The IRONMAN® triathlon is particularly interesting for recreational (age group) triathletes, where tens of thousands compete annually to qualify for the IRONMAN® World Championship in Hawaii. The purpose of the present study was to identify the fastest event location for age group triathletes. A total of 687,662 finisher records of IRONMAN® age group triathletes from 446 events at 65 different locations between 2002 and 2022 were analyzed, aggregating records by location and calculating and displaying descriptive statistics. The statistical significance of the differences observed was tested using a twoway ANOVA (sex and event location as independent variables, overall race times or split times as dependent variables) and post-hoc Tukey’s HSD tests. The fastest swim times were achieved in IRONMAN® New York, ahead of IRONMAN® Switzerland Thun and IRONMAN® Chattanooga for both men and women. There were differences between women and men regarding the fastest cycling and running courses. The fastest cycling splits were in IRONMAN® Barcelona, followed by IRONMAN® Copenhagen and IRONMAN® Tallinn for men and IRONMAN® Barcelona, IRONMAN® Copenhagen and IRONMAN® Vitoria-Gasteiz for women. For the marathon, men achieved the fastest running split in IRONMAN® Hawaii, ahead of IRONMAN® Vitoria-Gasteiz and IRONMAN® Tallinn, whereas women were the fastest in running in IRONMAN® Gdynia, IRONMAN® Haugesund Norway and IRONMAN® Hawaii. For overall race times, men achieved their times in IRONMAN® Hawaii, followed by IRONMAN® Vitoria-Gasteiz and IRONMAN® Copenhagen. For women, the fastest overall race times were achieved in IRONMAN® Vitoria-Gasteiz ahead of IRONMAN® Hawaii and IRONMAN® Copenhagen. For overall race times, average water temperatures were at 20.7 ± 2.8 °C and average air temperatures at 23.0 ± 3.0 °C. Most swimming courses were in a lake (7/10), most cycling courses were rolling (6/10) and most running courses were flat (7/10). Despite differences regarding the event locations, the fastest race courses were identified in the USA and Spain.
Finding the fastest race locations for non-elite IRONMAN® age group triathletes