What's up, Motivators? Taren here.
A couple weeks ago we did a video talking
about how I think Iron Man may have pushed media pros athletes a little bit too far.
And there are some dynamics going
on in the marketplace that make me worried for for the future of triathlon.
I want to do a part two follow up because the pro triathletes organization, the PTO,
has provided me with a little bit of inside info that elaborates on what we
talked about, about why I'm worried, and we're going to see head to head what
Iron Man and PTO are bringing to the table and where the market dynamics are with how
Triathlon is going to unfold over the next few years.
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All right Motivators,
before we get into this, I promise the PTO that I would allow them
to make a statement which they have provided here.
The PTO exists to celebrate the sport
of Triathlon and elevate professional Triathlon in the global sporting stage.
We are making significant investments
into the sport to drive the following strategic outcomes.
Professional triathletes are some of the greatest athletes on the planet.
We want to ensure that they are fairly rewarded for their athleticism talent
and dedication, making Triathlon as inclusive and affordable as possible.
To Motivate committed age groupers,
that sounds like something that I would write amateurs and new fans of all
abilities and backgrounds to take part in Triathlon and endurance sports.
Yes, reimagining Triathlon, broadcasting and storytelling to inspire
a global audience to regularly watch, engage and participate in Triathlon.
We are grateful for every participant,
fan, volunteer, partner, sponsor, investor and race organizer that supports
this vision by investing their time, effort and resources into the sport.
And then a couple of links at the bottom
where you can contact the Pto@protriathletes.org or
info@protriathletes.org. What I will say is that from this point forward
in the video, everything is just my opinion and not that of the PTO.
This is not something the PTO has asked me to say to you in our discussions.
They were actually very cautious of me even doing this video.
The first thing that I want to get across is that I do not get the impression
that PTO looks at it as PTO versus Ironman that might have come across at the start
of the PTO announcing that they existed and that they want to take over Ironman.
I really don't get that impression anymore.
Let's dive into the inside info here.
What the PTO put together internally that they shared with us that we're going
to share here with you is an Excel spreadsheet where you can say, all right,
what happens if an athlete races PTO races and has a certain number of placings
versus what if they have those same placings in Ironman races?
And what they've done here is you can look
at this in 2022 or 2023, the difference being that in 2023,
they are also going to have two additional events.
And you can calculate it based off
of middle and full distance being 73s and Ironman distance events or just 73s.
The difference being that an athlete
racing full distance races has a little bit more prize money.
What they've outlined here is, let's say you have a third place rank
in the Collins Cup being what PTO would look at as their world Championship,
third place in the Ironman World Championships,
7th in the Canadian Open versus 7th in the half Ironman World Championships,
12th in the US Open versus 12th in a regional Ironman Championship,
and then placing second overall in the yearend PTO rankings,
where they have a bonus versus second at the challenge overall Championship.
And what happens is the total PTO prize
money gets calculated down here versus the total other money here.
You can see that for the best athletes in the world that are placing in the very
top of the world rank races, that there is a significant benefit to the PTO races.
What if we change this, however,
to a very, I don't know, middle of the pack kind of pro?
So somebody that is placing, say 12th in the Collins Cup and then 12th
at the Ironman World Championships and let's say 13th at the Canadian Open,
13th at the half Ironman World Championships.
Let's go to 16th at the US Open,
16th down here, and then being somewhere around 16th ranked overall.
This is where it starts getting very interesting because what we see is
that in the lower prize money categories, that the average pro, the struggling pro,
the pro that might not have $500,000 sponsorship deals or you'd see
on billboards or the covers of magazines, the ones that cobbled together over
the course of half a dozen races, just $10,000 in prize money.
Whereas if they spent that race time
at PTO races, we're looking at $63,000 an actual fulltime salary.
What if somebody did this in 2023 when there's a couple of additional races?
Well, then it starts getting even more interesting.
Let's again look at a really top tier athlete.
Let's just go third across the board just for fun, over three and a half times more
prize money for the top tier athletes by concentrating on pro races.
And then let's again go with the middle of the pack pro triathletes.
Again, significantly more prize money.
We are talking about 13 times more prize
money for the middle of the pack athletes and a full time income.
They have another chart over here where
they compare placing for placing, what the top athletes would make in blue
for PTO races versus if they had raced the other races.
And then the multiple of how many times
more prize money there is by racing the PTO races.
And we see at the very top tier,
there is a little bit more money, but it starts going up to about five times
more money when you just get out of the very top six.
It only takes the 7th ranked athlete
to get to almost five times more prize money.
But then we go down to the 11th, 12th,
13th, 14th, 15th ranked athletes, and the number is significantly more.
We're talking four times more when we get past 16.
There isn't even prize money for the struggling pro out there.
This is where I think market dynamics
really takes shape and where I am a little bit worried about the future of Triathlon,
which I want to lay out what I think might happen.
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Here's the dynamics and how I see it playing out.
We have Ironman versus PTO.
And remember, PTO is not in competition with Iron Man, but I'm showing where
the big players are in the market and how I see it playing out.
Up here, we have a whole bunch
of different stakeholders, people that have some sort of interest
in PTO versus Iron Man, but it's not a competition.
First thing that I want to show is what happens with pros.
Well, there's a really good line that is
show me the incentive and I will show you the outcome.
So the incentives are that there's so much
more money going to the athletes if they race PTO races.
And we see Sam Long choosing to race more PTO races, I think we are going to see
a lot more athletes choose to race PTO races.
Then up here, what about viewers?
What about the amateurs, the age groupers, and what they're going to actually watch?
Well, if the pros are on the PTO races, well, there's going to be a lot more
viewership of the PTO races from the average person,
then the PTO are going to have the pros, they're going to have the eyeballs.
Well, what happens when Ironman and PTO are going to sponsors?
Well, if PTO has the best athletes in the world and they have a higher number
of viewers, well, all of a sudden the sponsors are also going to go to the PTO.
What about the race entries?
Well, it was always such
that the Ironman World Championship in Kona was the big draw.
This is what got people into the sport.
The nature of this is just that people
were watching a race and they were saying, hey, I want to be on that course.
I want to do what those athletes are doing.
Well, what if the PTO races,
they have more sponsors, they have more viewership,
they have the athletes that people look up to and the role models.
Are there going to be more athletes
that are going to all of a sudden start racing more PTO races?
Let's add on to this media, that media.
I am choosing to go to PTO races this year
because they are just nicer to deal with than Iron Man.
They're more collaborative, they are more open with all of their media.
So I am going to PTO and that is bringing even more eyeballs to PTO races.
All of this is what I was worried about
in the last video where athletes, where professionals,
where sponsors start leaving Iron Man, going to the PTO,
and all of a sudden Ironman, which was having real difficulties being
profitable for years and years, all of a sudden becomes not so profitable.
What happens then?
It is the biggest, most influential company in Triathlon.
And what happens if it starts losing even
more money than we know that it has over the last few years?
What happens to it then?
I see potentially and again, this is not my discussions with PTO.
I see what might happen is if Ironman starts losing so much money that it's
current ownership base says, you know what, we have to get this off the books.
Well, maybe PTO comes in in several years and accomplishes their original goal
of being able to purchase Ironman, which is what they originally intended
when they announced that they were going to come out and be in the marketplace.
They might end up in the same scenario
just a few years later and in a different way than they originally thought.
Is this a good thing?
Well, I got to say, the more I deal with the people at PTO,
the more I am impressed with how they operate, how open they are with media.
Now the question remains,
do I think that this is a good thing for the sport or a bad thing for the sport?
Well, as I've said to Sam, the CEO of the PTO, over and over,
the more I speak to him, the more I like where they're heading with their plans.
But I always say to him that I am
cautiously optimistic and I'm eager to see how things play out.
I'm eager to hear what you think.
Do you think that what I've laid out here is really what will happen?
And if it does happen, do you think that it will be a big detriment to Iron Man?
And if it is a big detriment to iron man, do you see a possible future where the PTO
can actually take over Iron man in a few years?
If you're listening to this or watching this go discuss it everywhere.
I think this is a very important topic for us to actually address
in the Triathlon world because it is involving the biggest organizations in our
sport which we love so much and we want to have a healthy sport.
How do you see it playing out?
Thank you for watching Motivators.
If you're looking for a training plan that is as good as a one on one coach
but as inexpensive as doing it yourself, check out our Motive training app
that covers triathlons, running races, do Athlons swim runs and cycling events.
The link in the description below where
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Also, if you rather listen to these tips, we also publish these videos in podcast
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Later motivators.