How is the World Championship thing working at 70.3 races?

Coach Rich

I'm talking about number of slots per age group, roll down, etc for the 70.3 champs in Vegas. In the past Clearwater was doable to get in to (if you were moderately fast) as the roll down went down pretty far because a lot of fast people weren't interested in going due to the races rep as a draftfest. I think LV will be much different race and pretty hard to get into after a couple years.

So, while cutting the grass yesterday, I was thinking about rolling my IMWI fitness into IMCali, getting a slot, maybe do Vineman, and finish the season in Vegas. September is good A-race timing for me.

Any experiences?

Paul Hough

Rich, I will posit that the further the 70.3 is from the location of the championship, the larger the age group, and the later the race is in the year, the better the odds of a deep roll down. When the worlds were at Clearwater, I can assure you that roll-downs did not go very far at the Florida 70.3. That race is heavily dominated by folks from Florida and the South, and it was low cost to travel to Clearwater if you got a slot. Now that the worlds are in Vegas my guess is that there will be a higher take rate from 70.3s in the west and fewer folks interested in the making the trip from the east coast unless they are really more interested in getting to Vegas. So what I'm saying is that if the roll downs to Clearwater out west went deep, it may have had more to do with the distance to the Champs than the nature of the bike course. And I'm guessing that it will be tough to get a slot at IMCALI now due to the ease of travel more than any other reason. I would also speculate that the additional travel to Vegas may make it easier to get a slot in Europe since they were really keen on a November trip to the beach.

Anyway, that's just my theory. For what's it worth, in 2009, it took me 3 tries to get a slot to Clearwater because they did not roll down far in the M50-54 anywhere I went (Florida, Boise, Augusta).

Coach Rich

Ok. Anyone know where I can find info on slot allocation? I've gotten top 8 at Cali in the past but 40-44AG is fookin' fast out here. I prefer no travel, I know Cali front to back, etc. But, yeah, good point about the travel stuff.

mancona

Totally agree with you Rich. Assumming that the Vegas race goes over well this year, I predict that 70.3 WC slots will be much harder to come by starting next year as compared to previous years.


Most 70.3s (including Cali) get 50 slots for Vegas. There used to be a list up at ironmanusa.com but I can't find it right now. You can click through the different races on ironman.com to see exactly how many each race has or check the individual race site. They will no longer post slot allocation until race day as it can change beased on no shows.

You already know this stuff but for others: about 26 slots go to 1st in each AG, and that typcially leaves about 24 to be distributed based on number of folks in each AG that checked in for the race.

This year at Cali the vegas slots still rolled a bit but not as nearlly as much as I have seen in the past. There is definitely already more interest in Vegas then there was in clearwater. I believe 2 of 28 Kona slots rolled and about 10 of 50 vegas slots. I've seen races in the past where littler 20 or more clearwater spots rolled. This might also have to do with the fact that Vegas is esay to get to for most of the people that do Cali.

I think you need to race Cali next year. The question will be how many of the fast dudesl take both Kona and Vegas slots vs one or the other like in the past. The advantage you have at Cali is you have plenty of time for a plan B, C, D before Sept.

Coach Rich

Yeah, thinking about it. I used to race it every year but bailed when the race was mid-late March, water was high 50's and was raining. No thanks.

5th in 40-44 this year was 4:30:30. I could go 26, 2:28, 1:32 on that course + 4' transitions, so right on the bubble. I'd also like to get my hommies together for WF and do the massive camping/party thing like back in the day, assuming WF and SG aren't the same weekend...

But that's all a year away :-) Cali halfs are crazy deep in my AG. May need to come out east and race those slower races y'all have...

 

mancona

Yeah, Oceanside was by far the most competitive race I have done outside of a world championship.

The midwest 70.3s are a crap shoot as there are now 5 within 5 months. Last year my AG was stacked at Racine with the top 5 guys all being Kona qualifiers and two turning pro because we all just picked the same race. It could have been any of them though and Racine may be weak this year as I know at last 3 of the 5 of us wont be racing it this year.

Michael Byerts

The ironman.com website used to have a page listing the qualification slots available at each Ironman and 70.3 race. I just checked and it's gone now, just like the ironman website used to have elevation profile comparisons available from all U.S. based ironmans, and 3 or 4 halfs (also gone now). From memory, however, I recall that most or all of the US-based halfs had 50 slots per race, allocated based on the number of entries in each age group. The race website should have the details. Furthermore, I know a guy who finished about 65th in the men 35-39 age group in 2009 at Oceanside, and got a rolldown slot. Like Matt said, it's likely to roll a lot less now that it moved to Vegas.
I know this is a little off-topic, but I am a little dubious of people taking both the Kona slot and the Vegas slot. Not that I will ever be in this position, but I think you should have to pick one or the other -- one race = one slot. On the other hand, the $1,000 price tag for taking both seems like a good deterent.

Coach Rich

In my opinion, racing a half 4wks before Kona would be a very, very bad idea, or at least not the best use of your $$$$$$$ investment in racing Kona. Don't make no sense.

Looks like Ironman/WTC has changed their results tool and you can no longer see who accepted a Kona slot in each AG group, therefore you can't tell how many slots went out to each AG. I was trying to figure out what KQ'ed at IMWI last year in 40-44AG.

Michael Byerts

I don't understand why WTC wants to make this kind of information harder to find. I suppose slot allocation changes from time to time, but the move to hide things bothers me.
@Rich: It's kind of old now, but Tri-Talk did a study of Kona qualifying times a few years ago and ranked all races based on the ease of getting a slot, in each age group. Here's a link:
http://www.tri-talk.com/KonaIQ.asp

Coach Rich

I don't think they're hiding things. I think they just changed/upgraded their results tool and in the process have misplaced the little M-dot icons that went next to the names of the people who took the slots. Their _old_ results tool was around for years. You'd find the race, the year, seach for the AG you're interested in, then could have it pull up everyone by all manner of variables: overall time, swim, bike, run splits, T1, T2, pace on the run, etc. You could then see 8 lil' MDot icons = 8 slots went to the AG, but could see that Mr 3rd and Mr 7th didn't accept their slots and it rolled down to Mr 10th = that's the time you likely need to try to beat this year.

40-44AG usually has 9-10 slots these days so I'm using that for IMWI. Bottomline is I need to be able to go under 10hrs to be safe. As a frame of reference for how fast these races have gotten, in '02 I went 10:05 and go 35th OA and 4th AG in 30-34, KQ'd. That same time would have gotten me 10th in 40-44, 12th in 30-34. Good thing I got in '02, cuz I won a pair of socks and Foster Grant sunglasses

Michael Byerts

I remember the old search engine well. And I spent enough time goofing off to look at what Kona and 70.3 qualifiers were at various races. I guess I am just more suspicious of WTC. I reasoned that WTC wants to sell out all their races a year in advance, and if people found out where the fewest Kona slots are, or which races are hardest to qualify at, it would drive down demand for entries to those races. So, to ensure that doesn't happen, they removed the information.

Paul Hough

Triathlete Magazine's annual event guide lists the number of slots for each race. The Florida 70.3 used to get 75 and even with that number there was very little roll down in the age groups due to the proximity of the worlds. This year, Florida 70.3 will get only 50 slots so it will be interesting to see what happens with the worlds now much further and much, much more expensive to get to. My understanding is that they had to reduce the number of slots at races like 70.3 to cover all the new races they've added to the series, elsewise the size of the World's would get out of hand.

GMAN 19030

M40-44 is usually the largest AG.  6 of the 50 Vegas slots went to M40-44 at the Texas 70.3 (281 raced, 330 registered for M40-44).  Not sure how far that rolled down as it didn't roll down to me in 40th place. 

The 6th place dude in M40-44 finished in 4:37.  First place in 4:19.  7th through 10th finished from 4:38 to 4:42.

mancona

While I agree that it sucks that WTC no longer shows who took the spots, they now post participant list for all of the races on each race site.



If you really want to know your "chances" and have spare time on your hands, I would do the following: 

  

A. Figure out how many slots your AG is likely to have:



1. Check ironman.com or race website to get total slots for that race (typcially 50 for 70.3 and ~65 for 140.6)

2. Download participant list from the race website after race is sold out of within a few weeks of race date

3. Open participant list in excel. Determine the number of people in your AG, the total number of people registered anf then divide. (i.e. 300 in AG / 3000 in race means that my AG is 10% of the race.

4. Remove the 1 slot per AG based on all AGs with at least one person registered. I typically up to 12 for the men and 11 for the women so 23 total, however this could be as high as 26. This means that there are 50 - 23 = 27 spots left to be distributed based on registration.

5. 27 spots * 10% of the participates in my AG means my AG will get 2.7 spots + the 1 for the winner.



Therefore there are 3.7 total spots, which would likely round up to 4. 

  

B. Figure out what time you need to have a chance

Instead of looking at what happend at roll downs in the past I simiply look at the last 2 or 3 years results and write down the 4th in AG time for each. Take the average 4th place time for the last few years and if you want a shot a getting a slot need to be able to go that time.



It will always depend on who shows up and who wants spots but in my mind the above is the most realistice way to have a time in mind that you need to qualify.



Keep in mind that in general AGers are getting faster and the field is getting deeper at the pointy end.

jneedell

70.3 has diluted in recent years. I am doing Boise this year and later year the last roll down in 40-44M was 5:11. It is still open as well. Just have to pick the right race. Boice gets a lot of entries but no one fast went.

Paul Hough

@ Johnathon - I did Boise 70.3 in 2009 in 5:01, and did NOT get a roll-down in the M50-54. I think you are right...with the growth of the series, there is a lot of luck involved in who shows up at what race.

mancona

Posted By Paul Hough on 08 May 2011 02:03 PM

@ Johnathon - I did Boise 70.3 in 2009 in 5:01, and did NOT get a roll-down in the M50-54. I think you are right...with the growth of the series, there is a lot of luck involved in who shows up at what race.

 

I agree with you guys 100% that it will alwasy come down to who shows up ... I've personnally seen 70.3 slots role to the point where Mike said "Is there anyone from M40-45 that wants a clearwate spot" but at the same race I got the last role down slot for M25-29 when there was only one roll down.

The only think to keep in mind is they have created a few more slots, but for the most part they are starting limit the spots a little and very very few races have over 50 slots now, where it used to be common to see 75 slots.  Therefore, yes there are more races and ways to get slots, but each race has less slots.

The best part about 70.3 is that is is easier to do multiple races and therefore you have more chances to get a slot.

Cary Blanco

At San Juan 70.3 (first US 70.3 of 2011) roll downs were VERY limited.

Cary Blanco

At Eagleman, 2010 Clearwater roll downs were available for just about anyone that asked. Keep in mind that gulf was fresh with BP oil at the time.