Who are the Important Stakeholders in Elite Triathlon?

It’s Monday morning and the dust has settled.

Jeanne Lehair and David Castro Fajardo are European champions after brilliant efforts and the world of elite triathlon is ready to move on to the next thing. However, with the events of the European Championships now consigned to history, it is hard not feel the whole thing was a little farcical.

Indeed, thinking about how the weekend in Madrid panned out, there is a big question to be asked. Who really matters in elite triathlon?

Let’s start with the primary issue in Madrid. Due to heavy rainfall, the water quality in the lake was deemed unsafe for the athletes. As a result the event had to be switched from a triathlon to a duathlon to keep the athletes out of the water.

If the water quality was considered unsafe, then the correct decision was taken in the interests of athlete safety. It is not reasonable to expect them to put their health at risk to compete and from that perspective Europe Triathlon landed on the right choice.

However, there are plenty of questions to pose throughout the chain of decisions taken by Europe Triathlon.

The water issue reared its head on the Saturday morning when, because of the quality hazard, the age-group Olympic distance races and the Para-triathlon events were converted into duathlons.

The first question here is if the water was unsafe on the Saturday, did any at Europe Triathlon truly believe that in barely twenty-four hours it would suddenly be safe? Once the water was considered dangerous enough on the Saturday, the Sunday should realistically have been deemed unsafe too.

Europe Triathlon opted to try to keep the Sunday races alive. With that in mind, a statement should have been put out on Saturday to say a final decision would be taken on the Sunday morning. Europe Triathlon did not do that.

They instead chose to publicly broadcast that evening that the elite races would still be a triathlon. After the uncertainty of Saturday afternoon, several athletes expressed their happiness at the call.

A little over twelve hours later the rug, though, was pulled out from under their feet. Europe Triathlon changed their minds and the race became a duathlon.

The last-minute change was poor management.

It is obviously easy to say now with the benefit of hindsight that it was a mistake to confirm the status of the race on the Saturday evening. But did no one have a sliver of doubt about how the Sunday would pan out?

Had anyone checked the forecast on the Saturday morning, they would have seen the possibility of rain over the subsequent thirty-six hours. Seeing as rain was the source of the issue before, surely even the slightest chance of further rain should have given the organisers pause for thought.

The narrative that Europe Triathlon sought to push around the change was that they cared about athlete welfare. However the reality of the situation is that the athletes were the last people to be taken into account. If anyone had put their interests first, the decision making process would have more robust and there would not have been any sudden flip-flopping.

This leads to the question: if not the athletes, who really are the key stakeholders in the sport?

Based on the European Championships, it is hard to say that the fans are valued either.

There is no sugar-coating this. The coverage of Madrid was poor. Amid missing the start of the women’s race, the underwhelming commentary and the camera shots in which it was hard to tell if the blurry moving shapes ahead of the motorcycle were people or something altogether different, can any fan hand on heart say the enjoyed the viewing experience?

Some might have enjoyed the random shots of trees and fences and tarmac while the action occurred elsewhere.

Under the livestream on TriathlonLive, comments to that effect were left by fans upset at the inadequacy of the product, a product that they had paid for with their subscription.

Furthermore the coverage displayed incorrect timing splits throughout. To take an example from the women’s race, Petra Kurikova and Miriam Casillas were apparently ahead of Cathia Schär and Tanja Neubert on the run even as the camera showed the Swiss and German pair ahead. Live timing gaslighting was probably not on anyone’s bingo card before the race.

Europe Triathlon has some interesting initiatives like their “Rising Stars”. Nevertheless, they would on balance be better served by getting their flagship product right.

Which brings us back to the original question. If not the fans or the athletes, who matters in this sport?

It seems logical that the people doing the actual running, biking and swimming and those paying to watch those athletes are the heart of the sport. They are the ones that matter. Maybe that is a bad take. Yet if you take out the athletes and the fans, there is nothing left.

Both groups deserved better treatment than what was afforded to them.

The mess of the European Championships will not have enticed any new fans to the sport and will have sent plenty of athletes home disappointed by factors out of their control.

Somewhere along the way in Madrid, people in positions of control either panicked or they did not care enough about the athletes or the fans. And neither of those are particularly satisfying conclusions.

When those in charge hopefully review how future episodes can be avoided, then, perhaps they could start by asking themselves a question.

Who are the most important stakeholders in elite triathlon?