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I have just released the 2017 edition of the KPR Observer, following Kona qualifying for the Professional athletes.

The Kona Pro Ranking (or KPR for short) is the system used to determine which Professional triathletes qualify for the Ironman World Championships in Kona. The 2017 KPR Observer consists of an Initial Information Package about the KPR and ongoing updates during the season.

The Initial Information Package (delivered at the time of purchase) contains:

• a description of how the KPR works in qualifying Pros for Kona
• changes to the 2017 rules and their implications
• base projections for the men’s and women’s cutoff
• graphs and descriptions of the current KPR standings

During the season, there will be at least six EMail Updates (and probably ten) about the KPR Standings, who is already in, who is close to qualifying, how many slots are still open and updated estimates of where the cutoffs will occur.

To give you a short glimpse of the material in the KPR Observer, here is a look at the women’s and men’s KPR rankings at the end of the 2016 racing season:

If you want to qualify as a Pro, coach a Pro athlete, write about professional Ironman racing or are otherwise interested in the KPR, this is must-read information! The time you’ll save with the KPR Observer is easily worth the price of 29$ for the full season.

(If you are a Professional athlete looking to qualify for Kona, please send an email to thorsten@trirating.com to receive information about a complimentary copy.)

Order today at https://gum.co/2017KPR or click on the button below:

Get 2017 KPR Observer

Just a few hours before the start of the “2016 Ironman World Championships” here is some information on how to follow the race.

First, here are the start times for the Pro races and the rough times when the first athletes are expected to hit T1, T2 and are likely to cross the finish line:

• 6:25am Men’s Pro Start
• 6:30am Women’s Pro Start
• 7:15am First Man in T1
• 7:22am First Woman in T1
• 11:40am First Man in T2
• 12:15pm First Woman in T2
• 2:30pm First Man to Finish (would be 8:05 finish – course record is 8:03:56 by Craig Alexander from 2011)
• 3:25pm Fist Woman to Finish (would be 8:55 finish – course record is 8:52:14 by Mirinda Carfrae from 2013)

These times are local times in Kona (Hawaii Standard Time). Just to give the time differences to a few other popular places (and the corresponding start time for the male Pro race):

• +3 hours to US West Coast – race starts 9:25am local time
• +6 hours to US East Coast – race starts 12:25pm local time
• +11 hours to UK – race starts 5:25pm local time
• +12 hours to Germany – race starts 6:25pm local time
• +21 hours to Australia (Sydney) – race starts 3:25am local time on Sunday
• +23 hours to New Zealand – race starts 5:25am local time on Sunday

Ironman will have a live stream hosted by Greg Welch and Mike Lovato, there will also be a “Live Blog” on the site. For me in Germany I also have the chance to watch the race on German TV, they have their own German commentary with triathlon experts and additional cameras to catch more German athletes during the race. The German language coverage will also be streamed through sportschau.de. I’m not aware of any other nations covering the race live on one of their TV stations, as usual the NBC coverage won’t be available until a few weeks after the race.

In addition to the information on the live streams there is always lots of information on Twitter, and I’ll also be posting on TriRating.com during the race with preliminary analysis after the field hits T1 (so I can analyze the swim) and the front of the field has started the run (so I can analyze the bike and project an outcome based on what athletes “normally” run). In the days before the race I have already put together a long list of free Kona resources including blog posts and articles by the triathlon press and a number of interesting and inspiring videos.

If you haven’t downloaded my Kona Rating Report yet, you should do so before the race and have a look through the data and athlete portraits. I’m sure it’ll make following the race much more enjoyable as you’ll be able to get an understanding of each athlete’s strength and weaknesses – and you can also refer to it during the race when some not quite as well known shows up at the front of the race. The Report is still available for free here , it has been downloaded more than 1.300 times by now, and I’m very grateful for the donations to support my work.

To all my friends racing in Kona – have an awesome day!

For the 2016 Ironman World Championships in Kona I have released a 120+-page Rating Report with tons of information:

• Detailed results and analysis of last year’s race
• Information about the Kona course, top Kona finishers and the current course records
• The Kona 2016 start list and my predictions and odds for the Pro athletes
• How the race may unfold and what to watch for when the race is going on
• Details about each Pro including their input and a lot of photos they have supplied

The Report is available for free, but it would be great if you can support my work before Kona and during the year by donating an amount of your choice, for example the list price of a regular tri magazine (around 7$).

The Kona Rating Report is the ideal information to have when following the Ironman Kona coverage!

Get The Kona Report

Here’s what others have said about the Report:

• 
  “Interview: We get Thorsten ‘The Geek’ from TriRating.com on the show again. We talk about Kona and his amazing 2016 Kona Rating Report” in Episode 535 of the IMTalk podcast.
• 
  “The highly-detailed document, complete with graphical representations of the data Radde has collected, brings Moneyball to multisport.” (Lava Magazine in their post about the Report)
• The Report received a lot of love on Social Media .. just a few of the tweets:
  
  

Get The Kona Report

Here is a list of resources for Kona 2016 (race on October 8th):

• Kona Rating Report (100+ pages with tons of information about the Pro field, order using this link or click ‘Get Kona Report’ in the sidebar, check out some more details and feedback in the post announcing the Report)
  
• My „always up-to-date“ Kona 2016 Pro Startlist (last update on Sept 29th with the withdrawals of Natascha Schmitt, Mareen Hufe and Pete Jacobs)
• My predictions for the male and female Pros (including a “heatmap” of the strengths of each athlete).
• If you want to know more details about the previous results of the Kona Pros, here’s a self-contained HTML file (that you can download locally – right click and “Save Link ..” or similar) with the 2016 Kona Pro Data.
• I’ve had a great chat with John Newsom and Bevan Eyles on the IMTalk podcast (Episode 535).
• The Kona previews I have written for triathlete Magazine are available on the web, check out my look at the female and male fields.
• Tawnee Prazak and I have a race preview chat on the EndurancePlanet “Kona Special“.
• On the “Cup of Tri” (Episode 93) Rob Wilby and I put a special focus on the chances of the British Pros in Kona.
• I’ve had a long chat with Bevan McKinnon (who will be racing in Kona and hopes to do well in the M45 agegroup) about how the Kona Pro races are shaping up and who to look for on Fitter Radio. I’m stoked to be in the same episode with legends such as Lisa Bentley, Paul Buick, Brent McMahon and the IM Talk hosts Bevan and John.

Here are some more posts from my friends and triathlon media:

• On Witsup.com Stef Hanson presents the Wahine Warriors – videos of some of the best female (wahine) triathletes as they prepare for the 2016 Ironman World Championship in Hawaii. The series covers Michelle Vesterby, Lisa Roberts, Leanda Cave, Annabel Luxford, Linsey Corbin, Mirinda Carfrae, Alicia Kaye, Susie Cheetham, Sarah Piampiano, Heather Wurtele, Jodie Swallow and Mel Hauschildt. Stef also offers an interesting “look behind the scenes” of her Kona coverage and her view on the women’s race in “Kona 2016: Through the Eyes of the Chief“.
• For 220 Triathlon Tim Heming has written his predictions for men’s and women’s races.
• Scott (the bike company) has a “Moments of Kona” series of posts about athletes such as Annabel Luxford, Cyril Viennot, or Luke McKenzie, including a cool video about Sebastian Kienle preparing in Australia.
• Sarah Piampiano has a series of videos about her Path to Kona.
• Slowtwitch has been posting Tim Carlson’s Kona Previews for years – here are his men’s preview and women’s preview for 2016.
• Bob Babbit’s “Breakfast with Bob” series of interviews with great Kona guests will start on Monday, but his podcast already has interviews with Boris Stein and Luke McKenzie. Bob’s “Breakfast Interviews” are available on his YouTube Channel.
• For the German language readers there are tons of video interviews on tri2b, Tri-Time and TriMag.
• First Off The Bike has published their podium picks for the male and female races as well as a number of other posts focused on specific athletes.
• TriZone’s Shawn Smith offers his views on this year’s Kona field and his podium picks – while he has two Australian women on the female podium he hasn’t picked any Aussie male!
• Red Bull TV has produced “Iron to the Core“, a fantastic 15-minute video about Sebi coming short in his title defense last year and building towards this year’s race.

I’ll add to this list as soon as my friends and I release more information closer to the race!