Project Ironman 70.3 - Benchmarks and Goal Setting
So I’ve been in a bit of a situationship with my fitness for a long time. Grew up chubby, a sore spot I used to hold, though I wouldn’t say I was particularly sedentary 1. However, it’s only been in the past 8 years that I’ve been intentional with how I saw my fitness.
1 Maybe just a bit too keen on my curries and laksas. No regrets.
2 A story for another day, but it was fun and I’d do it again… maybe with a bit more of an injury-free leadup
And so, since 2018, I’ve made it a point to run a half marathon every year, interspersed with powerlifting style training. Over time, this led me to doing a full marathon last year at the 2023 Sydney Marathon. It was a bit of a dismal showing really, and looking back, my training, commitment, nutrition, and consistency could have been improved 2.
The problem I’ve identified is consistency. The general cycle I’ve noticed is that I would train pretty consistently for an event in the leadup, I’d get sick or life would get in the way and I’d take breaks that would last for up to 2 months. I’d jump back in, get a niggle, and would end up sputtering to the starting line, with not enough miles in my legs. I’d reach the event, finish it, and I’d resolve to not do it again. Then, inevitably, I’d catch the bug again, start training, but always seemingly from the same baseline, and so year-on-year, improvements would come few and far between.
The thing is, I’ve caught the bug again, and so I find myself wishing complete an Ironman sometime before I die. That’s a 3.9km swim, 180km bike ride, and a full marathon at the end (42.2km). I’ve got plenty of life left to live, but I’d prefer to complete one in a respectable way 3, within my physical prime.
3 Be above average, at the very least.
Now This Is Average Performance
It’s obvious that peak performance depends on the event you’re looking at. Things that require explosive power have a younger peak performance age, relative to things that require endurance, acquired knowledge and/or skill (Stiefel et al. 2013). Then again, there is the added confounder of training age, ie: how long you’ve been intentionally training over your lifetime. From a purely physiological development perspective though, I do think that there is a inflection point after which things start going downhill. I admit to a certain amount of anxiety when it comes to this, so in that sense, time (and youth) is of the essence.
Thankfully, I’ve managed to get my grubby hands on a dataset presenting Ironman 70.3 finish times from 2004 up to 2020. Granted these are Half Ironman results, so not at all comparable to the full Ironman, and the demands on the body will be definitely different between the two.
But - the Half Ironman is a stepping stone to the full, so I figure I might as well focus on the Ironman 70.3 in the near to mid term first. That’s a 1.9km Swim, 90km bike ride, and a 21.1km run.
In any case, this is 16 years of data! 4, and it seems that the triathlon bug is hitting, and hitting good. Ironman 70.3 Triathlons are now big business, with 1572 finishers in 2004, up to a peak of 116,196 in 2019 (Figure 1), though I’d attribute the dip in 2020 to Covid.
4 Shoutout to David who painstakingly compiled and cleaned the data available here
Interestingly, age distributions among male amateurs of working age have started to stabilize over the past half decade. It seems that doing a triathlon may come hand in hand with having a midlife crisis (guilty as charged). Since 2013, almost 40% of finishers have been aged between 35 and 44 (Figure 2), with the 18-24 and 60-64 age groups being on the lower end of the working age distribution.
Personally, I’d rack this up to the fact that triathlons are both an expensive and intensive sport, probably accessible only to the young uns who can afford it (and have the resources to train for it), and the older ones who’ve probably had a lifetime worth of training to stand up to the rigous of the sport.
The thing is, with participation higher than ever before, excepting the blip in 2020 (Figure 1), you’d think the overall standard would have increased. Interestingly, not exactly. At first glance, you’d see a raft of improvements from 2004 to 2010, followed by what seems to be a plateau in average (ie: 50th percentile) performance, across all disciplines 5.
5 excepting 2020
6 I assume the sharp improvement in finish times here were due to an exceptionally more dedicated field of athletes, in both the pros and amateurs, possibly due to Covid restrictions meaning that only the more gungho folks would have still tried to participate at an Ironman.
It seems we’re now in the age of slow, marginal level improvements. (Figure 3) 6. We can probably attribute this to the fact that as more people get involved with the Ironman 70.3, an initial raft of enthusiasts would have lead to initial improvements over time, but as the late majority joined the sport, what we now see is a gradul regression to the mean. This seems to be especially the case for us amateurs, but something else seems to be happening with the pros…
In fact, doing some quick correlation analysis (Table 1) of finish times across different performance percentiles vs year indicates a very weak, non-significant negative correlation (ie: faster times) for us amateurs. Essentially, achieving average to elite times as an amateur age grouper has remained virtually unchanged over the years, and the time taken to say, be above average in one year would still make you above average in another. It’s a whole different ball game for the professionals though, with finish times being strongly correlated with the progression of time, from 2004 to 2020. The standard to go pro has never been harder, and it makes sense with the influx of Olympians into the sport over the past few years, with the Norweigians and their new-fangled approach to training widely hailed as one of the reasons for why World Records in the triathlon have been tumbling.
| Percentile | r, p (Pro) | r, p (Amateur) |
|---|---|---|
| 50th | -0.71, <0.01 | -0.22, 0.39 |
| 65th | -0.72, <0.01 | -0.17, 0.5 |
| 80th | -0.74, <0.01 | -0.11, 0.68 |
| 90th | -0.72, <0.01 | -0.12, 0.66 |
| 95th | -0.72, <0.01 | -0.2, 0.44 |
Benchmark Setting - Ironman 70.3
But then again, I have no ambitions at the moment for ever becoming elite in any age-group, nor going pro for that matter. However, I don’t wish to just finish. What this data is telling me then is that we’ve got some reasonably stable benchmarks (Table 2) that will hold steady for quite a while yet.
| Benchmark | SwimTime | BikeTime | RunTime | FinishTime |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average (50th Percentile) | 00:37:49 ± 00:01:01 | 02:51:08 ± 00:02:33 | 02:01:06 ± 00:02:10 | 05:41:03 ± 00:04:19 |
| Above Average (65th Percentile) | 00:35:15 ± 00:00:57 | 02:43:53 ± 00:02:31 | 01:52:07 ± 00:01:50 | 05:23:15 ± 00:04:46 |
| Intermediate (80th Percentile) | 00:32:28 ± 00:00:55 | 02:36:06 ± 00:02:36 | 01:43:09 ± 00:01:40 | 05:04:05 ± 00:05:03 |
| Advanced (90th Percentile) | 00:29:58 ± 00:00:53 | 02:29:26 ± 00:02:53 | 01:36:04 ± 00:01:24 | 04:48:30 ± 00:04:53 |
| Elite (95th Percentile) | 00:28:06 ± 00:00:56 | 02:24:36 ± 00:03:18 | 01:31:13 ± 00:01:21 | 04:37:28 ± 00:04:52 |
Now, it’s worth keeping in mind that these are for ALL Age Groups. I’m turning 30 next year, so my actual benchmarks to hit over the next 5 years are:
| Benchmark | SwimTime | BikeTime | RunTime | FinishTime |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average (50th Percentile) | 00:37:11 ± 00:00:54 | 02:49:24 ± 00:03:01 | 01:57:52 ± 00:02:26 | 05:35:03 ± 00:05:26 |
| Above Average (65th Percentile) | 00:34:40 ± 00:00:57 | 02:42:04 ± 00:02:56 | 01:49:03 ± 00:01:58 | 05:16:50 ± 00:05:35 |
| Intermediate (80th Percentile) | 00:31:56 ± 00:00:52 | 02:34:11 ± 00:02:58 | 01:40:14 ± 00:01:37 | 04:57:49 ± 00:05:13 |
| Advanced (90th Percentile) | 00:29:35 ± 00:00:54 | 02:27:33 ± 00:03:16 | 01:33:32 ± 00:01:34 | 04:42:44 ± 00:05:16 |
| Elite (95th Percentile) | 00:27:39 ± 00:00:55 | 02:23:00 ± 00:03:25 | 01:28:53 ± 00:01:17 | 04:32:18 ± 00:05:09 |
Out of all of these, the running benchmarks seem to be the most reasonable. Though keep in mind that running is the last event of the triathlon, so you’re going to be running on tired legs, after an average of 2.8 hours of hard cycling. In isolation though, it does seem to be witin the realm of possibility.
My Current Baseline
As of writing (12th June 2024), I am 29 years old, and stand at 174 cm (5’9”) at a slightly tubby 77kg. As of 5th November 2024, I’ve committed to an Olympic Tri on the 23rd of March 2025, 5 days before I turn 30. Ironman 70.3 Melbourne after that is on the 9th November 2025. Giving me exactly a year to train.
- My Half Marathon Lifetime PR (set last year while I was training for the Sydney Mara) is 1:49
- The last time I swam consistently was when I was 14
- And the hybrid bike (Trek FX 3 DISC) I bought last year has sat (mostly unused) in the garage (oops)
- My Garmin says I have a VO2 Max of 48 (doesn’t matter, I’m hilariously unfit right now)
Will I get there? Stay tuned.