American Brothers Continue Guinness World Record Push At Ironman 70.3 Melbourne

For the two Americans, GWM IRONMAN 70.3 Melbourne continued an incredible year, it marked their 40th half-distance triathlon, consisting of a 1.9km swim, 90km ride and 21.1km, since May 2021.

The old record was 24 half-distance triathlons in a year, which the pair knocked off in just four months, and they have their sights set on completing 50, culminating where it all started for them at the Sunbelt Bakery IRONMAN 70.3 North American Championship Chattanooga presented by McKee A Family Baker next May.

“I finished my first IRONMAN triathlon, and we were looking for the next challenge, what’s the next step and we’re not fast so we needed something where we didn’t have to win, so this was an incredible challenge,” said Sam. “I looked it up and the record was 24, that was a number I could wrap my head round. 24 in 12 months, that’s one every other week, yeah, we could do that. So, this will be number 40, we’ve set the bar high.”

While older brother Billy doesn’t actually remember agreeing to join Sam on the Guinness World Record attempt it’s certainly been an adventure of a lifetime for the pair.

“I’m not sure that I ever said yes, he called me up and was like ‘hey, I’m thinking about this’, and I did not immediately say no and so if you don’t immediately say no what I’ve been told is that is enabling, so I enabled this whole thing to go on,” said Billy. “It’s been super fun, we’ve had a great time meeting wonderful people all over the world.”

Completing a half-distance triathlon is an incredible achievement in itself, let alone 40 since last May, but Sam said that the logistics and battles with the every-changing COVID situation were the toughest part of their World Record attempt.

“The racing itself has never been the most difficult part, we did in the month of August seven races, your body just got used to that but having to deal with COVID restrictions and of course we were registered for GVM IRONMAN 70.3 Melbourne when it was supposed to be held last November and it got cancelled, we’ve had lots of races rescheduled and then we have to retool the schedule, it’s been an extra challenge,” said Sam. “We then needed to get PCR tests to get out of every country –it’s been an interesting challenge.”

“We do a lot of last-minute planning, we were on the plane over here making hotel reservations, the race cancellations have made it tough, sometimes we had races that were cancelled the week of and so we had to find a replacement race somewhere else in the world and then make arrangements for how to make it to that race,” he said.

The World Record attempt have taken the two, Sam based in Florida and Billy in Augusta, on a journey in their own backyard and around the world, including races in Austria, France, Sweden, Spain, Egypt, Dubai and Puerto Rico, with their next stop IRONMAN 70.3 San Juan in Argentina next weekend.

“Egypt was great for us, it was an incredible event and then we got to see the Pyramids after it,” said Billy. “Austria is probably our favourite bike course, it’s been voted the best IRONMAN bike course in the world, our favourite swim would be Augusta, Georgia, because it’s down river, the river was super-fast, the run in Chattanooga, Tennessee is really good along the river. Our favourite races are probably the international races because you get to meet people from a whole bunch of different backgrounds and you get to realise that all triathletes are pretty much the same, we all have the same mentalities, the same quirks, so that’s been a lot of fun.”

Sam said that Australia was always on the wish list for the pair, with the recent border opening allowing them to make the trip halfway around the world for GWM IRONMAN 70.3 Melbourne.

“This was a special race, we wanted to do Australia, it gave us all six continents, Melbourne just lined up perfectly with our schedule,” he said. “Melbourne has a fantastic reputation worldwide for sport and we wanted to come and see it.”

While it’s never been about who finishes first at each race there’s surely some brotherly rivalry that creeps in, with Billy taking the honours in Catani Gardens on Sunday, crossing the line in 6:05:19.

“It was awesome, the weather was great, the wind wasn’t too bad, the spectators on the bike were incredible, they lined the whole course, all the way to the end, that was pretty cool,” said Billy. “This is a wonderful race, I highly recommend it, it’s got to be a bucket list race for anybody in the world. We appreciate you all opening up Australia to let us race.”

Sam finished just under half an hour behind in 6:33:22, and enjoyed himself out on course just as much as his brother.

“It was fun, it was a tough day but we earnt it, it was a good one,” said Sam. “The weather was perfect, the support was incredible and the course was great, I loved it. The scenery we got to ride through was a blast, the hills were nice and rolling, it made it a lot of fun.

“This is one of my favourites, it’s incredible, I love it, we’ll be back,” he said.