Ironman Sweden 2025: Age Group Stats and Qualification Times

Ironman Kalmar took place in Sweden over the weekend. The first Ironman to have performance based qualifying slots for the 2026 World Champs win Kona. It also had a number of slots for the 2025 World Champs in Nice and Kona. For the purposes of this analysis I’ve focused on the 2026 qualification numbers, but you can explore all the data in the stats section.

Result Distributions

Not the most exciting distribution comparison to make, this year’s race falls completely in line with results from the past few years of racing in Sweden. There are no significant differences between any of the distributions.

DNF Rates

Similarly, DNF rates are normal for Sweden, around the 5% mark as it’s been in the majority of previous years. Looks to have been a normal day of business in Kalmar.

Median Splits

Median splits follow the pattern in the distributions, meaning that while there are fluctuations between age groups they largely match previous years of racing.

Competitor Origins

Kalmar attracts a broad range of athletes with about 50% from Sweden. 2026 slots mainly stay in Sweden but are also shared over a range of countries present.

Performance Changes

Tracking performance changes over the history of Kalmar shows that consistency is a feature. For the major age groups times don’t vary that much over the last decade of racing. Not many races have such smooth curves.

Qualification

Applying the new qualification method I’ve calculated how many slots will end up in different age groups as a consequence of ranking adjusted finishing times. If you’re at all familiar with past slot allocations you’ll see some clear differences. Men in their fifties performed particularly well. The top 20 charts below help explain their high slot count.

If you go to the qualification page for Kalmar you can also see the allocation of 2025 qualification slots and adjust slot numbers to explore the impact this has on qualification times.

Age Group Top 20

A lot of age group top twenty times actually trend faster than average. The front-of-pack looks to be quick this year. Particularly for male age groups. Where we see a male age group claiming more slots we’re also seeing their times among the fastest seen, and well ahead of the average. This goes some way to explain their high rankings for qualification.

Conclusion

We can easily describe this as a normal year of racing in Kalmar. While there were some fast times at the front, the overall results don’t vary much from past races. The most notable features of this year’s race was the presence of two sets of qualification slots for 2025 and 2026, along with the first application of the new qualification system in Ironman.