Ironman Hamburg 2025: Age Group Stats and Qualification Times
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EmailAs the season builds up we’re starting to hit some of the faster events on the Ironman calendar. Hamburg ranks as one of the fastest races, delivering a record time in the women’s pro field this year. In wet conditions, how did the race look for age groupers though?
Result Distributions
Overall there’s not much difference between this year’s race and the amalgamated results of the previous 5 races (2019-2024). At the median and 25th percentile the race looks to be slightly faster, but it’s hardly a significant difference. at the front of the age group field it is much the same. Swim times look to distribute slightly slower (consistently across the field) while bike and run time distribute slightly faster. None of these differences makes this year’s event stand out though. Business as usual for the age group ranks.
DNF Rates
DNF rates are a bit higher this year which likely reflects the stormy start to the day and wet conditions. There’s a 1% DNF bump at each step of the race brining the overall DNF to 9%. The second highest this course has seen, but not enough to put it near the levels of famously tough courses like Wales or Lanzarote.
Median Splits
With the distribution of finish and split times being close to previous races the medians also largely match up. Variations between this year and previous years are relatively small, particularly in larger age groups.
Competitor Origins
European races will always have a spread of competitors from across Europe and that’s the case in Hamburg. Germans make up just over a third of the competitors, they also look to claim around that many qualifying slots too.
Performance Changes
Tracking changing times for age groupers over the years of racing in Hamburg shows a lot of stability in recent years. Larger age groups show the mostly level results since 2021. In smaller age groups there’s a bigger fluctuation with slower years for 2019 and 2021. Earlier, 2018 stands out as a particularly fast race while 2024 had some fast male times for those in their 30s.
Qualification
As always I’ve estimated final qualifying times based on the number of athletes starting in each age group and the slots they should be allocated by the algorithm. If you’re interested I recently wrote about the methodology of slot allocation. Knowing slot numbers I then look at the times that achieve qualification, this doesn’t factor in roll down. You can explore qualification and adjust the slot allocation on my Hamburg qualification page.
We can expect lower slot numbers all round in the 2026 season as all athletes return to Kona.
Age Group Top 20
The final charts plot the top 20 in each age group over Hamburg’s many years of racing. Slot numbers are highlighted to show where qualification falls along with an average line and last year’s results. These charts suggest that for women and men under 35 this was a faster than average year, although not matching the fastest times seen. In the largest male age groups over 35 we see times lie closer to the average. The competitive M40-44 divisions being an exception to this. I’ll also note men in their 60s performed well above average too.
Conclusion
Hamburg is a consistent course that reliably produces fast times across the age group field. This appears to hold true even on a wet race day, its impact only showing in a higher DNF rate, not in any significant change to race times. Overall there’s not much to separate performances in the last 5 years of racing there. It’s a good course to chase a fast time, more challenging to qualify particularly when slot numbers reduce.
