Race Coverage

"I'M SLOWING DOWN"...

Thursday, 14 May 2015 00:10

By Ben Ewers (benewers.blogspot.com)

St. George 70.3 Race Report - I won the 65-69 age group with a 5:38, but slower than last years 5:32 on an easier weather day.  So, what is happening?

Well, I'm just getting older.  It's tough to compete at the "old" end of the "older" age groups.  In a prior post I compared the relative performance of the best age-groupers as a function of age.  I did this utilizing the USAT ranking system, and the USAT statistics for 2014 reaffirmed the general trend of an accelerating decline after age 40. To further smooth the recent 2014 USAT statistics, I averaged the scores of the top 5 ranked athletes in each age group.  The results were as shown below:

AGE-GROUP               MALE                FEMALE(1)
                 20-24                                104.3                   102.0
                 25-29                                104.6                   104.1
                 30-34                                105.3                   103.1
                 35-39                                105.8                   103.7
                 40-44                                103.9                   101.7 ...

                 45-49                                101.2                    99.4
                 50-54                                 97.9                     99.6
                 55-59                                 93.8                     94.8
                 60-64                                 90.2                     85.9
                 65-69                                 84.0                     79.4
                 70-74                                 76.2                     72.9
                 75-79                                 66.8                       (2)...READ MORE