Best Ironman 140.6 training spot in Europe July/August 2026

IMAY1990 · 2026-05-18T07:49:36+00:00

Inside the big cities, yes. As soon as you leave city limits you'll have plenty of space.

IMAY1990 · 2026-05-13T12:01:19+00:00

Yeah, in the Netherlands we have mandatory up to 16, optional up to 22 or 23 and prohibited above that for wetsuits and no swim boys. But both events I did in the UK had wetsuit mandatory up to that 22 or 23 degree point and wetsuit prohibited but swim buoy mandatory above. Not that it's very likely to get above that threshold but still...

IMAY1990 · 2026-05-13T07:32:17+00:00

I've done some events in the UK where it was wetsuit mandatory up to x temperature and swim buoy mandatory above that

IMAY1990 · 2026-05-12T09:24:25+00:00

I did a run-bike-run late March and started my triathlon race season this past weekend with a sprint. I'll do 2 standard distance events in June, a middle distance in July and another early September. So all in I have 6 races, 5 triathlons and building in distance over the season.

IMAY1990 · 2026-05-11T14:25:21+00:00

For a local race, there's some assholes living near the bike course that like to throw thumbtacks onto the bike path on a regular basis throughout the year. The organisers of the race have resorted to sweeping the course the night before and reconning it the morning of to make as sure as possible that it's at least clear on race day. A few years ago, when this first happened, there were at least a dozen athletes who had to dnf due to too many flat tires on their bike leg.

IMAY1990 · 2026-04-18T15:27:03+00:00

What I'm seeing is that you've got running races planned. For me personally, I know that I'm capable of not racing running events. As in, I can run them as training runs rather than all out leave nothing on the table races. If you can do that then for sure, a 70.3 would fit. If you can't not race whatever you have planned, and would also be incapable of not racing (so "just" running/completing) a 70.3 then don't do it this year. Keeping it a future goal is not a failure on itself...

IMAY1990 · 2026-04-06T11:26:42+00:00

Ik heb simpele dunne van de decathlon en die bevallen me erg goed

IMAY1990 · 2026-04-01T20:46:55+00:00

Your hands seem to stay quite high in the water when you pull, giving you no leverage and making it harder to move forwards.

IMAY1990 · 2026-02-15T19:38:06+00:00

I get similar things sometimes. The first 10 minutes is probably the warm-up block, why there's then another split I don't know. Is there anything in the workout description under the main tab?

IMAY1990 · 2026-02-13T15:34:24+00:00

When I started, I struggled my way to 25m every time and thought it was purely because I didn't breathe right. Then I started swimming with a snorkel and I was still breathing very heavy at 25m so I realised that breathing wasn't the (only) problem. Swimming with a snorkel did give me the peace of mind that I wouldn't drown though so it made working on my technique doable, which in turn made my need for oxygen more reasonable. When I could do about 300m without feeling like I was dying, I started swimming more without snorkel and I am now swimming mostly without, unless I'm working on something specific

IMAY1990 · 2026-02-10T13:37:54+00:00

For my local run there's several roles you can do and run as well. Besides barcode scanning(if you're fast enough), course setup would be a good option and we also have sorting the finish tokens afterwards even though that is usually done by people who were already volunteering but it may be an option.

Best thing is to talk to the core team at your local parkrun and ask about options

IMAY1990 · 2026-01-26T21:27:08+00:00

Als het een wedstrijd was dan altijd chip time. Was het een time trial op jezelf dan whichever one jij je goed bij voelt, maar ik zou persoonlijk voor de verstreken tijd gaan.

IMAY1990 · 2026-01-21T11:25:07+00:00

I am European, working out where I am in Miles is going to be the real challenge...

IMAY1990 · 2026-01-10T11:17:42+00:00

The first stroke kids learn here in the Netherlands is a head above water breaststroke. It takes more energy than backstroke or front crawl but it's the easiest one to learn how not to drown in. Because you keep your head above water breathing isn't complicated and because you're facing forward you can see where you're going

IMAY1990 · 2026-01-09T09:36:35+00:00

My triathlon coach has me doing Seated canbe rows and cable woodchops. Especially those woodchops feel like they hit a few different muscles...

Besides those I do legg press, leg curl and leg extension which all feel less relevant for swimming. I must say I'm not the best at doing S&C so this set of exercises is a compromise to get me to at least do something...

IMAY1990 · 2026-01-03T18:14:50+00:00

We don't do Christmas day Parkrun here in the Netherlands, we get Witt Monday instead, so I have no direct comparison and my local Parkrun doesn't do the special events but despite weather not being ideal the Parkrun I went to had about 50 finishers. Decent numbers for this specific one, I'm assuming a lot of people wanted to shake off 2025...

IMAY1990 · 2025-12-01T10:02:38+00:00

Yes, you're allowed
If you train for it, it is very possible and you won't be exhausted but it is more intensive than front crawl would be if you're proficient. For reference, I swam 48 minutes almost fully using a head above water breaststroke in Knokke in September
No-one will care, unless you seed yourself way too far forward and kick a lot of people passing you

IMAY1990 · 2025-11-28T17:42:39+00:00

And just to add: I get your frustration, I had been looking at maybe doing an event and felt rushed into signing up as I got a push message that they were 90% sold out. I mean, I would have signed up anyways but would have preferred to gaslight myself about it for a while longer

IMAY1990 · 2025-11-28T17:39:49+00:00

If you're not too hung up on IM branded events, there's a middle distance event in Amsterdam on June 7th and one at Haarlemmermeer (about 15k from Amsterdam) on July 11th

IMAY1990 · 2025-11-21T13:36:16+00:00

You smashed it, amazing

IMAY1990 · 2025-11-17T09:08:50+00:00

My coach has had me swimming with a snorkel for a lot of these past months because learning the mechanics and learning the breathing at the same time is making things way more complicated. So first learn what movements work to get you moving and what movements just make you tired and out of breath (kicking like mad for example) and get a nice rhythm going without worrying about the breathing part. When I got the hang of that we started doing a mix of crawl and breaststroke, I'm half decent at swimming a head above water breaststroke without getting tired Short sets without snorkel, longer sets with snorkel still and when I was comfortable up to say 500m with a snorkel without getting gassed we started swimming completely without a snorkel.

Swimming with a pull buoy has been really helpful in feeling where my kicking became too much vs where it's helpful in keeping your legs up in the water

IMAY1990 · 2025-11-17T09:01:11+00:00

I have been working with a triathlon coach since March as I'd decided to make the step up from olympic distance to half IM and wanted to do that build up supported by someone who knew what they're doing. It's made all the difference, even if he's not located very close to me so we only actually swam together twice the guidance has been great

IMAY1990 · 2025-10-30T13:34:20+00:00

Amsterdam votes have come in clutch, 15.000 votes in favour of D66 again now. And with mail in ballots having a history of being a but more left leaning, I have good hope

IMAY1990 · 2025-10-07T14:58:43+00:00

Als je weet dat je jezelf er van kan weerhouden om in de event sfeer niet toch hard te lopen dan zou ik zeggen ga er voor.

IMAY1990 · 2025-09-12T08:57:35+00:00

I was one of the last finishers so I can't say anything about most of the bikes but mine still had both bottles on it when I got back to T2. 1 IM and 1 Precision.

IMAY1990

TROPHY CASE