cSquared Design :: Anthony Cece

A story of the unremarkable, the extraordinarily average and the genetically challenged. And also triathlon.

There are only two ways into the Ironman World Championship in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii: either be very good or very lucky.  I'm one of the lucky, the 200 "common" athletes that race founder John Collins insisted always be allowed to compete. What follows will be my attempt to document my journey towards the Ironman World Championship ... and to see whether it truly is better to be lucky than good.

Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Better Lucky Than Good?
2.4 miles of swimming, 112 miles of biking and 26.2 miles of running: this is what makes up the Ironman triathlon, and what started out as a dare of bravado amongst a group of Navy Seals nearly 29 years ago has now grown into the premiere stage for long-course triathletes to display their talent and courage. While Ironman has grown through the years in both its number of races and the athletes competing, there remains one race that stands alone in its reverence, its mysticism, its history and its competitiveness: the Ironman World Championship in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. It is the big dance, and there are only two ways an athlete can score an invite—either be very good and win a slot at one of the qualifying races throughout the year, or be very lucky and win a slot through the lottery. I'm one of those lottery winners: the 200 "common" athletes that race founder John Collins insisted always be allowed to compete. What follows will be my attempt to document my journey towards the Ironman World Championship ... and to see whether it truly is better to be lucky than good.

For those that may be interested, by the end of each week leading up to the race, I will include weekly training totals, and each workout will also be tracked via a Garmin Forerunner 305 and uploaded to MotionBased.

My training digest:
http://kansaiben.motionbased.com/

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