Ironman France 2018: Age Group Results and Kona Qualification

Latest statistics for Ironman France

This week’s Ironman to analyse and review age group results from is Ironman France. It’s a long standing race, held in Nice and known for it’s climbs and descents on the bike and the fact, but exposed run course. It’s a large race with around 2,500 competitors, but only offers the standard 40 age group Kona slots for the fastest of them.

Distribution of Finisher Splits at Ironman France 2018 Compared with 2008-2017

This year’s race isn’t too dissimilar from the data from the previous decade of racing in Nice. The bike is the only section that shows a clear difference in performances over the day, with 2018 being slower than the amalgamated results. Overall median times look to be similar to the pact, but it’s of note that the front of the race comes out slower. Regardless of the medians, the fifth percentile times were slower this year than usual. Where we often see a slowing in the middle to back of pack, it appears to be towards the front here.

DNS and DNF Rates at Ironman France
Year
Listed Athletes
Swim Finish
Swim DNS/DNF
Bike Finish
Bike DNF
Run Finish
Run DNF
Overall DNS/DNF
2005
1396
1265
9.4%
1238
2.1%
1102
11%
21%
2006
1156
1014
12.3%
996
1.8%
857
14%
25.9%
2007
1498
1358
9.3%
1329
2.1%
1248
6.1%
16.6%
2008
2536
2149
15.3%
2159
1952
9.6%
23%
2009
2741
2377
13.3%
2279
4.1%
2323
15.2%
2011
2617
1943
25.8%
2281
2060
9.7%
21.1%
2012
2306
2284
1%
2226
2.5%
2052
7.8%
11%
2013
2783
2481
10.9%
2455
1%
2354
4.1%
14.8%
2014
2759
2506
9.2%
2425
3.2%
2324
4.2%
15.7%
2015
2783
2480
10.9%
2407
2.9%
2250
6.5%
19.1%
2016
2885
2577
10.7%
2509
2.6%
2407
4.1%
16.6%
2017
2070
1852
10.5%
1797
3%
1636
9%
20.9%
2018
2557
2545
0.5%
2474
2.8%
2375
4%
6.9%

I’ll throw out the usual caveats that DNF and DNS numbers are sometimes mixed in previous years and so confuse the picture a little. That said if we check only bike and run DNF numbers we can see this year looks to be towards the low end of the scale.

Median Splits by Age Group at Ironman France 2018
Median Splits by Age Group at Ironman France 2008-2017

Individual age group medians vary, but don’t tend to stray too far form the trends seen in the distributions at a race of this size. That’s the case here with medians quite close between the two charts and only the bike showing any differences of note.

Top 10 Nationalities at Ironman France
Country
Count
Percentage
France
1607
58.4
United Kingdom
187
6.8
Italy
184
6.7
Belgium
119
4.3
Spain
115
4.2
Germany
91
3.3
United States
72
2.6
Switzerland
38
1.4
Denmark
24
0.9
Taiwan
22
0.8
Ironman France 2018 Predicted Kona Qualifiers by Country
Country
Percentage of Slots
Percentage of Field
France
55.0
58.4
Belgium
12.5
4.3
Germany
10.0
3.3
United Kingdom
7.5
6.8
Switzerland
5.0
1.4
Netherlands
2.5
0.7
Italy
2.5
6.7
Poland
2.5
0.6

As with most European Ironman events there’s a good spread of athletes in attendance and in this case the slots tended to fall inline with the number of competitors.

Changes in Male Finishing Times by Position at Ironman France
Changes in Female Finishing Times by Position at Ironman France

Tracking timings for specific places over the last decade we can see a lot of up and down in performances at Ironman France. Conditions have varied a lot, some years hot, some years windy, some years both. As it stands, after last year’s particularly slow event, this year represents a return to the more middle ground of the event.

Ironman France 2018 Predicted Kona Qualification Times
Age Group
Slots
Winner
Average Kona Qualifier
Final Qualifier
M18-24
2
10:11:39
10:12:27
10:13:15
M25-29
3
09:07:57
09:18:07
09:27:03
M30-34
4
09:18:51
09:22:51
09:30:54
M35-39
3
09:20:11
09:24:14
09:26:28
M40-44
5
09:16:21
09:25:24
09:30:14
M45-49
4
09:28:09
09:32:49
09:37:10
M50-54
3
09:49:57
09:54:25
09:58:59
M55-59
2
10:24:13
10:29:28
10:34:43
M60-64
2
10:37:56
10:41:12
10:44:29
M65-69
1
10:50:33
10:50:33
10:50:33
M70-74
1
13:48:43
13:48:43
13:48:43
F18-24
1
11:02:18
11:02:18
11:02:18
F25-29
1
09:56:11
09:56:11
09:56:11
F30-34
1
10:07:28
10:07:28
10:07:28
F35-39
1
10:37:53
10:37:53
10:37:53
F40-44
1
10:56:39
10:56:39
10:56:39
F45-49
1
10:09:10
10:09:10
10:09:10
F50-54
1
10:31:34
10:31:34
10:31:34
F55-59
1
12:05:41
12:05:41
12:05:41
F60-64
1
11:35:23
11:35:23
11:35:23

Base on the number of starters I’ve estimated the Kona slot allocation at Ironman France and then the automatic qualification times in each age group. Exact numbers may vary and roll down will impact on the final qualifying times too. You can read more on qualification times and compare with other races on my Kona qualification page.

Top Twenty Male Performances and Kona Qualification by Age Group at Ironman France 2018
Top Twenty Female Performances and Kona Qualification by Age Group at Ironman France 2018

Finally the top twenty times for each age group. Here we see results that are often close to the average and occasionally a little bit ahead. Certainly the top twenties are not standing out at exceptional for the most part – neither fast or slow by Ironman France standards. Here, for the most part, the front of pack performed comparably with previous races. The apparent drop off in time of the top 5% may reflect the size of the race and that the top twenty if often a much smaller portion of an age group.

You can access a spreadsheet of the full results from Ironman France 2018 on my Google Drive.

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