I am new to the forum but I have been reading your posts for quite a long time an I finally decided to subscribe
On Sunday, I am supposed to have an Ironman 70.3 in Barcelona (Calella), but the weather seems pretty rough… 25km/h wind with gusts at 45 km/h… 1-1.2mt waves…
Do you think there are high chances that they will cancel the race or at least the swim leg?
I have been training hard for the past 8 months but I got a bad cold yesterday and feeling shit today… so I am honestly quite worried about going all the way down there (From the UK), fighting against the cold and then find out that the race will be cancelled… what do you think? Need your help guys!!
Most likely scenario is that they reduce the swim or cancel the swim completely which means you end up doing an duathlon. They wont cancel the entire event (if thats what you mean?) as that would require them to give refunds, which I can assure you will NEVER happen.
Take some medicine, plenty of fruits, veg, fluids and rest and you’ll have a good chance to be feeling better come Sunday
Thanks Cona4! So there are no “weather cancellation policy” (e.g. wind stronger than x, waves higher than y,…)?
1-1.2mt waves seem pretty rough for me but I must admit I have never done a race in open waters! Anyways, you are probably right and most likely we’ll do a duathlon… frustrating, but that’s the way it is…
Thanks Cona4! So there are no “weather cancellation policy” (e.g. wind stronger than x, waves higher than y,…)?
1-1.2mt waves seem pretty rough for me but I must admit I have never done a race in open waters! Anyways, you are probably right and most likely we’ll do a duathlon… frustrating, but that’s the way it is…
I did New Orleans 70.3 a few years ago and there was an actual tropical storm that hit and they still had the event but shortened the swim. It was a crazy swim and insane weather, but surprisingly they didn’t cancel.
Part of the problem with the original swim route was that they couldn’t maintain the safety / aid boats on certain portions of the swim course - so that will be a factor as well.
Oh wow! that sounds tough! thanks for sharing… then I guess the best I can do at this stage is to take the flight to Barcelona tomorrow, rest and try to recover from the cold and pray for the race not to be cancelled!
IMO- the swim may be shortened or cancelled. That’s the trend these days; as others have noted, IM hates to give refunds, but they have grown adept at postponing races…
As for you, health-wise, I would just do everything I could in terms of vitamins, rest, right foods, etc., to diminish my cold symptoms in the time remaining and set my goals for the race as just finishing and do an evenly-paced workout, keep my HR in a comfortable range, take a break here and there on the course, take in the sights, etc.
Also, there’s a live feed of the beach in Barcelona that you can view online. Just google it. I checked it a while ago and it looked beautiful. Around 21/22 degrees and the sea was relatively calm. I know it can change by Sunday but I would double check your weather reports…
I arrived in Calella a couple of days ago for the 70.3. The weather over the last couple of days has been very… changeable. Yesterday (Thurs) I had a beautiful sea swim with very little swell and no waves. It clouded over during the day and yesterday evening we had torrential rain for several hours and all the streets were flooded ankle deep.
Woke up this morning and it’s like that last night never happened, glorious sun and the sea is dead flat.
The current weather forecast for Sunday does look bad and if the rain is anything like last night then the bike will be unpleasant af. The good thing is the bike course is dead flat, main road, non technical, so no brakes required.
If the forecast comes true I do suspect we’ll get a shortened/cancelled swim but a race will go ahead. I don’t envy the full distance athletes though…
Have you done a covid test? I know you don’t need one for travel, but might be best to check, you don’t want to end up getting stuck in Spain because of it. On a side note, not sure if Ironman would let you transfer your entry to another race if you tested +ve or not.
I did IM Barca in 2019, trained hard but ended up with Bronchitis a few days ahead of the race. I was gutted.
Essentially I went ahead, but threw all race split targets out of the window - focused on just enjoying the experience and ended up having a really nice day (10:50 at the finish).
I was sick for a few weeks after as an IM is not exactly recovery for any minor illness but I have no regrets.
My advice would be to just chill enjoy the gorgeous bike route and soak up the cheers on the run course!
I did IM Barcelona a couple of years ago. weather was fine but during the night there has been a thunderstorm which made the sea very rough and probably was the worst conditions i ever swam in an triathlon race. luckily the waves were long but still quite high. at the start we were all asking each other if it was going to happen or not but i could not believe the swim was not shortened in the end. i finished the swim with sea sick feeling. i needed 30-40mins on the bike to get rid of that feeling.
Thanks Cona4! So there are no “weather cancellation policy” (e.g. wind stronger than x, waves higher than y,…)?
1-1.2mt waves seem pretty rough for me but I must admit I have never done a race in open waters! Anyways, you are probably right and most likely we’ll do a duathlon… frustrating, but that’s the way it is…
I did New Orleans 70.3 a few years ago and there was an actual tropical storm that hit and they still had the event but shortened the swim. It was a crazy swim and insane weather, but surprisingly they didn’t cancel.
Part of the problem with the original swim route was that they couldn’t maintain the safety / aid boats on certain portions of the swim course - so that will be a factor as well.
That’s because they had to cancel the year before on race morning. I was there for both years. And we did not get a refund
For the record (those following already know), they shortened the swim; nominally to 900 meters, but finishing times in the region of 10’ suggest that it was a lot less. Other than that, all seems normal in Ironman Barcelona.
First of all thank you for all your answers! you kept me motivated until the end and decided to fly to Barcelona despite the fever.
Weather was better than it was supposed to be but still very windy and wavy. The shortened the swim course (officially to 950mt, but I belive it was more around 600mt)… I am a strong swimmer and targeted to finish the swim in around 29-30 and finished the swim leg in 9 minutes, so no chance it was 950mt…
The bike leg was windy but less than I was expecting. I was extremely unlucky and got a flat tyre at 22km… took me quite a lot of time to get back on the bike and then I was so angry that I overpaced the remaining 70km…
It was quite frustrating to see so many groups of people riding together against the wind while I was riding alone most of the time…
My legs really hurt (Probably as I overpaced the bike) during the run and the last 10km have been really an agony…
Surely not my day but I still managed to close it so at least… mission accomplished!!
Now I feel so sad and empty… I guess it’s the down after the adrenaline… will surely need to register for another one pretty soon!!
