Harder than ever to get into an IM race

Why does this make it harder than ever to get into a race?  The only thing that has changed is allowing athletes racing this year to register for next year the day before the race rather than the day after.  I don't see anything else that has changed that would make it any harder for people to register online.  Since there has always been on site registration available, there is no reason that this change in and of itself would leave any fewer slots available for online registration.

It is ever increasing demand that is making it harder to get into the races, not the registration process itself.

-Steve 

You're right, it is the continually increasing demand that makes Ironman races difficult to get into.  However, with current year athletes signing up before anyone else, then the onsite registration getting started early the next day, folks trying to sign up via the internet are going to have some quick fingers and fast internet connections in order to secure one of the few remaining slots.  Not that I'm complaining.  I'm fortunate to live close to IMCDA and IMCA so both of those will continue to be relatively easy for me to register for.

I agree with that.. plus with the extra lead time hopefully they will know exactly how many slots are left for the online sign ups and not be a rushed affair the morning of.

 Plus I believe IMKY is still open..and has been for 3-4 wks..

Yep.  At least for a little while (that increasing demand thing noted above). 

On-site has always been given preference over on-line.  NAS sees how many slots they have to give on-site and then decides how many to release to active on-line.  Same thing now.  This just makes it easier for them to do it in a timely fashion.  They were a little overwhelmed at LP this year with the number of on-site (and they still allowed you to sign up somebody else then too) and had to delay the on-line registration for a few hours.

I would guess that sometime in the next 2-3 years that one or more of LP, WI and FL will not have any slots go to on-line though.  Could even happen as early as next year.

History was made ... Johnnykay can say he took part in the last IM where they allowed friends/family to register other people at the line mess at Lake Placid!  And because of that there are these new rules ......

Thank gawd Johnny is in the history books for that, otherwise I'd be sitting at home next July.

I have a suggestion.  The athletes who sign up the day before their IM should be able to use that reg for any IM event.  This allows athletes to experience different events without having to fly to to the other venues to make sure they get in.  There would be enough cross pollination that the numbers would even out.

Don't you think that NA Sports would want to encourage people to do different races rather than the same one every year?  I would think the host communities would want this as well.

Actually, I don't think I like it.  Seems this would likely begin to lock-out new athletes to the races.  And that's probably of greater importance to NAS and the host communities.

It definately happens for IM.  Though in a fairly predictable statistical manner.  They sell more slots than they expect (or want) to have race.  That's why they don't pass those out to somebody else.  They could sell fewer up front and then have a wait list, but it doesn't let any more get to race.  So your last statement is absolutely correct. 

Yeah, like JohnnyKay said they already factor in the drop outs and oversell the races accordingly. A "waiting list" system would actually just make it harder to get into the race during initial registration since they'd have fewer slots to sell. And then, how do you train if you're on the waiting list? Do you train as if you're doing the race, making all the associated sacrifices in the hopes that you'll get in? That would be awfully hard to manage mentally...hard to stay motivated knowing you might not get in, and/or very depressing putting in all the work and then not getting in.

Besides that, there's no upside for NAS/WTC. They're more than happy to take money from 2600 people knowing that only 2200 will show up on race day.

-Steve