Not going to speak for Brooks, but generally:

SafeSport governs emotional, physical, and sexual misconduct / abuse. Everything from bullying / name-calling to grooming, etc. is governed here. I would think the concern is that you have potential exposure to more of those risks with a much larger event that has thousands more unaware age groupers that their behavior may be considered at best inappropriate under the SafeSport guidelines (and that's assuming a best-case scenario).

To put in context -- I'm volunteering for my daughter's ski races, which are governed by US Ski and Snowboard. In order to work any position that may have close contact with the athletes, I have to get a volunteer membership for USSS, then had to go through the same SafeSport / background check process I do for coaching. Somehow I don't think that's going to be the same standard we have at AG Nationals.

That said, this is, IMO, where SafeSport has the most value.

---

----------------------------------
Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

Don’t feel bad I’m in the US and have no clue either what this term means.

Thanks for the explanation. So they're trying to avoid a Triathlon Canada type of situation (except that the victims of Triathlon Canada "coaching practices" were adults), not just sexual harassment.

Still, I'd assume that these kinds of threats (sexual as well) are mostly from perpetrators who know the victim well and possibly have power over the victim (coaches, teachers, relatives, physically or emotionally violent peers, etc.), not random strangers who came to do an age group race.

---

"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

If you're talking about sexual misconduct specifically, then yes, that's usually the case.

But all of the other covered behavior (e.g., let's use bullying or other verbal abuse) is more pervasive.

Like, for example, do you know how you're supposed to appropriately console a child who might have crashed and is upset, and you're acting in a covered capacity? Because that kind of stuff is technically under the umbrella of SafeSport, too.

I loathe SafeSport requirements for those of us who primarily engage in remote one-on-one coaching relationships with adults. But this is where SafeSport is really, really important.

---

----------------------------------
Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

Do North Events (host of PTO Canadian Open last year) has officially announced PTO Canadian Open will not be hosted in Edmonton this year...

https://triathlonmagazine.ca/news/pto-canadian-open-out-for-2023/


Good article on the reason for the cancellation

thanks, fixed the link

---

"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden

I'm suggesting that so far in the almost 20 years of junior specific racing, the race environment is very much a "bubble" style atmosphere. Hell many of our current junior "specific" events even have pro or adjacent AG events themselves that are raced hours before or after said junior races. But for the most part it's very "small scale". This new "festival" setup is going to combine the ~1k juniors with 3-6k AG athletes into one weekend of racing. That's a lot of people (just think of volume of people that will be on site adding in spectators/family of athletes) and that's a lot of juniors in an environment that we've never put them in before. But again I get it, if it's a budgetary issue, ok, They have cut out 1 full week of travel logistics by combining the 2 championships (JR nats and AG Nats have always fallen on back to back weekends; JR 1st weekend, AG 2nd weekend). But do I think it's a "good idea"? No I don't. I dont think juniors should be tied in with any other AG event of this scale and magnitude. That's where the concern comes in. The overall volume of people that will be on race site, is going to be 10k+ people easily.

And how many of those people will be "safe sport" trained, so yes I think there is some issues with this setup, but again if it *has* to be like this, ok. But it never was like that for the last almost 20 years (of which I've been going to Jr Nats since 2010). USAT only requires safe sport training for those who are in "regular contact" with minors. Thus we are putting juniors in an environment that many many people will have no concept/thought/responsibility to that type of standard. At the 2022 junior nats anyone on-site that was within the team areas to wear an ID badge that was for all coaches/staff that was safe sport compliant.

And again please note this is nothing pointing at PTO.

---

Brooks Doughtie, M.S.
Exercise Physiology
-USAT Level II

They've updated the weekend race schedule: The PTO Pro Women start at 4pm on Friday and the Pro Men start at 4pm on Saturday.

Tri247 is floating the Collins Cup scheduled for November in Marrakesh, Marocco https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marrakesh
https://www.tri247.com/...arrakech-unconfirmed
"While neither confirming nor denying that the 2023 Collins Cup will be held in Marrakech in November, the PTO have said it would tick the box of taking the PTO Tour to “new and exciting places”."
Given the two PTO tour races scheduled in August plus Nice only 11 days into September, the Collins Cup was bound to move from August (as in 2021 and 2022 at Samorin).
If they tried to schedule it after Pontevedra but before Kona, they'd lose most of the 18 women: a non-starter.
So PTO in Europe in May, Singapore and Milwaukee in August and the Collins Cup first week in November: average temperature = 21°C (October) and 17°C (November).
The PTO ranking scoring protocol for 2023 (which has been trailed as significantly revised) has yet to be published (I guess in part because of timelines resolving the date of the Collins Cup).

PTO should bring some water to Marrakech to fill up the only reservoir where swim can take place, wich is located 30 miles north of Marrakech.
IM70.3 Marrakech swim took place in this reservoir in october 2019 and it was not a pleasant swim I can assure you. Just ask Tim Don.
Cheers

Is Lac Takerkoust 22 miles SSW not a more attractive option?
https://friendlymorocco.com/...es-and-things-to-do/
Anyway, there's still no PTO word on whether the Collins Cup is on (there) for November. Needs to be enough days after Kona for the women to recover. All the European AQ (top 4 of 6) will have raced at Kona unless Lawrence and EPB have 2023 PTO Tour stormers. Perhaps this will give the Internationals (Gentle, Findlay, Duffy and Jewett) a valuable advantage, at least to Match 6. Maybe they'll switch around so the men go first, followed by the women second.

The Moritz Event Company gets dumber and dumber. Is Moritz a bond villain? Middle of the desert with no water? lolz

---

Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Haters gonna hate. Sand Hollow OK in St George?
Lac Takerkoust 22 miles SSW of Marrakesh - click the link to see images of 'middle of desert'. Atlas Mountains - middle of desert?
https://friendlymorocco.com/...es-and-things-to-do/

Ah, Marketing. Like when they said it was in Bratislava and not Samorin...

---

Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

2028 Olympics: Long Beach.

Long Beach is at least physically connected to Los Angeles, where you would swim for this is not close to Marrakesh. It's like calling Bonelli Park a part of Los Angeles and not San Dimas and Pomona.

---

Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

So, where's the Collins Cup?

---

Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Your guess is as good as mine.

---

----------------------------------
Editor-in-Chief, Slowtwitch.com | Twitter

No Collins Cup this year.

We hope your season is going well and you are enjoying racing being back in full-swing for 2023.
As mentioned in earlier communications, we are now in a position to give you a brief update on plans and important dates for 2023 and beyond.

4th PTO Tour Event – 2023
We have made the difficult decision not to move ahead with a 4th event on the PTO Tour for 2023, including The Collins Cup. Timing and logistics did not allow for us to deliver the event to the high standards we require, especially given the scale of our broadcast production. As has been shared before, our intention is that the majority of PTO events will take place over multiple days, with independent races for Pro Men and Pro Women as well as entirely separate opportunities for age groupers to race. While this ensures the best ‘product’ it does have a bigger operational impact on our host cities compared to ‘normal’ single day (or morning) event. Our focus now turns to ensuring we deliver to these high standards with the PTO US Open in Milwaukee and the PTO Asian Open in Singapore.

PTO Tour 2024
As outlined in Chris Kermode’s (PTO Chairman) letter earlier in the year, we believe for the professional sport to reach its potential, it needs to evolve from a fragmented calendar to a ‘season long narrative’ that can provide fans, future fans and our broadcast partners with consistent opportunities to see the top athletes racing head-to-head.
To support creating a more consistent calendar, the PTO will evolve its membership agreements to provide travel support and marketing contracts to the highest ranked athletes at PTO Tour events. Selection for these agreements will be based on your PTO Ranking – so there is no need to do anything different or change your current racing plans – just perform to your potential as a professional. We will use two ranking selection dates for this: August 21st and December 10th (accounting for the final rankings event of 2023 – which is Challenge Salinas) and share more information nearer the time.


We also want to make it easier for everyone to plan their seasons so will be aiming to announce the full calendar, including dates, locations and qualifications in October of 2023.

Athletes
As the integral part of the PTO, we will also continue to work on ways to engage, develop, and support the full Athlete Membership and recognise the importance of this to help grow the organisation as a whole.

Not terribly surprised given that the Collins Cup never delivered the dividend they were hoping for? Big broadcasting dollars etc
It’s was nothing more than an easy pay day for the pros who will probably miss it the most. Think most of us thought the concept was largely a yawn as well

Seems with Kermode his mandate was to get the organization to sustainability and that the pathway to profitability was actually going to be arduous and that they needed to stop throwing money around. Weirdly Renouf should have been the one to do this as CEO I think right? But Adamo as chair seemed to have a different idea. Weird structure anyways.

Point being is they were burning hundred dollar bills like no tomorrow, so seeing the bonus pool cut and the open invites cut, and the broadcast quality cut, I'm wondering how they get to profitability as there is now limited market differentiation other than the tight race package.

---

Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

Sounds like this billionaire is tired of pumping money into it. Pros better hope another one falls out of the sky.

Responding to you, Brooks, because you mentioned marketing.

Today the PTO sent me an e-mail. Subject line:


It’s Race Week! How to Watch the PTO US Open


What do I find inside the e-mail? A link where I can fill in a form with my data and they'll let me know how I can watch the PTO US Open. Click-bait subject line and zero information.

Is it just me or are they out of their fucking minds?

Pat Lemieux criticized the PTO for not including the exact race times in their website (when they were already decided and the info distributed to PROs), but this beats his adventures...

---

"FTP is a bit 2015, don't you think?" - Gustav Iden