It was not only my first IronMan 70.3 but also my very first triathlon event in general. If I had to describe my experience on that day in three words, it’d be:

• Life-changing

• Liberating

• Exhilarating

Why it turned out to be an IronMan 70.3 as my first triathlon race, in a nutshell: Due to Covid, I kept on with consistent training over the 2-3 years and progressed so much that the distances of a sprint or Olympic triathlon didn’t challenge me anymore. But you can read all about it in detail in this post.

I’ve already took you with my on my journey throughout the whole race weekend from registration to packing my bags and racking the bike. If you missed this article, click here.

So let’s jump into Race Day and the Swim start….I get goosebumps writing about it :)

Part 1: THE SWIM (1.9 km / 1.2 miles in the open water)

It’s around 6 AM when I make my way to the swim start with all the other 2,000 participants. Everyone’s wearing their wetsuits, the yellow IronMan swim cap, goggles and the really lucky ones had a friend or partner with them so they could wear shoes, a jacket and gloves until very close to the actual swim start. The first sunlight falls over the beautiful sea, I can still see the moon and stars and most importantly, the sea is calm! What a relief! Only last year, they had to shorten the swim here because the sea conditions were so rough. It has around 12 degrees out here, the water temperature is 17 degrees. Sounds warm and promising compared to standing barefoot on the cold pebble beach for ~1.5 hours ;)

You’ve got to be so early at the swim start because as you can image with over 2,000 participants, it just takes a while to get to your place. Especially, when you’re walking around without glasses like me. Without my glasses, my vision is completely blurry. So it took a while until I understood the whole ‘start in waves’ theory and until found the sign that said ‘60 minutes estimated swim time’. It was a deliberate choice to start at the very end of this massive long queue of people because I’m not a strong swimmer and if you’v been following me for a while now, then you know that I was terrified of the swim. So I wanted as many people as possible out of the way so I could do my thing. Ha! That was a nice thought but reality looked a bit different. We’ll come to that in a second.

So I’m lined up, standing there alone, trying to fight tears of panic and not getting overwhelmed by this whole experience while the sun rises behind the gorgeous trails and sea. The woman next to me, accompanied by her husband, kindly asks me with a smile on her face “How are you?”. And BOOM, waterworks on! I start crying again and mumble “I’m so sorry. I’m just so terrified of the swim.” And what does that lovely young lady? She gives me a proper hug and says “Don’t you worry. We’ll do this together! It’ll be all fine. Just one stroke after the other.” What a kind soul. We started talking more and it turned out that she loves swimming and was absolutely dreading the run - the exact opposite of me. So we promised to each other that she’ll think of me during the swim and will cheer me on in her thoughts and I’ll do the same during the run - which I did.

As the queue movs slowly but surely forward, I get closer to the swim start when all of a sudden I hear someone yelling my name. I couldn’t believe it! The host of the flat where I stayed, seriously came down to the beach with his dog trying to find me in a sea of wetsuits and yellow swim caps in order to wish me luck and joy. To this day I can’t believe that he really did that and that he found me! He knew that I was here alone and what a big challenge this was for me so he wanted to support me. Bless him!

Having met these two people and them being there for me at the swim start even though we didn’t know each other, meant so much to me. It calmed me down and made me feel supported. I can’t thank them enough.

Ok, so the queue is still moving over 1 hour later and the music gets louder. The two songs that are on when I enter the actual red carpet at the start are “Unstoppable” by Sia and “Let’s Go” by Ne-Yo. These two songs would stay with me the whole day and push, giving me confidence and goosebumps.

SHOWTIME! Finally the actual swim begins…

I’m on the red carpet, lining up in one of the six lanes, I hear the clock ticking: Beep, beep, beep, BEEEEEEEEP! And off I run into the sea. Well, perhaps it’s more stumbling into the sea because my feet are frozen by that that point and it quite hurts running on the pebbles. But Gosh, the water feels so nice and warm :) I start with front-crawl but quickly realize that I can’t sustain that for long because people are swimming over me!!!! WTF!? Literally swimming over me. Why? We’re in the open water! We’re in the sea! There’s enough space for everyone. Why do people have to be so ruthless and just literally swim over me so I get pushed into the water, trying not to swallow too much salt water. Ok, so this is the real deal here. I get back up again and start swimming breaststroke so I can catch my breath again and see more where I’m going and who’s next to me. Even though the majority of people are already in the water ahead of me dnd yes, the professional athletes were already on the bike course while I was still waiting in line to get into the water, nevertheless it was a battle swim.

Thankfully I found goggles with prescription a few weeks before the race so I could see clearly and this was absolutely necessary! I’m focused on getting from one buoy to the next without drowning. I’m mostly using breaststroke so I can breath and cheer myself on. About one third in, I really shout out in bouts to myself: “Go on. You can do this. Go on. Don’t drown. Keep going.” I was close to tears at times because it was scary and exhausting. Yes, there are kayaks out there if I need help but how on earth would they see me in this sea of swimmers?

Half-way in…

About half-way in, I’m trying to do front-crawl again to make up some time but I start to feel dizzy because the sea isn’t so calm out there anymore. The next buoys seems so far away and the finish of the swim unreachable at that point but I remind myself, I’m still swimming. Even if I don’t make it within the cut-off time, I want to finish this swim on my own! So I keep going and I start to even overtake other swimmers even though I’m doing breaststrokes! By the way, my neck hurt quite a lot by that time trying to keep my head out of the water for so long. I am reminding myself why I am doing this: I want to overcome that fear of open water swimming and the only way out of this fear is through. The only way out is through. So I keep going and then another thought hit me: I’m not doing this purely for myself! I am doing this to show and prove to others that everyone can face and overcome any fear they’ve got! This is so much bigger than me. I genuinely thought that. So I keep on swimming, making my way closer to the next buoy and I can feel how I’m propelling.

A life-defining moment…

Then finally the last turn and I’m on my way back to the swim finish! I can hear the crowd cheering us on now. This gives me goosebumps. I’m not sure if they screamed so loud because we are super close to the cut-off time? So I’m thinking to myself: “Ok, I made it this far. I honestly don’t know if I’ll make it through the last bit here but I’d never forgive myself if I hadn’t tried everything, if I hadn’t give it my all to finish it AND trying to make it within the official time.” So head down under the water again, front-crawl on and I started to overtake even more people. I feel dizzy, swallow water, I am out of breath, still scared but I can hear the people’s voices louder and louder. OMG! I’m so close to the beach now. I try a few times to reach the ground so I can run the last bit and then finally, only 3-4 meters from the shore, I can finally stand. WOHOO! I sway and stumble in the most ungracious way out of the sea, looking at my watch and can’t believe it: I’M STILL IN THE RACE! I FINISHED THE SWIM AND I’M WITHIN THE CUT-OFF TIMES! I start crying again, happy tears this time ;) I also start hyperventilating. One of the IronMan staff was so concerned that he ran a bit next to me to the transition because he was afraid I might get a heart attack or something. Bless him ;)

Believe me when I tell you: When I got out of the water, finishing this battle, this survival swim, it was a life-defining moment for me. At this point, I had already won.

On the way to transition…

While I was running to transition, I started to peel off my wetsuit and I saw my host again! I yelled at him “I DID IT! I’M STILL IN THE RACE. I’M STILL IN THE RACE!”. He seriously waited there to cheer me on again. What a kind soul. Yes, ultimately I finished the swim on my own. No one can do it for me but having the support of strangers here and mentally from my friends far away, helped me mentally to do it. You have to go through the scary things in life in order to overcome them. That’s the only way and it is easier if you’ve got support.

Now I’m in the transition tent, trying to find my bags, pick out the blue one. First thing: Putting on the helmet. Then peeling off the wetsuit which was easy because I had my trisuit on underneath, used the towel to dry my toes, put on my toe powder and socks while stuffing some oat bar into my mouth. I looked like a ‘crumble monster’ haha :) Bib number on, suncream, sunglasses, pack the nutrition bars which I fancied, some tissues, and off I run to my bike. To be honest, there weren’t many bikes left on the racks so it was easy to find ;) I run with my bike to the start line, put my smile back on and off I go to the next chapter of this race. The hilly 90 km (56 miles) bike ride.

Stay tuned to read all about my bike leg and run in the next articles. In the meantime, check out my image gallery of this race.