An IronMan triathlon is a 2.4 mile swim, 112 mile bike ride, and a 26.2 mile marathon. 140.6 miles. When I had friends who did IronMan triathlons, I was shocked to learn that the 15-20 hours weekly of training that they did had one main purpose: to minimize the chance of going anaerobic during the race. Even the top IronMan athletes who are running 6 minute miles in the Kona heat and humidity at the IronMan World Championships are not going out of their aerobic zone. Once you go anaerobic, everything breaks down. You may recall those famous videos of athletes crawling across the finish line. The weekly commitment to 15-20 hours of IronMan training is to prevent that. As a side note, I went to IronMan Lake Placid to cheer on a friend a decade ago. We did not see her so we started walking out of town, reverse along the marathon course. It gets really dark and lonely quickly once you get about 2 miles out. So many of the 140.6 miles it is just you and your mind. We found her about 5 miles out and she was ecstatic to see us. She finished her IronMan. The next morning you see all these proud athletes of every age group (men’s 40-45 are the most competitive, cue mid-life crisis) strutting around with their finisher medals. Registration for next year’s race opens up exclusively on site before the Internet. There were a lot of people in line, some without medals.