Why the World Champs’ location change is the right move for Ironman

Mauna Loa wasn’t the only news erupting from the Big Island of Hawaii in the last week of November.

While the world’s largest volcano blew for the first time since 1984, the leaks were coming thicker than a lava flow that next year’s Ironman World Championship was heading for Nice [Ironman have yet to officially announce the location] – or at least the men’s race was.

An almost instant rethink

Having confidently announced the Ironman Worlds would continue to be a two-day event in Hawaii in 2023, local unrest forced a rethink almost as soon as the M-Dot roadshow rolled out of Kailua-Kona in October.

In many ways the now one-off two-day event had been a success. It was a solution to the backlog of qualifiers hankering after their dream race post-pandemic. It was also, finally, a platform to showcase an independent women’s race that provided great stories.

But there were also issues such as a shortage of volunteers and closing the highways for two days that stoked the ire of residents.

So a U-turn was in the offing and Ironman had about as much chance of keeping a lid on its own news as the Big Island residents did of stopping the Mauna Loa lava jets shooting 200ft skyward.

Split races

The answer? The promised women-only race remaining on the Big Island next October, while the men’s race shifts 8,000 miles east to southern France and held a month earlier. The expectation, if this policy proves successful, would be for the men to race in Hawaii in 2024.

Nice offers a great course in a triathlon heartland, with a history dating back to 1982

It feels like the right move. As the switch and lack of uptake for St George for the delayed 2021 Ironman World Championship showed this year, Kona remains the holy grail; the obsession.

If the genders are to be split the women deserve first dibs. Even in a sport that prides itself on equality, they too often get short shrift racing midweek while the men get plum weekend slots [Kona top-10 finisher Laura Siddall was just one of many female pros to echo this sentiment].

A Kona rival once again?

As for Nice, it has the potential to offer a great course in a triathlon heartland and considerably less costly for Europeans than making the pilgrimage to the mid-Pacific. It also has a history dating back to 1982, won 10 times by Mark Allen, when it rivalled Kona as the premiere long-course race.

Ironman could have picked up far more in hosting rights had they headed for the Middle East, but finding a non-Kona course and location engaging enough to entice athletes to fork out for slots would 
be a challenge.

It’s not perfect. There’s sympathy for those already qualified for Hawaii in 2023 who will now be forced to change plans – they should be adequately compensated.

Worth a try for tri

There’s also the threat of profit becoming too tempting to ignore and thousands of extra slots being made available that would dilute the quality and undermine the long-term value of the race.

Yet it’s a concept that merits being tried and serves as a hint that 
Ironman may have finally outgrown the Big Island. Hawaii will always remain at its core, it just won’t be its everything.

Illustration: Daniel Seex