While I have never done or seen an Ironman race, how common is it to see walkers on the run portion of the race? In this video of Ironman Wisconsin, I had a hard time actually finding people running. I actually thought it was a charity walk at first. Is it just the tail end of the race?
(related question: do people start ironman races with the intention of walking during the marathon?)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zmtll8NltI0&feature=youtube_gdata_player
A lot of people walk through aid stations to get rest mentally and physically for a minute, get in some liquid and calories, and then jog on to the next one. The later in the day the higher the ratio of walkers to runners though.
Common. Just take a look at results and you’ll see tons of 5 and 6 hour marathons
It’s at an aid station, of course there are going to be more walkers than runners. That being said I think it’s fair to say that at some point, almost everybody short of the elite pros will be walking at some point during the run.
Come on! It’s an Aid Station!
Lots of Ironman race strategies call for walking through the aid stations to give your legs a slight break and to allow you to properly hydrate and fuel.
Come on! It’s an Aid Station!
Lots of Ironman race strategies call for walking through the aid stations to give your legs a slight break and to allow you to properly hydrate and fuel.
I hear you, but doesn’t it seem like it would be difficult to start up again after walking through every aid station? What about a light jog?
Have you tried drinking out of a cup while running, or even a light jog?
Yes. Most of it ends up on me rather than in my mouth, although if you do that special grab/hold it helps.
Have you done a IM marathon? You want to be able to get the most fluids/calories in as you can. Easiest way to do that is to walk through.
Nah. What’s difficult is getting enough calories in to want to run at all.
Lots of walking. It’s sad. There were some results posted on average times for all the IM races worldwide. I think the absolute lowest run-portion average was like a 4:30 (10:19/mile avg pace), with several of them being north of 5 hours (11:30/mile+ pace).
There’s nothing wrong with walking an aid station at all, but when you’re moving at a 5 hour marathon pace, you’re basically walking the whole course anyways.
Just wait until you are at mile 20 of the run after a 2.4 mile swim, 112 miles on the bike and 20 miles of running. That would probably be how many hours for you? 9-10 hrs. min.
See how much your legs feel like running.
I think the biggest issue with Ironman racing in the age group ranks is that most people do not know how to properly execute this race. They end up going to hard on the bike and 5-6 hours into the race because they feel good they push to hard, but fail to realize they are going to be on the course for 11, 12, 13, 14+ hours and in many cases are not even half way done with the race. By the time they are late into the run, they are cooked and walking is all they can do.
Best advice I ever got was from Endurance Nation.
An Ironman race does not begin until mile 18 of the run, up to that point you take it easy. It’s nothing but lolipops & unicorns on the swim, bike and first 18 miles of the run. After mile 18 you want to get all Ricky Rocket Racer, go for it. The trick is just not slowing down.
I “ran” a bit over 3:30 for my first marathon (open or otherwise) at IMAZ and walked EVERY single aid station. 10-15 seconds. Pound fluids or whatever was needed and then take off again.
Common, especially if the conditions are hot. I went 5:30 on the marathon at Canada last year. Wheels came off in a big way after mile 10 and ended up in the med tent. Walking sucks, but so does DNFing.
I “ran” a bit over 3:30 for my first marathon (open or otherwise) at IMAZ and walked EVERY single aid station. 10-15 seconds. Pound fluids or whatever was needed and then take off again.
I did the same at IMAZ walk every aid station, and ran in between, ended up with a 4:15 marathon so guess you were running faster in between 
FYI from one of the times we kicked this around: http://forum.slowtwitch.com/cgi-bin/gforum.cgi?post=2859574;search_string=kicks;#2859574
For kicks I just ran a few #'s to give some perspective on the run times in an IM. Below is pulled from LP '09 & the % of athletes OVER that time (+/- 1%):
**>3hrs: **99%
**>4hrs: **87%
**>5hrs: **47%
**>6hrs: **15%
**>7hrs: **1%
So what this is saying is that if you can manage an 11:15 pace (+/-), you’ll have a faster marathon split than the majority of the finishers at IM LP. Take that FWIW. —
Wasnt it Jesse Thomas last year that spoke of walking every aid station at Wildflower that threw everyone into a tizzy?
Wasnt it Jesse Thomas last year that spoke of walking every aid station at Wildflower that threw everyone into a tizzy?
That may or may not be true, but the problem w/ many triathletes marathon times is not a result of whether or not they walked the aid stations…it’s walking the other 25.5 miles of the race.
Absolutely agree. Just trying to defend the idea of walking aid stations being part of a race strategy - even at a very high level. Of course thats not the case for most, as you’ve pointed out.
Come on! It’s an Aid Station!
Lots of Ironman race strategies call for walking through the aid stations to give your legs a slight break and to allow you to properly hydrate and fuel.
I hear you, but doesn’t it seem like it would be difficult to start up again after walking through every aid station? What about a light jog?
Yeah, because an IM marathon is soooo easy, as you know… oh. wait
How are you making this assumption, as the video only shows the aid station, and nothing else?
Not that there aren’t a lot of folks walking IM marathons. But so what? Try one once and then you can make fun of them. Until then…