The PTO and World Triathlon will announce a collaboration in which the PTO Tour will be transformed into the “Official World Championship Long Distance Tour’. This Tour can be compared to the WTCS series, but then meant for the best ‘long distance’ athletes.
That long distance in this case refers to the PTO Distance, in which athletes swim 2 kilometers, bike 80 kilometers and run 18 kilometers. In fact, the ‘Long Distance’ has thus changed into a distance that is even less than a regular Middle Distance.
In any case, the development is interesting, because even though it is still unclear how many PTO races will be part of this World Championship Tour next year, it is an interesting fact that ‘Long Distance athletes’ will battle to collect points during established races over the course of a year, from which a ranking will result, which in turn will lead to world champions. The races will be spread across Europe, America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. World Triathlon will take charge of referees, including doping controls.
There will be a minimum of six PTO races next year, but the goal is to expand that to 10 races.
