coerce/convince/argue when in the arena of ideas. One particular approach is to do a lot of math and then brandish your notes while yelling loudly at your opponent, hoping to cow them with the putative superiority of “rational numbers.” If you’re facing this kind of line of argument, there is a very obvious counter-argument, which is to (correctly) identify this type of rhetoric as specious, or misleadingly compelling. Another term for it, one that maybe I’m coining or appropriating, is “math-washing.” In these sound-bitten days, you can usually count on your audience NOT to look too deeply into your numbers or over there, behind the curtain, where the little con man is furiously operating the Levers of Oz.

My guess is that Ironman—who correctly took a LOT of flack when they just trashed their new approach to their World Championships from 2023-2025—instead of actually trying to fix the problem, is now hoping that their somewhat confusing and arcane system distracts and divides those that have raised criticisms. It is an ancient ploy by people in power, and I might be wrong, but I suspect I am at least somewhat right.

What It Means for YOU

Very little. I was on the phone with an athlete yesterday who has qualified for Kona once and Nice once. He’s aiming for a slot to Kona 2026 at Ironman Arizona in November. He’s in the lucky 50-54 age group, and his last two cracks at this particular race were 10:02:53 in 2024 and 10:00:39 in 2019 (a statistically insignificant difference). Under the new system, he’ll have to be in the 9:50-9:55 range to have a shot at qualifying, and being in the 9:45 range is safe. Given this athlete’s past race history and development, that is a very doable goal. And if you are reading this, you’re probably in a similar boat, even outside of that odd M50-54 category: if you’re in the “power band” age groups of M25-49 or W30-44, you’ll need to be in the high 8’s/low 9’s for men and 9:30-10:30 for women. This is not materially different from what you had to do before, and my counsel about qualifying remains the same:

• Widen your training window for qualification from 9-12 months (what most athletes do) to 24-36 months (it’s endurance sports! You HAVE to be patient!)

• Focus primarily on aerobic conditioning (LOTS of time at LT1 in all three sports)

• Build a bulletproof body through strength and mobility

• For god’s sake, spend more time in the pool and get your stroke analyzed

• Truly accept that running well in an Ironman requires superior BIKE fitness, not superior run fitness

Finally, everything I have said before about qualifying for Kona remains the same, and you can get that information here.