Piranha National Series strategy

As National Series Coordinator for Piranha, I am pleased to announce our National Series Strategy for 2015.

This year Triathlon Ireland have altered the structure of the National Series by creating a new draft legal 6 race “Super Series” which will provide some exciting head to head racing for the top athletes in the country (cat 1). While there are a few of our members who have qualified for Cat 1, most of us will take part in the non-draft Vodafone National Series which features 29 races taking place between April and September.

The primary measurement of the success of the National Series Strategy is to increase the number of members who complete the regulation 4 (or more) Super Series or National Series races. We will also measure (i) our performance in the Super Series and Vodafone National Series Championships and (ii) our number of podium positions at the Annual TI Awards. Note that TI Awards include Duathlon (March 29^th in Ennis) and Aquathon (July 11^th in Galway) National Championships.

To deliver on this strategy, I (with assistance of the Committee) have identified 6 out of the 29 Super and National Series races that will be designated as ‘Club Races’. There are two Standard and four Sprint distances. We are also proposing that we have formal ‘Away Weekends’, like last year, around three of the six Club Races.

The Club Races are:

TriAthy Sprint will be the Club Championship – with a club night out in Dublin that evening. If the Sprint race doesn’t take your fancy, we recommend members take part in the TryaTri, Olympic or Double Olympic that day. The more Piranha’s the merrier! The away weekends will be Dunmore East, Kilkee and Kinsale. It is also intended that we have a club night out in Dublin after the final race of the season, Pulse Port Beach Triathlon, so mark your diaries now!

The races have been selected to encourage the maximum participation of Piranha members. They are either relatively close to Dublin and / or usually get a very high participation rate from our members.

For each Club Race, we will seek to do the following:

• Race Directors: for each race we will contact the Race Director and confirm with him / her that Piranha has selected their race as a “Club Race”. We will ask to be kept informed of Piranha registrants and also to receive advance warning if the race is approaching its maximum capacity.
• Registration: we will publish key registration dates for each race and monitor Piranha registrants. Note, TriAthy Sprint is open now so no time like the present to enter!
• Transport: we will promote car-pooling through the Piranha site
• Accommodation: We will research and recommend hotels and / or houses for away weekends and pre-book restaurants
• Event Co–ordination: We will work with the Events Officer, the lovely Emer Tighe, to arrange official Piranha night’s out after some of these club races
• Warm-up: we will organise a formal warm-up for Piranhas prior to the race and provide last minutes tips / pep-talk for peak performance
• NS Points Tracker: we will report on the NS points performance for all Piranhas and celebrate successes as they are achieved.

Through this strategy the club aims to build on the significant and great work of our previous National Series Co-ordinator and current Chairman, Bernard Hanratty, and increase the number of Piranhas completing the required number of Super and National Series races, and consequently improve our performance in the NS Club Championships and in the TI Awards.

We look forward to your participation and welcome any thoughts / comments you have on the strategy itself.

William Owens

National Series Coordinator