Super League Triathlon

Super League Triathlon is a league of nonstandard triathlon-based races held in the traditional off-season of the sport. Every race involves a swim, bike and run element but all contain additional rules in an aim to test athletic ability, increase viewer excitement and increase the popularity of triathlon more globally.

Super League Triathlon
SportTriathlon
Founded2017
Most recent
champion(s)		 Vincent Luis (FRA)
 Katie Zaferes (USA)
Sponsor(s)RBC
Official websitehttps://www.superleaguetriathlon.com/

Structure

The leagues season lasts from around September to April, over the course of the season Rounds are held at locations around the world, a Round will normally cover a weekend with multiple races occurring for both the men's and women's competition.[1]

Contracts

Being a closed league only athletes who have a contract with the league for the current season may compete, most athletes that are considered to be the current best in the world are invited to sign contracts with additional contracts won in preseason qualifier events and others awarded to local athletes. The current split is the top ten from the previous season are awarded contracts with ten more split between the best placed at the two qualifying events and the final five being wild card invites currently favouring young or local athletes.[2] This gives a total of 25 athletes for both the men's and women's competitions.[3]

Jerseys

All athletes wear the same yellow jersey with the leagues sponsorship on it, however there is also space for personal or national sponsors. Each jersey is adorned with the athletes national flag for men on the left shoulder and for women on the side panelling under both arms. Special coloured jerseys are awarded to athletes to distinguish them each colour has a specific meaning:[4]

  • blue-fastest swim split from the previous round
  • green-fastest bike split from the previous round
  • red-fastest run split from the previous round
  • white-athletes under 21
  • pink-overall points lead

A jersey of each colour is awarded to the relevant men and women before the start of the next round, except the white jersey which is awarded to all of the athletes under 21.

The women's jerseys are currently a more revealing design than that of the men. This continues to draw criticism from female triathlon participants across the sport with regards to objectification of female athletes and safety/health implications of a lack of breast tissue support and skin cancer risk, due to their open back design.

Points

During every Round each race awards points towards an athletes Round score then at the end of a Round athletes are ranked based on their total Round points and awarded League points based on placement, the athlete with the most League points at the end of the season is crowned the overall winner. Point distributions for Round and League points are the same using the following spread.[1]

Place 1st 2nd 3rd 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12-15 16-20 >21 DNS
Points 25 21 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 3 2 1 0 -3

Any athlete that gets pulled from a race due to a time cut will have Round points removed, if they are pulled in the first stage of a race the lose two points if they are pulled during the second stage they lose one point and if they are pulled in the third stage they are awarded 0 points for that race.

Races

Super league triathlon was created with the aim of testing athletes abilities in each discipline of a triathlon (swim, bike, run) but not in the usual way, to do this the league consists exclusively of races that do not follow this convention. Each race is designed to test different aspects of an athletes ability and racing nous. All races are based on short loops this leads to fast and aggressive styles of racing, this also means that the race can be based in a city allowing spectators to repeatedly see athletes pass and cause minimal inconvenience to the host.

At every location a short loop for each race element (swim, bike and run) is set around a central transition area then each race will use those loops but in different variations depending on the race.

The current five races are:

  • Triple Mix- Three short triathlons are raced but in each triathlon the order of the disciplines is changed the first is a traditional swim-bike-run the second is a run-bike-swim and the third is a bike-swim-run, with a ten minute break between each stage to rest and reset their equipment ready for the next one. The first two stages are mass starts with the third being a pursuit with start times based on the sum of the previous two meaning the first over the line of third stage wins the Triple Mix.[5]
  • Eliminator-Three short triathlons are raced but at the end of each triathlon the slowest are removed and do not start the next stage. After the first stage the 15 fastest race again then the top ten from the second stage advance to the third stage where the order over the line is the given order of the Eliminator.[6]
  • Enduro- Three short triathlons are concatenated into one long swim-bike-run-swim-bike-run-swim-bike-run race with the added punishment that last two into transition after each discipline are eliminated.[6]
  • Sprint Enduro- The field is split in two by random draw, each half races a short triathlon with the first five from each half advancing along with the two fastest finishers not to automatically qualify. Those who advance race a shorter enduro race consisting of two short triathlons i.e. a swim-bike-run-swim-bike-run race.[6]
  • Equalizer-A two-stage race comprising an individual cycling time trial in for the first stage then the second stage a swim-run-swim-bike-run is raced with the stage started pursuit style with the time gaps from the previous time trial.[7]

Also if an athlete is at any point 90 seconds down from first place they are pulled form the event. This is to keep the focus of the race at the front and to avoid athletes getting lapped and interfering with the race due to the short loops used for the course.

In all instances the swim is open-water and the cycling will be draft-legal.

2018–2019 season

About the season

Men's Results
Round RaceFirstSecondThird
 Jersey Triple Mix[8]  Vincent Luis (FRA)  Henri Schoeman (RSA)  Kristian Blummenfelt (NOR)
Enduro[9]  Vincent Luis (FRA)  Henri Schoeman (RSA)  Richard Murray (RSA)
 Malta Eliminator[10] Richard Murray (RSA) Vincent Luis (FRA) Henri Schoeman (RSA)
Equalizer[11] Vincent Luis (FRA) Henri Schoeman (RSA) Tyler Mislawchuk (CAN)
Mallorca Triple Mix[12]  Henri Schoeman (RSA) Vincent Luis (FRA) Jonathan Brownlee (GBR)
Sprint Enduro[13]  Vincent Luis (FRA) Jonathan Brownlee (GBR) Henri Schoeman (RSA)
 Singapore Eliminator[14]  Jonathan Brownlee (GBR) Tyler Mislawchuk (CAN) Hayden Wilde (NZ)
Enduro[14]  Vincent Luis (FRA) Jonathan Brownlee (GBR) Henri Schoeman (RSA)

Women's Results
Round RaceFirstSecondThird
 Jersey Triple Mix[8]  Cassandre Beaugrand (FRA)  Katie Zaferes (USA)  Ashleigh Gentle (AUS)
Enduro[9]  Katie Zaferes (USA)  Kirsten Kasper (USA)  Cassandre Beaugrand (FRA)
 Malta Eliminator[15] Katie Zaferes (USA) Rachel Kalmer (NED) Joanna Brown (CAN)
Equalizer[16] Katie Zaferes (USA) Kirsten Kasper (USA) Summer Cook (USA)
Mallorca Triple Mix[17]  Katie Zaferes (USA) Taylor Spivey (USA) Kirsten Kasper (USA)
Sprint Enduro[18]  Taylor Spivey (USA) Kirsten Kasper (USA) Katie Zaferes (USA)
 Singapore Eliminator[19]  Katie Zaferes (USA) Cassandre Beaugrand (FRA) Ashleigh Gentle (AUS)
Enduro[19]  Cassandre Beaugrand (FRA) Katie Zaferes (USA) Rachel Klamer (NED)

2017

The 2017 season consisted of a test event that was held on Hamilton Island, Australia in order to gauge popularity as well as test many of the unique factors about super league i.e the unique race formats). After the success of the test event, another event now also hosting a woman's competition was held on Jersey; this event refined many of the original ideas and allowed for further testing.

Announcement

Although it had been a somewhat open secret in the triathlon media, on 10 February Super league triathlon was officially announced and its website launched.[20] During the announcement one of the founders Chris McCormack declared it to be the future of triathlon with 25 of the best professional men competing in action-packed, innovative race formats competing for 200,000 US dollars.[21] It was stated that although this was a test event there were already plans to include an equal woman's event as well as age group races and a total prize purse of 1.5 million US dollars. The series was to be broadcast on television locally by Australia's Fox Sports and in Europe by Eurosport the series also stated that the races would be available to stream live on their own website.[21]

Invited athletes

[22][23]

Hosts
Super league locations
Country Location Year
20172018-19[24]
 Australia Hamilton Island•
 Jersey Saint Helier••
 Singapore •
 Malta Bormla•[25]
 Spain Mallorca, Porto Cristo•

References
    1. "Points and scoring" (PDF). superleaguetriathlon.com. August 2018.
    2. "Qualifier Series - Super League Triathlon". Super League Triathlon. Retrieved 2018-10-09.
    3. "Championship Series - Super League Triathlon". Super League Triathlon. Retrieved 2018-10-09.
    4. "Super League Triathlon on Twitter". Twitter. Retrieved 2018-10-09.
    5. "Blummenfelt wins Super League Jersey Day One Triple Mix | Elite News | Tri247.com". Tri247.com. 2017-09-23. Retrieved 2018-10-07.
    6. "Super League Triathlon: the race formats | Event News | Tri247.com". Tri247.com. 2017-02-10. Retrieved 2018-10-07.
    7. "02 - A GUIDE TO THE SUPER LEAGUE TRIATHLON EQUALIZER FORMAT - TRIfinder". www.trifinder.co.uk. Retrieved 2018-10-07.
    8. "Jersey Superleague 2018 | Pro". jersey-superleague-pros.r.mikatiming.de. Retrieved 2018-10-06.
    9. "Jersey Superleague 2018 | Pro". jersey-superleague-pros.r.mikatiming.de. Retrieved 2018-10-06.
    10. "SLT Malta Day Two: Richard Murray runs to Eliminator win | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-10-27. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    11. "SLT Malta Day Three: Vincent Luis sprints to victory | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-10-28. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    12. "SLT Mallorca Day One: Henri Schoeman takes Triple Mix victory | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-11-03. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    13. "SLT Mallorca Day Two: Luis holds off Brownlee in a thriller | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-11-04. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    14. "Men – Singapore – S18 » Super League Triathlon". Super League Triathlon. Retrieved 2019-03-05.
    15. "SLT Malta Day Two: Katie Zaferes dominates The Eliminator | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-10-27. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    16. "SLT Malta Day Three: Double success for Katie Zaferes in The Equalizer | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-10-28. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    17. "SLT Mallorca Day One: Katie Zaferes dominates Super League Triathlon. Again. | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-11-03. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    18. "SLT Mallorca Day Two: Taylor Spivey heads another USA podium sweep | Elite News". Tri247.com. 2018-11-04. Retrieved 2018-12-06.
    19. "Women – Singapore – S18 » Super League Triathlon". Super League Triathlon. Retrieved 2019-03-05.
    20. "Super League Triathlon is launched | Event News | Tri247.com". Tri247.com. 2017-02-10. Retrieved 2018-10-13.
    21. "New format | Chris McCormack presents "Super League Triathlon"". TriathlonWorld.com - go further. race better. know more. Retrieved 2018-10-13.
    22. "Contracted athletes 2017" (PDF). trimaxhebdo.com. February 2017.
    23. "2017 athlete bios" (PDF). maltinpr.com. January 2017.
    24. "Super League Triathlon confirms 2018-19 season | Event News | Tri247.com". Tri247.com. 2018-04-24. Retrieved 2018-10-02.
    25. Ltd, Allied Newspapers. "Super League Series adds Malta to its 2018 schedule". Times of Malta. Retrieved 2018-10-06.
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