Iron Distance Triathlon
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An Iron Distance Triathlon is a triathlon performed over the following distances:
- 3.8 km (2.4 mi) swimming
- 180 km (112 mi) bicycling
- 42.2 km (26.2 mi) running (the length of a standard marathon)
However, races do not have to be exactly this distance to be considered Iron Distance Triathlons.
The historically first and most well known example is the Ironman Triathlon in Hawaii. This term is trademarked by the World Triathlon Corporation, which runs a series of races under that name but which are not sanctioned as official competitions by the International Triathlon Union. Other races over the same distances are called Iron Distance.
Several of these races are held around the world including Challenge Roth in Germany, The Longest Day in England, Blue Devil in the U.S. state of North Carolina, Great Floridian in Florida, and Ultramax in Missouri.
Multiple Iron Distance events are also held: double, triple, quintuple, deca (ten-fold) etc. In a deca Iron Distance event for example, a 38 km swim is followed by an 1800 km bike race and a 422 km run. Astrid Benöhr holds the (women's and men's) world records over the quintuple and deca Iron distances.
The ITU runs a similar series of official races called Long Distance Triathlon. The distances for the long distance races are close to but slightly different from the specifications for iron distance.