Macho, Macho Man

Macho, macho man - I've got to be, a macho man - Macho, macho man - I've got to be a macho!  Thank you Village People, for that lovely song.  It describes perfectly how I felt on Sunday night when I watched the end of the Ironman. 

The Ironman is a well known triathlon that began as a challenge between a group of Navy Seals.  Today, the Ironman holds their triathlon all around the world.  Every year, they travel to the sandy beaches of Port Elizabeth.  The best part is, it takes place right on Beach Road, where I live!  We literally walked outside our front door and sat down on the curb to cheer the runners on.

The Ironman begins at 7 am with a 2.4 mile swim in the Indian Ocean.  The 112-mile bike ride is next.  The day ends with a 26.2 mile run.  Yikes.  So intense.  A total of 1,745 athletes participated in it.  No wonder Port Elizabeth had been preparing for weeks on end.  There were posters everywhere, the viewing area and vendors had been set up.  This was going to be huge!

1,745 athletes running into the water.

Unfortunately, I was not able to watch the swimming or biking because some of us were at Chintsa.  But, I took pictures from some of the girls that did stay back.  It looked pretty awesome.  Cheering for the runners was really fun.  We brought down an I-pod with some speakers and played some motivational music.  Their racing numbers had their names on them, so we could cheer for them by their name.  We had mini-vuvuzelas and did the wave a couple of times.  A lot of them joked around with us, making poses and what not.  This guy was directing our cheering. 

Jan (pronounced Yawn) from Germany directing our cheers.

The fastest people usually finish the race in 9 hours, so from 7 am to 4 pm.  When we went outside to watch, it was around 6 pm.  People were still going after 9 pm too!  After a set time, they cut you off.  It’s crazy to think these people were being physically active for the long of a time!  One really cool story came out of the South African Ironman.  Chrissie Wellington of Great Britain competed and set the record for the fastest ever women’s Ironman race.  She finished in 8:33:56 – that’s so incredible!  Back in 2007, that would have been the overall Ironman record.  Wellington also broke the woman’s biking and running record, and had the fastest run time overall for the day.      

Chrissie Wellington

I was astonished by the range of people that participated in the Ironman - women, men, young, old, even guys with beer bellies.  Also, the people came from all over the world.  It was really inspiring.  The oldest man who took part in the race was 79-years-old!  These people were really inspiring.  It shows that you can do anything you set your mind to.  We are so much more capable of things then we think we are.  Attitude is what it’s all about.  I want to be a macho man.