81 days

You are an IRONMAN

YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!

I can still hear those words.

After 15 hours, 31 minutes and 47 seconds of swimming, cycling, running, eating, drinking, thinking, hurting, smiling and relentlessly moving forward, I was running down the finish chute at IRONMAN South Hokkaido.

It was my first IRONMAN. In fact, it was my first triathlon of any distance.

And 81 days earlier, I could not swim 50 metres freestyle in a swimming pool.

That still sounds ridiculous when I write it.

I was not starting from zero

There is an important part of this story I do not want to exaggerate. I was not sitting on a sofa in June and completing an IRONMAN three months later.

I have been active my entire life. I started playing tennis when I was six. I have always run and played sports. But for most of my life, even a marathon seemed excessive. I remember thinking a half marathon was probably my limit and wondering why anybody would voluntarily run twice that distance.

Then I moved to Japan. Something changed.

Over the last two years, I started signing up for things that scared me and finding out what I was capable of.

By 2026, running had given me a serious endurance engine. I ran the Tokyo Marathon in 3:48. Then the Fuji Five Lakes Ultramarathon, where I covered 97.47 km with 780 metres of elevation gain.

Six weeks later came the Nara Ultramarathon: 100 km with a completely ridiculous 2,117 metres of climbing. Then there was the Hakone Limit Break, 27 km with another 1,054 metres of elevation.

So yes, I could run. What I could not do was the other two-thirds of a triathlon.

Then I bought a bike

On 2 May, I went to Tama and bought a secondhand Specialized Tarmac Pro.

It is roughly 20 years old. It is slightly too small for me. It is a road bike, not a triathlon bike. And I loved it.

My COROS history is almost comical. The first rides appear on the exact day I remember buying it: 2.02 km and 10.33 km on 2 May. Two days later I managed 25.33 km.

From there, I started building: 70 km, then my first 100 km, and eventually 154 km, my longest training ride.

Before race day, COROS recorded only around 631 km of cycling in total, including all the little rides to and from places.

Then, 134 days after buying the bike, I asked it to carry me through the 180 km IRONMAN bike course.

After the race, I met an experienced triathlete who was disappointed he had not qualified for Kona. He was riding a beautiful Canyon tri bike.

He looked at my Tarmac and told me he loved it. I explained that it was about 20 years old, secondhand and slightly too small. He called it vintage.

Then I told him this had been my first triathlon. His reaction was basically disbelief: ‘I cannot believe you did it on that.’

Neither can I, mate.

The bigger problem was the water

The bike was new. Swimming was another universe.

On 24 June, 81 days before IRONMAN, swimming 50 metres freestyle was an achievement.

I could breaststroke. Freestyle was different. I was learning how to breathe, learning technique and learning body position. I did kicking drills while holding a float and occasionally discovered that I could kick with considerable enthusiasm while moving approximately nowhere.

At first I would stop every 50 metres. Then I started reaching 100 metres. Eventually I managed my first continuous kilometre.

My longest recorded swim before race week was only 1.9 km. In fact, COROS recorded roughly 21.5 km of swimming in my entire build before race day.

The IRONMAN swim alone was 3.8 km. There were plenty of moments when the maths looked ridiculous.

But something had changed in how I approached challenges. I stopped needing proof that I could complete the whole thing. I just needed enough proof that I could take the next step.

The road to IRONMAN

Looking back, the timeline makes me laugh. Somewhere in there, I had to become a swimmer and a cyclist.

I also had a full-time job, projects I was working on, a dog to look after, friends and a social life.

I did not disappear into some monastic training camp. I was still me.

That became important. I did not want becoming an endurance athlete to require giving up everything else about myself. I wanted to find out what was possible while still living my life.

Race morning

By race morning, strangely, I was calm.

I had done the packing, planned the nutrition, checked the bags and checked them again. Transport sorted. Wetsuit ready.

I had even randomly met an athlete named Dai who had been doing IRONMAN for decades. He gave me advice about the swim: sight regularly, watch the current, look at how other swimmers are moving and do not waste hundreds of metres zig-zagging around the course.

It made immediate sense because it was exactly how I would approach getting into the ocean for a surf.

Then it was time. There was nothing left to prepare. Just show up.

3.8 km

The swim had always been the monster.

Official time: 1:46:38. First 1.9 km: 51:15. Second 1.9 km: 55:23.

I had done it. Eighty-one days after struggling with 50 metres, I had swum 3,800 metres in open water.

But there was not much time for existential reflection. I had a bicycle waiting.

180 km

T1 took 9:33. Then the old Tarmac and I went for a rather long ride.

180 km. 7:53:05. Average speed: 22.83 km/h.

COROS recorded around 1,403 metres of climbing and an average heart rate of only about 134 bpm.

That heart rate tells an important part of the story. I was not trying to race anybody. The objective had always been simple: finish.

The bike was not the race. The bike was transportation to the marathon. So I ate, drank, managed myself and kept moving.

Eventually I arrived at T2. There was now only one problem. A marathon.

Finally, something I knew how to do

This is where the race gets particularly funny.

My age-group discipline ranking for the swim was 128th. On the bike: 131st. Then I put my running shoes on.

My marathon was 5:28:16. Suddenly my age-group discipline ranking was 99th.

Among all male finishers, my discipline ranking went from 935th in the swim and 905th on the bike to 625th on the run. Overall, my run split ranked 696th, compared with 1,049th for my swim and 999th for my bike.

After almost ten hours of swimming, transitions and cycling, the runner finally arrived.

My first 5.7 km was still 6:53/km. Even around 34 km into the marathon, I produced a segment at 7:29/km. The final section was 7:14/km.

I was tired, obviously. But I was still moving. My cardiovascular system was remarkably calm. COROS recorded roughly 135 bpm average across the entire event.

I was not redlining my way towards a finish. I was managing my way towards one.

226 km

The official numbers:

At 10:18:54 p.m., I crossed the finish line. Then I heard it: ‘YOU ARE AN IRONMAN!’

Fuck.

Even now, I am still wearing the merchandise, looking at the medal and watching the finish-line video.

I am still trying to comprehend that the person who could not swim 50 metres in June is the same person in that video.

Stop asking for permission

There is a bigger reason I wanted to tell this story.

I think we spend an enormous amount of our lives waiting. Waiting until we are ready. Waiting until circumstances are perfect. Waiting until we are fitter, richer, younger, more experienced or less busy.

Sometimes we are waiting for someone else to tell us: yes, you can do this.

I have increasingly stopped doing that. You do not always need permission. You do not always need to know exactly how you are going to reach the finish line before you start.

And you definitely do not need proof that you can complete the entire journey before taking the first step.

Sometimes you need to do something slightly unreasonable.

Book the fucking ticket. Then figure it out.

Show up. Learn. Fail. Adjust. Show up again.

Eighty-one days can change a lot.

On 24 June, I could not swim 50 metres freestyle in a pool. On 13 September, I swam 3.8 km, cycled 180 km and ran a marathon.

My first triathlon. My first IRONMAN. 15:31:47.

I was not the fastest person out there. I never needed to be. I wanted to know whether I could do it. Now I know.

Anything is possible. Just show up. 🫶🏽

YOLO