#144: Dispelling rumors one at a time

Just doing the Lord's work.

Jul 16, 2025

issue #144: July 16, 2025

All-sporters, I have been gradually working my way back from movement to exercise to almost workouts. It’s not that the TrainingPeaks & Strava charts aren’t going in the correct upwards direction and at the correct (steady non-injury-inducing) rate; it’s just that they’re working out of a very deep hole and it’s a long long way from here to where I want to be. I think all the vaguely generic bullshit people toss in the direction of pregnancy masked how deep a fitness hole I had dug. Oops.

Thank goodness for my unfounded self-confidence, without it I can see how people struggle.

Also back at home for a few weeks right now before more events later this summer — sign up for the women’s performance workshop at USAT Age-Group Nationals. Which means I have more time right now to not train and spend on tri gossip. You’re welcome.

- Kelly

This week’s random (100% not going to happen) rumor: A 100km triathlon at the Olympics

Back when I was a local news reporter I had an often-used rule: Whenever someone was saying stuff that contradicted all available evidence, you had to ask: Are they lying to you or are they lying to themselves? Because if someone is lying to themselves there’s really not much you can do about it.

To that end, I can’t speak to whether or not the T100 executives really believe they’re going to bring a 100km triathlon to the Olympics. But I can say the chances of it happening are slim to none.

I’m not just randomly saying this on Instagram, I actually asked around to people who are involved at that Olympic level. And the responses were all: “… what?!”

That’s because:

There’s a 10,500 athlete cap for the Olympics > this is why they’ve been adding more medal events for TV (relays, team competitions) without adding athletes
Adding additional events also requires a process by which the Olympic Programme Commission makes recommendations > the current goals of that programme are to attract youth, stay cost-effective and relevant, etc — which, generally, means shorter things not longer things
T100 thinks they’re aiming for 2032 in Australia, and the local organizers do get some sway and ability to pick a couple of sports themselves — hence, breakdancing in Paris and flag football in L.A. — but this infers that the T100 will still be around and funding this by 2032

There is something to the idea that another goal of the IOC right now is more mass participation events, like the marathon organizers held in Paris, and so there’s been a talking point about how adding a 100km triathlon would add that participation element. But, well: If you wanted to make a mass participation triathlon in conjunction with the Olympics, you could just do it at the already well-known and established existing Olympic distance…

I think the bigger question here is: Why is World Triathlon entertaining this almost certainly pretend idea? And my guess is the answer is money.

Here’s what is worth reading out of these meetings: The World Triathlon report from Deloitte on the financial challenges and opportunities for triathlon, and what World Tri needs to focus on strategy-wise in the coming years. (Which, I’m guessing, is where they ended up at the “strategic partnerships” point.)

A sample blurb from the section about the U.S. market:

The U.S. is home to one of the few major national federations that operates on a fully sustainable business model based entirely on private funding. While this model offers flexibility and independence, it also means that USA Triathlon tends to avoid hosting elite-level races. These events are often not profitable, and the high standards and logistical requirements make them a significant financial undertaking. As a result, the sport’s full potential remains underutilised—particularly in the lead-up to LA28, where key opportunities to harness global momentum and engage a commercially powerful market have been missed. The U.S. remains a strategic market not only for its demographic and cultural relevance but also for its advanced stage of commercialisation.

And age-grading is going...OK?

We’ve now had two weekend of 70.3s using the new age-graded qualifying system for 2026 70.3 Worlds. (Remember: 70.3 Worlds spots are evenly split into two separate pools for men and women.)

You can now see the age-graded times and rankings in the Ironman app. When you go to look at the results for a race, there’s an option now for the age-graded men’s rankings and age-graded women’s (after the race is over).

For an example, here: Musselman 70.3 women & men + Jonkoping 70.3 women & men

To figure out how the spots actually got awarded: You have to count out all the 1st places in their age groups, and then see how many spots are left after that, and then count down that many spots on the list (outside of the age-group winners). This, however, assumes no rolldown on the podium spots (just to understand a baseline). At the actual award ceremony, I believe they do all the age-group winners and podium rolldowns first, and then call out the remaining “performance pool” spots going down the rankings.

If you go through those steps — just to see how it shakes out now — you’ll see that at Musselman, for example, it went to 7th in the 30-34 women’s age-group and 6th in the 35-39 & 40-44. At Jonkoping, it went deep on the 55-59 and 60-64 men. No idea why.

Word is: It’s kinda fun at the actual awards ceremony because it jumps all over the age groups as the spots go down the list, and there are at least some athletes who had no idea they’d get a spot.

The first race for 2026 Kona: For age-groupers is Ironman Kalmar on Aug. 16 and Copenhagen on Aug. 17 (even though yes, those are also the last 2025 qualifying races). Fun fact: At Kalmar, there are 65 spots for 2025 Men’s Nice and 20 spots for 2025 Women’s Kona + 40 total spots for 2026 Men & Women’s Kona. So, yeah, guess which of those things is going to be “easiest” to get.

Validation still TK

With Anne Haug pulling out of IM Vitoria this past weekend 10km into the run, that now leaves three previous world champions who still need to validate for World Champs this fall:

Anne Haug - presumably going for Kalmar now
Chelsea Sodaro - going for Kalmar now after a run injury
Sam Laidlow - now on the list for Leeds next weekend

As always: Trirating has the complete list of who’s qualified for world champs. Another fun fact: 14 of the women lined up for IM Lake Placid this weekend already have their Kona spot + there are still four Kona spots up for grabs.

The relay walkouts are getting weird. Photo: Wagner Araujo/World Triathlon

From the races

WTCS Hamburg: Is Matt Hauser peaking a year too late or right on time? I bet he’s spending a lot of time thinking about that. Between his win (which now makes all firsts and seconds at WTCSs this year) and then his totally nutty final leg on the relay (to win over the French team) it looks like the Australians are back on top. I will also never not think it’s crazy that Sophie Linn additionally has, like, a regular full-time product job for Hammerhead. I also will never stop feeling like it’s just one French athlete after another — this week it was Leonie Periault.
IM Vitoria: I think was the other surprise but not a surprise of the weekend. Julie Derron won by 38 minutes in her full-distance debut — though Anne Haug dropped out 10km into the run (no word yet as to why, though we presume it was the run niggle she had earlier this year), Julie was ahead of Anne by over ten minutes at T2
Swansea 70.3: And completely not a surprise? Kat Matthews and Harry Palmer repeated their wins. And Kat is back on the top of the IM Pro Series. (Jackie Hering could jump back ahead after Placid this weekend, but Kat’s definitely playing a long game here.)

Results: Swansea 70.3, IM Vitoria, WTCS Hamburg, World Tri Mixed Relay World Championship, XTERRA World Cup - Quebec

Mark your calendars

IM Lake Placid: My pick’s are Sarah True (always) and either Leon Chevalier or Dr. Matt. But the start list has a lot of interesting names. Jackie and Danielle Lewis will meet up again. So will Trevor Foley and Dr. Matt and Matt Hanson. I know everyone is curious about Holly Lawrence’s full-Ironman debut and Kona bid, and curious if Solveig Lovseth is actually going to start. And if Braden Currie is back. We’re also all curious if Cam Wurf has finally called a break (since he withdrew).
- WATCH: Sunday 6 a.m. ET/3 a.m. PT on Outside Watch in N. America and Ironman Youtube or proseries.ironman.com everywhere else

The -ish

Some of the things worth knowing about this week in our sports — or that I just think are interesting.

Slowtwitch is doing a whole series about being a pro, starting with the endless debate of ‘is it too easy to get a pro license.’ To which David Tilbury-Davis had the most correct response: “Out of curiosity… why does it matter?” (For the record, any issues are not about the ease or difficulty with which one gets an elite license, but are rather about the lack of tiered racing at the long-course elite level. And also USAT added an additional criteria option for elite qualification during the pandemic, which involves scoring tables and an algorithm — and which made sense during the pandemic, but is now the only criteria that’s significantly easier to achieve than the other criteria IMO.) (Slowtwitch/USAT)
T100’s new Australia 100km age-group race is sold out at 1,500 entries. You can still enter the Olympic-distance.
If you had been wondering what Chris McCormack was up to these days, the answer is leading global strategy for the One Hundred Endurance Trail World Championships. Which is, as I have now learned, a race organizer seeking to crown “the undisputed world champion of ultrarunning” by creating another world series of ultrarunning to add to the disputes. (MACCA/One Hundred)
I think it’s hard to argue against Katie Schide being the undisputed best in the world right now, after taking down *another* major course record at Hardrock. (Outside Run)
An 80-year-old became the oldest finisher of Badwater 135. (GearJunkie)
A 60-year-old woman died six miles into Hardrock; it’s not known yet what happened. A man died during the swim portion of Muncie 70.3. And a runner was hit by a car and killed during the Ragnar, overnight running relay, outside of Seattle. (Detroit Free Press/MSN/Slowtwitch)
Gordon Ramsay did Luxembourg 70.3 in just under seven hours. (Endurance Sportswire)
This is a reasonably well-thought-through discussion on the good and bad of the growth of trail running. (UltraSignup)
Tour de France Hommes has been kinda chaotic, right. And good for Ben Healy and his dog. (The Gaurdian/Cycling Weekly/Instagram)
The Aquatic World Championships are currently happening right now, too, in Singapore — which includes diving and water polo, as well as swimming. But the open water event has already been rescheduled twice because of water quality. (SwimSwam)
Front Office Sports did a good pretty comprehensive dive into all the money problems the new track leagues are having. My favorite detail: Gabby Thomas’ comment on a Grand Slam Track Tiktok: ‘that’s dope, please pay me.’ (Front Office Sports)
The L.A. Olympics schedule was announced and women’s triathlon will be the first medal of the Games. (LA Times/World Triathlon)
Marion Jones was on the Hit Play Not Pause podcast. Lauren Brandon came on the Feisty Tri pod and told us all about the joy of retirement. And we went deep last week on The Feist women’s sports pod about Ironman qualification (and boxing) and we talk all about all the new women’s sports leagues on tomorrow’s episode. (Spotify/Apple Podcasts/Youtube)
Youth sports are a $40 billion industry, even though we all agree the industry is total bullshit, right. I also once read that the cardboard box industry is bigger than the movie industry in terms of revenue (and it’s true, I looked it up), and I can never stop thinking about that. (New York Times)

One last thing

Ashley Gruber’s photos from the Tour are my favorite thing about the Tour.