Sunday 3rd July 2022
Bolton Ironman
Dubbed one of the UK’s friendliest towns, Bolton is the home of England’s only full-distance IRONMAN. This race is known for its iconic spectator support, incredible North West English bike course scenery, and impressive finish line in the heart of the town centre.
The thoughts from our very worthy competitor Mark Turnbull are below:
I’ve done a few ironman events and the last couple were in Barcelona where I was 10th in age group (V50) in 2018, then 7th (only 3 minutes behind 3rd!) in 2021, so I picked a harder hilly one, take the big powerful cyclists out of the equation. Bolton is probably the hardest course on the ironman calendar with over 9000ft on the bike and even the run is hilly with 1300ft for the marathon – a proper course! Qualification for the Ironman world championships in Kona was the target, at least 3rd should get a guaranteed slot. I’d looked through the start list and the 50s was probably one of the biggest age groups, over 300, quite a few from abroad, it would be super competitive.
The race started at Pennington Flash with the heavens opening just on cue. I started fine but got some wicked calf cramps on lap 2 and it felt like everyone was overtaking me. Not much slower than usual but I was hoping for more. I knew the race was all about the bike and run though and was still confident running through T1.
Swim 1 hr 18 mins 56th V50
The bike route is 12 or so miles from the lake to Bolton, then 3 laps of the surrounding hills passing through the town centre each time. After the second lap I saw Emma who shouted that I was in 11th, ok then let’s go, this is on, gave me a boost to keep pushing on the last lap. We had rain, wind, hills, potholes, dodgy road surfaces, the lot but I actually really enjoyed it, the support at various places was pretty amazing.
Bike 6hrs 12 mins, 5th fastest V50 time.
Exiting T2 Emma was there shouting 9th – again that was great – I can do this, stick to the pace plan, keep fuelling and I can run down the podium.
The run is 4 laps with a steep hill in the middle and then a gentle climb to the turn for a downhill return. The live leaderboard (Emma) was ticking down, 9th, 7th, 5th, then the magic number 3rd with still over a lap to go, 7 minutes behind second. In my mind that was still do-able and I tried to keep pace as hard as possible, they might blow up, anything can still happen, but there was no way – 3rd was the final result. The last 2 miles downhill to the finish was the best part of the whole day, with the usual euphoric Ironman finishing chute and realisation that I really was 3rd, job done!
Run 3hrs 24 mins, 2nd fastest V50
Overall 11 hrs 7 mins, 3rd V50
Kona slot in the bag, thank god for credit cards.
The only downside (apart from the cost) is the thought of doing another ironman in 12 weeks time.
Stunning effort from Mark who now has qualified for the World Championships Kona, in October! Mark is a fantastic ambassador for our club, the amount of hours spent training for an event such as an Ironman cannot be taken lightly. It requires dedication, commitment plus a huge amount enthusiasm and mental strength to finish an Ironman let alone cross the finish line in the manner that Mark achieved. The work and sacrifices behind the scenes that only family and close friends witness is very inspirational. Huge congratulations on your achievement and good luck in Kona.
Field size 1700
44th Mark Turnbull 11.07.12 & 3rd Vet male 50-54
2.4 mile swim – 1.18.47
T1 – 6.31
112 mile bike – 6.12.20
T2 – 5.28
26.2 mile run – 3.24.08