Fusion Triathlon Coaching

Ironman Tallinn was one for the ages yesterday.

It threw just about everything but the kitchen sink at Gordy.

A delayed start because of heavy fog. Rain. Hail. Severe winds. Cold. A race that disappeared off the tracker at midnight and briefly had everyone back home wondering what the hell had happened.

Meanwhile, Gordy Baird was still out there getting the job done.

And here’s the bit that makes this one particularly special:

Ironman Tallinn wasn’t just Gordy’s first Ironman.
It was his first ever triathlon.

No shorter-distance apprenticeship. No previous race-day experience to fall back on. Straight into 3.8km of swimming, 180km on the bike and a marathon — on a day when Tallinn decided to make him earn every single metre of it.

He stuck to the task.
He trusted the plan.
He kept moving forward.

And eventually, long after the tracker had given up on him, Gordy crossed that finish line.

Perseverance.

Continuing when circumstances give you every reason not to.

First triathlon.
First Ironman.

Job done. Boom. 👊🏻🔥

Congratulations, Ironman. Tallinn demanded that you earn that one. 🤙🏻

I tried to think of a more polite title for this one.

I really did.

But sometimes you just have to call a spade a spade.

😈 THE 5 BASTARDS OF TRIATHLON

Forget fast courses. Forget PB hunting. These are five races designed by people who looked at triathlon and thought:

“This seems a little too comfortable.”

Each is a bastard for its own very particular reason.

🇨🇭 1. SWISSMAN EXTREME
Welcome to your granny ring.

3.8km swim. 180km bike. Around 4,800m of climbing. Then a marathon finishing above 2,000m.

The scenery is spectacular. Which is fortunate, because you’ll be looking at it for a very long time.

🇮🇹 2. ICON LIVIGNO EXTREME
Apparently the Stelvio wasn’t enough.

Nearly 200km on the bike. Around 5,000m climbing. High altitude. Then a marathon finishing around 3,000m.

At some point you have to admire the commitment to making absolutely everything unnecessarily difficult.

🇳🇴 3. NORSEMAN EXTREME
The ferry jump is about to be the highlight of your day, mate.

Jump into a freezing fjord in the dark, ride 180km through Norway, then tackle a marathon towards Gaustatoppen.

Want the famous Black Shirt? Earn it.

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿4. CELTMAN EXTREME
How do you like your jellyfish?

Cold water. Jellyfish. 200km bike. Mountains. Remote terrain. Scottish weather.

How do you like your suffering?

Celtman offers the tasting menu.

🇫🇷 5. ALPE D’HUEZ LONG COURSE
Nothing but net.

And by net, we mean climbing.

118km bike. Around 3,200m ascent. And towards the end?

21 hairpins of Alpe d’Huez.

Because putting transition somewhere flat would be showing weakness.

These aren’t simply the longest or the hilliest races. Each has its own unique ability to make a rational human question the sequence of decisions that brought them there.

And if you’ve looked at these five and thought:

“I’d quite like to have a crack at one of those…”

Congratulations.

There’s a non-zero possibility you’re a sadomasochist and simply haven’t realised it yet. 😂

👇 Which bastard are you taking on — and which one have we missed?

140.6 miles is never easy.

But some IRONMAN courses seem determined to make absolutely certain of it. 😂

🔥 THE 5 HARDEST IRONMAN RACES

After our 5 Fastest Ironman Courses post proved surprisingly popular, it seemed only fair that we went looking at the other end of the spectrum.

This list combines our coaching experience, course profiles, route characteristics, typical race-day conditions, mean finishing times and years of watching athletes discover that not all 140.6 miles are created equal.

Our five:

🥇 IRONMAN Wales
Nothing here is free.

🥈 IRONMAN Lanzarote
Welcome to the wind tunnel.

🥉 IRONMAN Malaysia
Congratulations. You’re now soup.

4️⃣ IRONMAN Lake Placid
You wanted flat? That’s adorable.

5️⃣ IRONMAN World Championship — Kona
Welcome to the bonk factory.

Wales takes our top spot because it simply refuses to give you a break. Sea swim. Relentless bike profile. Tough run. Welsh weather waiting in the wings in case you were beginning to enjoy yourself.

Lanzarote brings the holy trinity of climbing, heat and wind.

Malaysia asks whether you’d like your Ironman served at approximately the temperature and humidity of a slow cooker.

Lake Placid combines a beautiful setting with a bike and run course that steadily sends the invoice for every pacing mistake you’ve made.

And Kona? Heat. Wind. Humidity. Exposure. History. Pressure. The Queen K doesn’t particularly care how impressive your FTP looked back home.

There are other legitimate contenders — and that’s where the argument gets interesting.

👇 What have we got wrong?

Which IRONMAN course deserves to be in the five?

And, more importantly…

What’s the hardest one YOU’VE raced?

COMMIT. TRAIN. EVOLVE.

Well done champ 👏

🏊‍♂️🚴‍♂️🏃‍♂️ WANT TO GO FAST? PICK YOUR BATTLES.

Here’s something endurance athletes occasionally don’t like admitting:

Not all IRONMAN courses are created equal. 😂

Yes, you still have to swim 3.8km, ride 180km and then make a series of increasingly questionable life choices for 42.2km.

But if you’re chasing a first IRONMAN finish or hunting a new PB, course selection matters.

So we went digging.

We looked at:
📊 Race and projected average finish times
⛰️ Course profiles
🌦️ Typical race-day conditions
🏊 Swim characteristics
🚴 Bike speed and elevation
🏃 Run-course difficulty
🧠 And our own experience coaching multiple athletes specifically for each of these races.

Our Fusion Five for speed:

🥇 Barcelona — The King of PBs
🥈 Copenhagen — Fast. Smooth. Reliable.
🥉 Hamburg — Flat, fast and built for speed
4️⃣ Tallinn — Incredibly flat. Incredibly fast.
5️⃣ Kalmar — The Swedish speed classic

Does entering Barcelona magically make you fast?

Sadly not. We checked the small print.

You still have to do the training. 😭

But for a first-timer, the right course can remove some unnecessary difficulty. And for an experienced age-grouper chasing 15, 20 or 30 minutes, choosing a course that suits the mission can make a very real difference.

Because ultimately:

Courses don’t set PBs. You do.

But there’s absolutely no rule saying you have to make it harder than it needs to be. 😉

Which course would YOU pick for an all-out PB attempt? And which one have we criminally left off the list? 👇

The finish line isn’t built on motivation.

It’s built on repetition.

With Stuart Martin

Coaching isn’t just built on qualifications.

It’s built on thousands of training hours, mistakes, setbacks, victories… and stories like this one.

I thought it was worth sharing here too.
https://fusiontri.wordpress.com/2026/07/27/the-day-i-beat-the-ironman-world-champion-technically/

Every endurance coach has experienced this…

Athlete: “My Achilles is about a 7/10.”

Me: “Let’s take 3-4 days off running. Cross-train, let it calm down.”

Athlete (the next morning):

“I just wanted to see how it felt…”

Strava: 10.2 miles • Threshold • 7:03/mile • 5 PBs 🏆

We can’t help you if your decision-making disappears the moment you lace your shoes. 😂

Remember: the goal isn’t to prove you’re tough today. The goal is to still be training six weeks from now.

This post might be for one person.

Maybe you’ve followed this page for months.

Maybe even years.

You’ve watched race photos.
Cheered people on.
Read the stories.

And every now and then you’ve wondered…

“Could I actually do something like that?”

But then the doubts arrive.

“I’m too unfit.”

“I’m too old.”

“I don’t have enough time.”

“Maybe next month…”

Here’s the truth.

Almost nobody starts feeling ready.

The athletes you see standing on finish lines weren’t born with confidence.

They weren’t always runners.
They weren’t always cyclists.
They definitely weren’t always triathletes.

They simply made one decision.

To start.

Not with a marathon.
Not with an Ironman.

Just with a pair of trainers.

Run for five minutes.
Walk for one.

Repeat.

That’s enough.

You don’t need to earn the right to call yourself an endurance athlete.

You earn it by taking that first step.

One of the things I’m proudest of is that we don’t coach elite athletes.

We help create them.

Most of the people in these photos once believed endurance sport wasn’t for them.

Now they’re the ones inspiring someone else.

So if you’ve been waiting until you feel ready…

Don’t.

Start before you’re ready.

Start before you’re confident.

Start before you think you’re fit enough.

Because one day you’ll look around and realise you’re no longer watching from the sidelines…

You’re walking towards the start line with everyone else. 💙💪🏻