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Photo: USAT
What it shows is that the 20-29 age-group (the pink line) is up consistently over the last three years. That age-group is now the second biggest age-group after the 30-39-year-olds.
At the same time, it shows that the 40-49 age-group (the orange line) has been on the steady decline over that same time period.
The sport is now made up predominantly of 20- to 39-year-olds. Not 40- to 59-year- olds. Even if it doesn't feel that way, lol.
A footnote: These numbers are from USAT's stats. USAT captures all sanctioned races in the U.S. Though the large majority of races are short-course and independent, their numbers include Ironman. So it is, in most ways, the most complete and accurate data of what's happening in the biggest market in triathlon. (No, it does not include non-sanctioned races, and some of those, like the Cal Tri race series, have definitely grown. But because USAT provides insurance for all sanctioned U.S. races and every athlete at a race has to then buy a one-day or annual USAT membership, their stats capture well over 95% of the races and triathletes in the country. And, certainly, provide a year-over-year picture.)
BUT. But! There is an important caveat to this youth-ing of triathlon. The youths have very different behavior patterns.
According to the data, the majority of these 20-29 triathletes wouldn't consider themselves triathletes. The vast vast majority of these are one-day licenses; they do one, maybe two events, and they then (so far) move on to something else.
This corresponds with what we understand of this age-group. They want to do bucket list things, they want experiences. (There's some very basic Psych 101 at play here for a cohort that came of age in the era they came of age in.) They care about health and wellness and performance in a way that 20-29-year-olds have not historically, and broadly they do fitness. So jumping into this event or that event or why not makes sense to them. Hell, it makes sense to me.
The only reason this is either a problem or an opportunity for triathlon. The reason that Ironman is paying for influencers to do their events. Is because, at the same time, we're also seeing that what has been the historic core of triathlon, the people you could count on to do your events over and over and over, they aren't doing triathlon anymore. That 40-49 and 50-59 age-groups, they're the ones who made up that dedicated 'triathlete for life' base. They were always a small group — it's actually only 5% of the USAT membership that ever does 16+ races in their lifetime (so congrats to all of you who are reading this, you're probably already in the 5%) — but without them you lose the diehard evangelist core customer you can count on.
So. What do you do now?
You either change or you don't.
I spend a lot of time reading about and thinking about and talking to people about the K-shaped economy and vibecession, and about what's happening in the U.S. right now. And you can pretend those things don't have anything to do with triathlon, but you'll just be pretending yourself right out of business.
There were a lot more stats from the USAT report: the number of events has leveled off from last year at 829 v. 824, the number of members is at 303K (not quite pre-COVID's 329K), and the number of total race starts is down 3% from last year. And there was a bunch of data from the State of the Sport survey, too — which is, in essence, a consumer sentiment survey, but I have decided is only so-useful a survey because it doesn't track the same consumers year-over-year (ie. I bet race directors who went out of business feel less optimistic about their financial prospects, but we don't ask them do we).
And you can interpret those numbers probably however you want to interpret those numbers. "New triathletes feel the number of triathlons in their area is increasing!" (OK!) But underlying every conversation I had and every one of these stats is the overwhelming sense of uncertainty.
(And no one means good uncertainty. They're not like 'gee I just am not sure how amazing things are going to be.')
Why aren't people registering for races early anymore? Because they don't know what the hell is going to happen between now and June! It makes sense to wait, makes sense to me. Why are race directors struggling to plan their budgets? Because they don't know how much their costs are going to go up! And they don't know how much their customers can absorb price increase to cover those costs. Why are people declining spots and trying other things and holding onto their money and training but waiting? Because wtf is the world even!
Over and over, what I am hearing is that it is this uncertainty that is going to define the business of our sport for the next few years. At every level. Not because there is something uniquely wrong with triathlon, but because we are not unique and we are not immune.
So what do you do? You either change or you don't.
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