Mid March 2019

Introduction

The Ironman 70.3 returned to San Juan for Saint Patrick’s Day. More then 900 athletes from North and South America (and a few from Europe) participated in the swim – bike – run competition. The event is in reality a half – Ironman, with a 1.2 mile swim, a 56 mile bike ride, and a half-marathon to finish. The events are twice as long in a full Ironman.

I live about a block away from where many of the race activities occur, so it is an easy task for me to take pictures at various points along the course. I’ll share some of them in this post.

The Start

The first leg of the triathlon is the swim. The athletes start in groups according to age and gender at five minute intervals. The elite men and women go in the first two groups. The swim is in the Laguna de Condodo. The start is at the Condado end of the Puente dos Hermanos, the bridge of the two brothers.

The groups are called into the water at five minutes intervals and begin their swim when a horn goes off.

The Swim

The waters in the Laguna were warm (about 78 degrees F) and calm. Volunteers in kayaks watched over the swimmers who were guided over the course by a series of orange floats along the route.

The Swim – Bike Transition

The swimmers use a ramp to leave the water. They then run about a quarter of a mile to where the bikes are stored. The athletes run with their bikes for about seventy five yards before they can mount and start the 56 mile ride.

Bike Mount and Start

The riders had to reach a line before they could mount their bikes, They then biked up a small hill to leave the park and head towards Dorado and back.

Bike Finish, Dismount and Run Start

It was a great day for a bike ride. There were no showers and the wind was not a factor. The riders came back into the park, dismounted, went to the bike corral, put on their running shoes and started the half – marathon.

In terms of my interest in getting pictures of the event, the run is the least interesting. I mean, how many pictures can you take of runners grimacing with pain? So I’ll show only this one.

The Results

This year, for the first time I can remember, athletes from the United States won both the men’s and women’s competitions.

Cameron Hackett did the swim in just over 25 minutes, the bike ride in two hours and twelve minutes, and the run in just under an hour and a half. His total time was four hours, eleven minutes, and thirty nine seconds. Christopher Portugal Reibel, from Peru, finished second about four and a half minutes behind Hackett.

Heather A. Jackson crushed her opponents. With a total time of four hours and nineteen minutes, she beat Carolina Dementiev of Panama by nearly 32 minutes.

You can click here to see the full list of participants and results.

It was a great way for me to spend St. Patrick’s Day, especially since later that afternoon we went to a friends apartment for a traditional corned beef and cabbage dinner. And we did not once have to worry about snow flurries.

Notes and Sources

The images are all mine, edited with Adobe Lightroom and/or Photoshop.