{"id":209301,"date":"2025-10-13T07:31:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-13T07:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/209301\/"},"modified":"2025-10-13T07:31:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-13T07:31:08","slug":"eighty-year-old-becomes-oldest-woman-to-finish-ironman-world-championship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/209301\/","title":{"rendered":"Eighty-year-old becomes oldest woman to finish Ironman World Championship"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Natalie Grabow of the United States completes the 2025 IRONMAN World Championship Women’s Race on Saturday in Kailua Kona, Hawaii.Ezra Shaw\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Natalie Grabow proved that age really is just a number when the 80-year-old became the oldest woman ever to complete the gruelling Ironman World Championship in Kona, Hawaii on Saturday.<\/p>\n

The American age-grouper completed the 3.8 kilometre swim, 180 km bike ride and 42 km run in 16 hours, 45 minutes and 26 seconds, winning the F80-84 division in her 10th start at the iconic Hawaii event.<\/p>\n

Grabow, from New Jersey, discovered triathlon in her 60s after years of running and qualified for this year\u2019s World Championship with a time of 15 hours and 53 minutes at Ironman Maryland, becoming the first woman to complete that race in the 75\u201379 category.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll of us in sport are competitive and want to do well, but it\u2019s the journey that matters,\u201d Grabow said ahead of the Kona race.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re an age-grouper, people rarely remember how you did in a race, but they remember that you had a good attitude, had a smile on your face, and were happy with your effort. I\u2019m so lucky to be able to do this, so I race with gratitude.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her coach Michelle Lake described her as \u201cresilient\u201d and \u201cdisciplined,\u201d praising her steady training approach.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s competitive. She doesn\u2019t just race against her peers \u2013 she studies the men in her age group and finds ways to beat them,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She surpassed the previous oldest female record held by Ironman Hall of Famer Cherie Gruenfeld, who completed Kona at age 78.<\/p>\n

Race organizers celebrated Grabow\u2019s achievement, calling her \u201can icon of endurance\u201d and highlighting her determination, with the phrase \u201cage is just a number\u201d on social media posts.<\/p>\n

In the professional field, Norwegian rookie Solveig Lovseth won the World Championship in eight hours, 28 minutes and 27 seconds, with Britain\u2019s Kat Matthews second and 2024 champion Laura Philipp from Germany third. The men\u2019s event was held in September.<\/p>\n

More than 1,700 age-groupers also completed the race in sweltering heat and high humidity, testing the limits of every athlete.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Natalie Grabow of the United States completes the 2025 IRONMAN World Championship Women’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":209302,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[901,888,902,879,877,903,49,48,876,895,896,891,878,875,46,549,295,894,887,914,880,881,893,889,890,884,904,885,909,910,912,907,911,905,908,882,898,899,714,897,906,82,865,61,900,892,886,883,913],"class_list":["post-209301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-alberta","tag-arts-news","tag-bc","tag-breaking-news","tag-breaking-news-video","tag-british-columbia","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-canada-news","tag-canada-sports","tag-canada-sports-news","tag-canada-trafficcanada-weather","tag-canadian-breaking-news","tag-canadian-news","tag-economy","tag-education","tag-environment","tag-federal-government","tag-foreign-news","tag-globe-and-mail","tag-globe-and-mail-breaking-news","tag-globe-and-mail-canada-news","tag-government","tag-life-news","tag-lifestyle","tag-local-news","tag-manitoba","tag-national-news","tag-new-brunswick","tag-newfoundland-and-labrador","tag-northwest-territories","tag-nova-scotia","tag-nunavut","tag-ontario","tag-pei","tag-photos","tag-political-news","tag-political-opinion","tag-politics","tag-politics-news","tag-quebec","tag-sports","tag-sports-news","tag-technology","tag-travel","tag-trudeau","tag-us-news","tag-world-news","tag-yukon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=209301"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/209301\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/209302"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=209301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=209301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=209301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}