Anyone else sick of people pretending a 70.3 is only half an Ironman?
Listen, I get it. A 140.6 is technically longer than a 70.3. Nobody is disputing that. But distance doesn’t determine how hard something is. I’ve done a 5k marathon Turkey Trot before and honestly that was harder than some full Ironmans I’ve seen. Nobody calls that a 0.035 Ironman.
I trained extremely hard for my IRONMAN. Some weeks I was doing almost 4 hours. I had to wake up at 8:30 AM on a SATURDAY. I missed brunch twice. My wife said I was “being distant”. My Whoop recovery was yellow for three consecutive days!!!
And before anyone mentions the swim, yes, it was downstream. That doesn’t make it a “cheat swim.” Everyone had the same current. I still had to swim 1.2 miles. My watch only recorded 1,450 yards because GPS doesn’t work well in water.
Meanwhile some elitist 140.6 guy comes along talking about his “five-hour bike rides” and “20 mile runs of the bike” like I’m supposed to be impressed. Congratulations bro, sorry you don’t have hobbies.
And can we stop calling it a 70.3?
It’s an IRONMAN.
It literally says IRONMAN on the medal, the shirt, the backpack, the emails and the $900 worth of merchandise I bought afterward. I don’t understand why people keep adding “70.3” when I tell them what race I did.
Also, I’m technically a World Championship qualifier.
At awards they kept rolling the slots down and eventually the announcer literally asked if “anyone in the audience” wanted one. I raised my hand.
That’s how qualification works.
You can gatekeep all you want, but Ironman says I qualified for Worlds. Sorry.
Yet every time I mention that I’m an Ironman triathlete and World Championship qualifier because I completed IRONMAN Chattanooga in 8:27, some asshole asks:
“Oh, have you done a full?”
Yes.