TSP11: Upset in Australia. Part 1.

The video above is the 1987 Nice Triathlon. Won by Kirsten Hanssen and Rick Wells. The race was held on 25th October and was the last important international race of the triathlon year. 

The 1987 season had been a long one for Hanssen and Wells. Both had been active on the USTS circuit. Hanssen actually won the final in Hilton Head and the overall Coke Grand Prix. And both had peaked mid-season for the $100,000 race in Bermuda. Where Hanssen won and Wells got 4th. 

But Hanssen and Wells’ seasons actually started in January. At 30:50 mark in the video, when Craig Masback says that Wells was the short distance world champion he was referring to the self-titled World Sprint Championships that took place in Perth, Australia on 17th January 1987.

TSP3 was about the emergence of aerobars in the spring of 1987. Well those Unofficial World Sprint Championships were the last internationally significant triathlon without aerobars.

Images: Triathlete (USA) November 1986

But before we get into Perth let’s start our story by jumping ahead to 31st March 1989 with the formation of The International Triathlon Union at meetings held in Avignon, France.

Finally, after previous failed attempts to form a world governing body, the main triathlon centres of Europe, the USA, Australasia and Japan came together to defeat their common enemy.

That was The International Modern Pentathlon Union. A body that had offered to govern triathlon and give the sport its best chance of eventually being accepted into the Olympic Games.

But there were also rumours that the UIPM wanted to change the format of triathlon completely. Maybe into a points-based event, like the Modern Pentathlon, with three individual time trials.

During these meetings Les Macdonald became the first president of the ITU. Les was British born, held a Canadian passport and spoke French. He was also passionate about moving triathlon forward as a highly organised global sport and eventually getting it into the Olympics.

It was also decided that the first official World Short-Course Championships organised under this new world governing body would take place in Avignon on 6th August 1989. Those races were won by Erin Baker and Mark Allen. The ITU then launched a World Cup Series in 1991 and organised the first World Long Distance Championships in Nice in 1994.

As I mentioned earlier, before the formation of the ITU in 1989 there were several other attempts to form a world governing body. At a conference in Amsterdam on the 14th and 15th November 1987 the Triathlon Fédération International or the TFI was created. And the city of Kelowna in Canada was awarded their first world championships.

But after these meetings and during subsequent meetings in Vancouver on 30th January 1988 there was a falling out between the representatives from the USA and the Europeans. Due to the system of voting on decisions. There was also no consensus on what to do about Japan’s potential membership. As they showed up to Amsterdam with two rival federations.

Member countries of the ETU refused to attend the Kelowna race. And so it was scrapped as an official World Championship. The race went ahead, however and is also out there on YouTube.

Now. Before all these political kerfuffles happened. As well as Perth there were already two other races being proclaimed as world championships. 

The first Nice International Triathlon took place on 20th November 1982 and was billed by the organisers IMG and the broadcaster NBC as the World Triathlon Championships. Then in reaction, the Hawaii Ironman and their broadcaster ABC also decided to use the designation in October 1982. 

Already for the February 1982 race they’d put the words World Triathlon on their publicity poster and the winners’ trophies.

The second Hawaii Ironman of 1982 took place 6 weeks before Nice on 9th October. In later years, Nice would do the switcheroo and schedule their event a couple of weeks before Hawaii. In an attempt to either get the pros at their freshest or force them to make a choice between the two races.

So. Before 1989. If you offered enough prize money and most of the best athletes in the world showed up. Then why not call your race a World Championship. There was nobody with any authority to tell you not to.

Unlike Nice, which offered big money from the first year, Hawaii didn’t pay out until 1986. But they obviously believed their place in history was enough to keep attracting the fastest racers.

Later in the 1990s the ITU did start to try and shut down races unofficially using the word “world” for their event. The most publicised one was the World Cup on the Gold coast.

Images:
Triathlete (USA) May 1987
Tri-Athlete (FR) Mars-Avril 1987

Although the organisers of the Perth race in 1987 named it the World Sprint Distance Championships, the distances were actually what we now call Olympic or Standard Distance.

A race report, appeared in the May 1987 issue of Triathlete (USA) and the June 1987 issue of Tri-Athlete (FR). It was written by the then editor Terry Mulgannon. You can see both above with links to the magazine issues where I found them. And. If you listen to the podcast audio at the top of the page you can hear me reading the English version.

Links:

1987 Nice Triathlon
TSP3: I Bought Four Sets Of Scott DH Handlebars
1987 USTS Hilton Head Triathlon
1987 Bermuda Triathlon
1989 ITU World Championships in Avignon
1988 Kelowna Triathlon

Sources:

Carl Thomas Interview on Innervoice
FFTRI Triathlon History Portal
Ironman Posters
25 Years of the Ironman World Championships by Bob Babbitt
Iron Will by Mike Plant
Triathlete (USA) June 1988
Triathlete (USA) November 1988
Triathlete (USA) December 1987