Steeled by Age

There are Ironmen and there are Ironwomen…but Age-defying Athletes who compete in an Ironman Triathlon should be considered Steelmen and -women.

Steel

Steel results from a complex life cycle that begins with iron. That element is transformed by a recipe in which nickle, manganese, chromium, vanadium, and other things are added…in which carbon is subtracted…and in which heat, cold, and water are periodically applied.

The resulting product is 1000 times stronger than iron.

Steelmen and -women (AKA Age-defying Athletes) have also experienced complex life cycles. From childhood onward, they have been developed by education, jobs, families, relationships, society, politics, finances, health, and a myriad of additions, subtractions, and periodic applications of the unexpected.

Steelmen and -women are certainly 1000 times stronger – mentally and physically – than when they were tiny little bundles that rolled around on the floor decades ago.

But not stronger anymore, right? Not when pushing 70?

Of course, a 70-something member of the Age-defying Athletes Project (ADAP) community doesn’t have equivalent muscle power compared to his or her 30-something self (assuming the 30-something self was in excellent shape).

But what do they have is more valuable, simply because ADAPers must compensate for diminished muscular strength with more focus, determination, and persistence.

All of which leads to a few observations about The Ironman World Championship®.

The Ironman was launched on February 18, 1978.

A California couple - Judy and John Collins – had left the Golden State for Hawaii. There they were active with a variety of sports clubs – primarily those devoted to swimming and running.

But the idea of a super endurance race took hold of their imaginations, and once they had figured out the bicycle leg, they were ready to go.

The Collinses said to each other, "If you do it, I'll do it." To which John famously added "...whoever finishes first we'll call him the Iron Man."

Fewer than 20 individuals participated in that initial race.

Fast forward almost 50 years, and hundreds of thousands of athletes across the globe compete for one of the 3800 annual World Championship slots.

In 2025, the Ironman World Championship will take place in the fall – at Kona, Hawaii, in October for the men, and in September in Nice, France, for the women.

Today, there are eight qualifying Ironman race options in the US, including the Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas North American Championship in The Woodlands this weekend.

A few ADAP stats from the 2024 World Championship

For females aged 70-74, the winner was Missy Lestrange, who completed the three-part contest in 15:13:39.

Just behind, in the 65-69 group, Judy Mcnary turned in the best performance, at 13:14:30. In this age band, 20 women completed the swim (the first portion of the triathlon), and 18 finished the entire race.

On the men’s side, the top finisher in the 80+ men’s age group was Japan’s Hiroshi Nakata with a time of 15:59:08. Gennaro Magliulo from the USA clocked in second, with a time of 16:24:21. And another American, Bob Plant, finished with a time of 16:26:47.

You’re probably thinking that the overall Championship time was much shorter than any of these records. And you would be right.

In 2024, that winning performance was made by German Patrick Lange, 38. Not only did he win the overall competition, he bested the previous race record with a dazzling 7:35:53 overall finishing time.

It’s a marvelous achievement, and, based on his training regimen, a well-deserved one. But he’s not even half as old as Hiroshi Nakata – so is the latter’s 80-year-old time essentially equivalent to Lange’s 38-year-old record? And will Lange perform as well as a Nakata or a Missy Lestrange when he has attained those pinnacles of age?

(Lange is also defending his Memorial Hermann Ironman Texas North American Championship this weekend.)

WIIFY?

Not for nothing was Superman “The Man of Steel” – rather than “The Ironman”.

Faster than a speeding bullet and capable of leaping tall buildings in a single bound, this Action Comics hero also had to battle his vulnerability – Kryptonite!

Is age a vulnerability? Graduate-level aging is certainly fraught with reductions in speed, strength, and flexibility. Yet, Age-defying Athletes overcome such limitations. In so doing, they generate prodigious feats of focus, persistence and determination during the grueling Ironman Triathlon (perhaps better than Superman protected himself against Kryptonite?).

You may not be as physically powerful as your 25-year-old self, but you have successfully ruin the gauntlet of life and are the more amazing for it.

And don’t forget bragging rights:

Swim 2.4 miles! Bike 112 miles! Run 26.2 miles! Brag for the rest of your life". (Now a registered trademark of the World Triathlon Corporation.)