The Fourth Time – Cobra Ironman 70.3

August 1, 2013Let Leave a comment

Once, I asked my husband a question like this:

Me: Papsy, pareho lang ba yung passion mo sa sports mo sa passion mo sa akin? (a bit selfish I know). 😉

Erick Guieb: Syempre mas higit sa iyo at sa mga anak natin. (and this made me smile)

Being the family man and triathlete that he is, he has been able to juggle his time perfectly well. Even to the point that he has to sleep at the hospital to take care of our daughter who was confined just a few days ago so that I could sleep comfortably back at home. And after I relieved his duty at the morning, he would train.

Me: I thought it was taper week already? I asked for it was just a week away from his major race which is the Cobra Ironman 70.3.

Erick Guieb: Taper week doesn’t mean I won’t train, I would just have to lessen the intensity and distance. He spoke like a true athlete. 🙂

Upon writing, we are now in The City of Smiles, Cebu City for the race. And for the Fourth Time, he’s racing the prestigious Ironman 70.3. I do hope that all his training will pay off, and will finish strong. ‘Am here to support him all the way! 🙂

The sweetest dad ever, my Irondad! (as per my kiddos) 🙂

Cobra Ironman 70.3 takes to the sea

June 29, 2012Let Leave a comment

The Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines takes to the sea in Cebu as the province hosts its fourth staging as well as the Alaska Milk Ironkids Triathlon on August 4 – 5, 2012.

After racing in a man-made lake the past three years participants will swim in open water as the Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines holds the 1.2-mile swim part in the sea starting at the beach of the Shangri-La’s Mactan Resort & Spa in Mactan Island. The province of Cebu will literally host the event with the 56-mile bike ride traversing four municipalities ( Lapu Lapu, Mandaue, Cebu City and Talisay). The culminating 13.1-mile run will be at Punta Engano, Lapu Lapu City.

Race organizer Sunrise Events, Inc. promises to top the wildly successful races of the past three years assuring that that this year’s race will be its biggest, most exciting edition yet.

A huge field of 1,319 individuals and 115 relay teams from 31 countries, with 350 on the wait list, will test their strength and endurance once again as Ironman 70.3 Philippines provides another once-in-a-lifetime triathlon experience. Alaska Milk Ironkids Triathlon on the other hand is for the youngsters. It is the local junior version of the international triathlon series, Ironman. It is open to kids age 6 to 14 years old and aims to promote an active lifestyle for kids to promote their health. Leading the Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines are the professional triathletes including back-to-back champion Pete Jacobs of Australia.
Jacobs, who has become a regular fixture of the Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines, will gun for an unprecedented third consecutive victory after winning the past two editions in 2010 and 2011. He will have his hands full against Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines inaugural champion Terenzo Bozzone from New Zealand who won the 2009 race. Other male professionals include Fredrik Croneborg from Sweden, Justin Granger from Australia, Mathieu O’Halloran of Alaska TeamTBB Philippines who now lives in the Philippines and Jesse Thomas from the United States.

Defending champion Belinda Granger, also from Australia who is fresh from her triumph at the Century Tuna 5i50 Triathlon in Subic, aims for back-to-back titles against familiar face Bree Wee from the United States who was in third place last year. Ali Fitch of Alaska TeamTBB Philippines from Australia will also be in the mix.

The presenting sponsor of the Cobra Energy Drink Ironman 70.3 Philippines is Globe Telecom. The official carrier is the Philippine Airlines. Media partners are MultiSport magazine, the Philippine Star and Studio 23. The event is also sponsored by Alaska Milk Corporation, Century Tuna, David’s Salon, Intercare, K-Swiss, Oakley and Powerade. Official photographer is Finisher Pix while the host venue is Shangri-La’s Mactan Resort & Spa. Official hotel partners are BE Resorts, Crimson Resort & Spa, Movenpick Resort & Spa, Radisson Blu,

The Ironman 70.3 Philippines has become one of the most-awaited sporting events in the country attracting thousands of participants since its inception in 2009.

For more information, check out the Cobra Energy Drink IronMan 70.3 Philippines website, www.ironman703phil.com.

A message from Fred Uytengsu

December 14, 2010Let Leave a comment

Regarding the Ironman 70.3 Philippines on August 2011

Hello fellow triathletes— This message below is from Fred Uytengsu, organizer of Ironman 70.3 Philippines 2011. Please feel free to pass on and share with the other tri teams:

“It has been brought to my attention about certain concerns and grumblings about the cost of Ironman 70.3 Philippines and the quick sell out of rooms at Camsur. I am not on Facebook but some friends alerted me about the situation.

Allow me to clarify some misconceptions. First of all, bringing Ironman to the Philippines has been a long time goal of mine and it took several years of negotiations. It also takes a quarter of a million dollars! We work with sponsors to defray as much of the costs as possible and registration fees are in line with other 70.3 events around the world. Some ask “why do we have to pay more in the Philippines than other local triathlons”? The simple answer is because it is a better event and it is an official Ironman race! Why do you pay more for a Rolex versus a Swatch? They both tell time. We are cognizant of the financial burden on triathletes and also try to keep costs down for transport and food. (Most races don’t even arrange these details). Hopefully you will agree that the service and quality are better than most other events. WTC thinks so. Furthermore competing locally defray the cost of airfare.

With respect to hotels, there is a shortage in CWC simply because so many people want to stay there. So as soon as registration opened, CWC rooms were filled up in 72 hours. There are some rooms reserved for sponsors but these are less than 20. At the Awards Banquet this year, Gov. Lray promised to build an additional 100 rooms. He is working on this but we are not in a position to offer these until they are confirmed. So for those who were not able to get in to CWC, I would suggest that you book another hotel and once the CWC rooms open up, it will be posted on the event website. I can tell you that in Kona, ALL hotels jack up their rates and require a minimum of a one week stay.

Registrations are far ahead of where they were last year. I expect we will sell out well ahead of schedule. We are seeing great interest from abroad because of the word of mouth support from those who attended last year. One group from Hawaii is bringing 15 triathletes and is also doing a charitable mission. So aside from promoting sports tourism, they are giving back to a community they have never visited before. This is something we can be proud of and encourage others to do. Additionally the sport is growing and we will have a lot of first timers in 2011.

WTC Managing Director, Murphy Reinshreiber told me that Ironman 70.3 Philippines is one of the better races around and was the best inaugural race he had ever attended. Sure there are many areas for improvement but we are off to a good start. We are not tooting our own horn but simply trying to reinforce that we can hold world-class events in the Philippines. By doing so we not only grow the sport but help with sports tourism. This is a free country and with Facebook and the internet we have seen a growing democratization of free speech.

I would have hoped to hear how many Filipino triathletes are proud of our very own 70.3. Instead, it is disappointing to see some of these complaints are typical of the crab mentality which negatively impacts our country. It is quite easy to try to drag someone down when they are trying to do well. I’d hope that more people would focus on trying to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem. It is even more disappointing to read words like “boycott” coming from Filipino triathletes. You do have a choice and hopefully it is an informed choice. I trust the aforementioned has clarified any misconceptions and if you see fit, we’d like to see you at the finish line.”

Merry Christmas.

Fred Uytengsu

Note: The blogger is in no way connected to Mr. Fred Uytengsu, I shared this post just to spread the word and since I also know some people who will be joining this event. 🙂

Enduring the Half Ironman Race

August 27, 2010Let 5 Comments

AUGUST 22 – D DAY

This is it! D-day is almost here, Erick woke up at 1AM, he couldn’t sleep because of the excitement so he decided to watch a movie on the computer, but it’s loud noise woke me up. So Erick and I were awake and waited while watching a movie. I decided to ready the stuffs that we would be bringing, a bag for Erick’s post race and a bag for me and for the kids. I dressed up, dressed the kids while they were sleeping and called the cafe to follow-up on our breakfast.

Erick was a bit anxious, I felt like I was walking on thin ice, I’m careful of what to say for I don’t want to ruin his mood. It was past 4AM when we left the hotel to drive for CWC, it was already filled with participants, cheerer and supporters when we arrived. One by one the transition area was filled with participants having their body markings, you could feel the excitement from everywhere.

With Jonas of Sunkist

A few minutes later, Erick was on his way to the big lake, you could hear applause and cheer from supporters. At this time, I was feeling nervous, I was praying to God to keep everyone safe, that no mishap would happen, and one by one I telephoned Erick’s mom, my mother, my sister and my best friend informing them that in while Erick would start on reaching for his dream and to help me for praying Erick’s safety.

Waiting for the start of their wave

The sound of the horn indicates the start of the Professional and Elite athletes start. Everyone was clapping and shouting, we could see how fast these guys are and have trained so hard for this race. Erick’s wave would start 2 minutes after the pro and elite started, their wave was the biggest, and most of them are competitive. At the sound of the second horn, the louder the cheer, my hands won’t stop shaking while I was taking a video.

Wave 2 (Photo from Doc Marvin)

After taking a video, I immediately went to on to the small lake to wait for Erick’s transition from Lago del Rey to the small lake. One by one, pro and elite athletes came running to swim for another 300m.

NZ’s Terenzo Bozzone who won 1st last year 😀

Noy Jopson who won 1st last year

Finally! Erick made it out of the big lake

Erick finished his 1.9K swim in 41minutes and 0.2 seconds which is fast, at this point I was worried thinking that he might have pushed himself so hard at the swim that his run might suffer. I was even more excited when I saw him off to the transition area.

Running to T1

I had no way of watching Erick in the bike leg except from his exit to the highway, so we just patiently waited for him at the run course. And that is the reason why I don’t have a picture of him on the bike leg. It was a hot day, and it was almost everyone’s comment on the weather that day, the last year result is faster than that day.

He finished the 90K bike route in 2hours and 35minutes and was on his way to T2. WHAT?!!! he has a fast bike time, so what happens now to his run? would he be walking and crawling his way to the finish line? this are my thoughts when I was calculating his time, I just hope that he had done his proper nutrition so that his run wouldn’t suffer. Then he was off to his first loop at the 21K run.

But why would I be worried if he looks like this? All smile pa rin. 🙂

Or maybe because he saw my “hakot cheerer” NOTE: pumayag po sila na walang bayad basta pakainin ko lang daw po sila. 🙂

We have agreed that his estimate time of finish would be 5hours 50minutes or up to 6hours. But with his performance I predicted that he could finish in 5hours 30minutes considering that he won’t walk at the run leg. But once a runner always a runner.

Nearing his way to the finish line (Photo courtesy of Doc Marvin)

My calculations were wrong, he could do a sub 5hours 30minutes. He clocked his finish time at 5hours 25minutes, which is a decent time for a first time half Ironman participant. He did it! He reached for his dream and made me proud. All glory and praises belong to the Lord alone! His love ENDURES forever and His mercy never ends.

Almost there

Victory is yours!

Here is his time according to Ironmanlive

Congratulations to the member of Team Endure who are also an Ironman James, Rico, Ziggy, Ronald, Melvin, Jason. Hats off to all of you! You rocked CamSur! And to the unequaled supporter/cheerer Taty, Marga, Ellen, Carina, Doc Marvin, RJ and Emil, I salute you. Money can’t buy your efforts, for giving the time just to be there for the team. God bless you all even more and God bless Team Endure!

My hubby is my Ironman!

August 26, 2010Let 4 Comments

My hubby has once again made me proud by finishing his first Half Ironman race as CWC in Camarines Sur. If there is one trait that I love about Erick, that is perseverance. He never ceases to amaze me on how far he is willing to give and do for the love of multi-sport. I have always been a supportive wife, I ‘am a friend to Erick best friend to be exact, and I ‘am his number 1 fan.

A year ago, when the debut race of the 70.3 Cobra Ironman was held in CamSur, I saw in Erick’s face the excitement of wanting to join the race. But since he was just starting at multi-sport, not to mention that he don’t have a road bike yet and of the high registration fee, he promised that he would join this year. So as early as December of last year, he registered online and devoted his time to train for the race.

He would be training during weekends and even weekdays, long bike rides, swim drills and run under the heat of the sun. It is also a good thing to have a buddy when training, you get to exchange ideas with each other or as what Erick calls it science of the sport.

There had been race before the Half Ironman, like the Animo Sprint Triathlon where he place 1st in his age category and the Powerade Duathlon 2nd Leg where he landed on the 2nd place on his age category. His training for the half Ironman may have paid off. 🙂

Podium finishers (my kiddos at 1st and 2nd in their age category)

Happily receiving his medal

Erick had always made me proud when he finish his race strong. I feel like that it’s also my accomplishment whenever he finish ahead of the group. That’s why sometimes the thought of just being the “supporter wife” crosses my mind and thinks that it would be enough. 😀 After long months of waiting for this race, all roads lead to CamSur.