Ironman Ottawa 2025: Age Group Stats and Qualification Times
Almost a week ago Ironman Ottawa debuted on the Ironman Calendar. The new Canadian race drew a decent sized field and offered slots to Kona and Nice. Qualification at this race was still based on start numbers with the switch over to performance happening later in August.
As a new race there’s no historic data to compare 2025’s results with. So, I’ve compared with the last year of results from North American Ironman races to give some context.
Result Distributions
Compared to other North American races of the last year, Ottawa is slightly faster at the average. It’s largely the same further ahead in the race. There’s an interesting dip in number finishing just after 12 hours, unusual to see in a race with over 2,000 starters. The bike course trends a little faster than the other races, but the run is much the same. Swim times are distinctly slower for this race.
A single race gives a limited picture of the course and we should remember that grouping a mix of races for comparison will tend to give a broader range of results. Whether this will be a consistent pattern for Ottawa remains to be seen.
DNF Rates
DNF rates at Ottawa are low in comparison to most other North American Ironman races we’ve seen recently. At this level Ottawa falls in the normal range for Ironman.
Median Splits
Medians will follow the distribution for the most part. So, swim is the clearest difference with Ottawa being much slower. Bike splits are also generally faster while run doesn’t differ as consistently.
Competitor Origins
The majority of the field is from Canada as we expect. Slots are likely to have mostly remained with Canadians too.
Qualification
Based on start numbers I’ve calculated the slot allocation for this race and from that the final qualification times before roll down. This was applied using the older system of qualification, but you can try out the new system on my Ottawa qualification page.
Age Group Top 20
For comparison I’ve plotted the times of the top 20 age groupers at Ironman Ottawa 2025 alongside those from other North American races and their average times. Age groups vary (one of the reasons we’ll see more varied slot allocations with the new system) but for the most part they aren’t too far from the average. Perhaps trending slightly faster in Ottawa.
Conclusion
Overall Ironman Ottawa doesn’t appear to be too different from other North American races. Certainly not a fast course, but consistent with results for the region. The swim is the one thing that stands out with particularly slow times for this.