PTO, World Triathlon Team Up For World Championship Tour

World Triathlon and the Professional Triathletes Organisation have partnered to create a new World Championship series of events out of the PTO Tour races. The announcement covers both professional and age-group racing at the distance.

The planned series for 2024 will cover six total races: five "Continental Championships" and a final race. Similar to the current World Triathlon Championship Series, points will be awarded to athletes based on their finish in these events in order to determine a professional World Champion. Qualification for said events will follow the current PTO Tour model, meaning that athletes will be selected based on their PTO Rankings, wild-card selections, "up and coming" status, and crucially, current WTCS athletes who have "a sufficiently high World Triathlon ranking so as to expect that they would be competitive in the event." Athletes will earn PTO ranking points through the current system, meaning that although Challenge and IRONMAN branded events are not included in the Championship Series, ranking points to qualify for said series can be earned through those other promoters' series.

World Triathlon will create a new 100 kilometer championship for age group athletes, with world champion status determined off of the results of a single race, which will rotate across the venues of the World Tour. Tour stops are planned for 2024 in the Americas, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania, with a schedule to be announced in October 2023.

In a statement, PTO CEO Sam Renouf said, “Given the importance of the Olympics and short course racing on the traditional federation funding model, long distance triathlon has largely been left to the ‘private sector’ of for-profit promoters; leading to a fragmented and uncoordinated calendar for both athletes and fans. In partnering together to recognise the PTO Tour as the official tour of long distance triathlon, the PTO and World Triathlon are both elevating long distance triathlon and bringing this part of the sport back into the fold of the World Triathlon family.”

As Renouf mentions, long distance world championships have been a contentious component of the sport over the years. World Triathlon's predecessor organization, the ITU, brought IRONMAN to arbitration multiple times over IRONMAN's use of the term "world championships," losing both times. The then-ITU also tossed IRONMAN (and other race producers) out from the ITU umbrella in 2004 before reconciling in 2006. IRONMAN has also previously announced rules harmonization with World Triathlon, including but not limited to rules regarding shoe stack height and wetsuit thickness.

Image Courtesy of PTO