In Comparison

During NCAA Triathlon's time as an Emerging Sport, we have been lucky enough to have a case study right beside us the whole time: women's wrestling. At the beginning of 2025, women's wrestling met the standards and obtained the votes to become the next championship sport within the NCAA, displaying immense growth at the college level within the last few years. As a women's triathlete that was exposed to women's wrestling at my institution (North Central), I saw firsthand the storytelling and character-building that wrestling media outlets were publishing surrounding these athletes. There was so much hype and excitement built around women's wrestling on social media by accounts like FloWrestling and USAWrestling. I was always very happy to see these women get the attention they deserved and it allowed me to consider why the same thing couldn't happen for triathlon.

The major differentiating factor is that men's wrestling existed in the NCAA first...decades and decades prior to women's wrestling. This means that the media surrounding men's wrestling was already built up considerably by the time NCAA women's wrestling emerged on the scene. Therefore, it was easy to add more coverage, as the system had already been built up and brands existed on the scene that could give women wrestlers a spotlight.

This is not true for triathlon, however. There was not a men's championship version in the NCAA prior to Women's Triathlon; Women's Triathlon is leading the charge at the NCAA level. While spotty coverage existed for collegiate club triathlon before the introduction of NCAA Triathlon, no media outlets have picked up on creating more than a handful of posts per season for any version of collegiate triathlon. Over the years, media outlets that cover the greater triathlon community have dedicated a few posts to NCAA Triathlon during championship season, and that content has been very appreciated. But the greater issue is that the collegiate triathlon community lacks consistent (social) media support, which means we are missing out on a key area of exposure to the sport and building up the stories within it.

In the current day and age where young adults constantly consume social media, the best way for a sport to gain exposure and grow is through social media. At an even greater scale than women's wrestling, women's basketball has truly embraced the power of social media. The storytelling that has emerged about collegiate women's basketball players has been nothing short of incredible. While there have always been incredible women's basketball players, the media's ability to create narratives around women's basketball players and teams peaked with the Caitlin Clark era and have been going strong ever since. Women's basketball serves as an example that more media coverage and power surrounding women's collegiate sports works. So, what are we waiting for in the collegiate triathlon community?

The Idea

While I had the idea of starting an NCAA Triathlon coverage platform during my collegiate career, I wanted to wait until I was fully done with my eligibility to ensure that I could highlight the sport from the outside. And, I wanted to wait until I had time to devote to the project, as any successful coverage platform requires consistent in-depth effort. In my last semester of my undergraduate career, I was tasked with developing my own leadership project for my Ethical Leadership Capstone course. Prior to this course, I had reached out to USATriathlon to see if there was anything I could help with on a volunteer basis, so I knew that folding this collaboration into my leadership project would be an exciting passion project. 

So, in January 2025, I initiated the first steps in my journey of uplifting NCAA Women's Triathlon. I know this journey will not be easy. Starting something so massive from scratch is intimidating, but luckily I have the support of many people in and outside of the triathlon world. And, my plan is to involve as many current and former collegiate triathletes in the process as possible, making this platform a contribution of the entire community of women that have raced within the collegiate triathlon system.

Of course, the roadblocks that other past triathlon coverage channels have encountered weigh on my consideration of this project. Triathlon media coverage has not always been met with support by everybody in the community, whether the concerns be that the person behind the coverage is "biased" or that their coverage is not plentiful enough. I have decided no matter what criticism this project is met with, I will be authentic to my mission in undertaking this effort: to uplift and support current, former, and potential women involved with NCAA triathlon. Input and feedback from the community will be an integral part of my process, however, if the feedback does not align with this mission, it will not be of priority for me. I challenge everybody who develops any criticism of the coverage to be patient or volunteer their own time to help out if they want to see things change.

With that being said, my background is that I competed for North Central, a Division III institution. Therefore, my perspective in covering NCAA Triathlon is to give ALL DIVISIONS attention and support. Yes, it is important to highlight the top athletes in the system, but the way we engage more girls at the high school level to give triathlon a try is to be less intimidating and elitist. As a triathlete that came from a non-draft racing background, I saw firsthand how elitist the draft-legal community was, even if there was not a conscious effort to appear that way. This is a concerning barrier when cultivating more support for triathlon as a whole, especially at the youth and junior level. In order to connect with girls who have never done triathlon before, we need to highlight more diverse stories within the collegiate triathlon community. I will always commit to DIII & DII coverage being just as plentiful as DI coverage, because that is an extremely important step in uplifting all of the women in our sport.

The Future

I am looking forward to a future of uplifting NCAA Triathlon, creating more support for it, and cultivating a community for the women involved in it. I have started by forming LinkedIn and Strava groups for current and former collegiate triathletes to connect and start building a stronger community. I am also assessing the possibility of starting weekly Zwift rides! Check out our community page for more ways we are building connections between the women of NCAA Triathlon.

Additionally, I'd love to connect with other collegiate triathlon alumni, if anybody is interested in helping. Please reach out to breakawaytri@gmail.com if you are interested. There is room for women of all interests to help out, whether it be social media content creation, writing race recaps, photography, etc.

There is a lot of work to be done and I am so excited to gradually begin coverage as I develop this brand. Be on the lookout for announcements and updates; with an increase in coverage and support surrounding NCAA Triathlon, I am certain the 2025 season is going to be the best one yet!