Performance analysis of elite Brazil-Ironman athletes from 2003 to 2010

Abstract

The aim of this study was to analyze the performance evolution on the Brazil-Ironman from 2003 to 2010. Additionally, we verified which of the modalities were the most influential on the overall performance. The first ten athletes for each year in the ELITE male category were analyzed. The differences between the racing times were analyzed by ANOVA, followed by Tukey post-hoc test. Pearson's correlation coefficient was utilized to investigate the association between races performance and the performance in each one of the different modalities. The results showed that there was no performance evolution over the years and a great variation in racing times was observed. We have found a important correlation between cycling performance and race time (r = 0.82; p < 0.01) and the fastest athlete in cycling was the Brazil-Ironman champion in 75% of the analyzed years. Thus, it was concluded that there was no evolution in race time over the analyzed years. Additionally, the cycling might be the most influential modality for athletes' success in Brazil-Ironman.