70.3 World Championships - Race Report

Mark Brandt raced the 70.3 World Championships in Marbella, Spain on Sunday November 9th, 2025. Here is his race report to share:

"Making it one Ironman World Championship 70.3 after learning how to swim at 50 would be a dream come true! Making it to 4 would be a dream over and over! I made it to my 4th this year. After paying to race it was announced the course would be 5900 feet of vertical climb. Double the most I’ve ever raced. I got out and did hills. Over and over. I did 4000 feet multiple times. I changed my gearing to have smaller rings up front and bigger in the back. I am not going to lie I was terrified of this bike course. Early on I would slow to 2.4 mph and my Garmin would pause. After working hard I got up to where even on bike hills of 14-21 percent grade I could maintain 6-8 mph! Cindy told me don’t go over 220W power. So with that I arrived wed with a bike bag but short two suitcases. My wife insisted I put airtags in my bag. After returning day two we sent Carlos the bagman with the number of our claim check into a room of hundreds of bags. A lady behind me in line said you can make those tags beep! I did that and we recovered our bags.

Sunday am in the way to the race at 6:30 am the bars and night clubs were on our street and in the way to the race I was propositioned by an all night party. Where are you going? To do an Ironman. I’d like to do an Ironman! No kidding.

The race was in the Mediterranean Sea. Very salty and it was very windy at 7:50 when the pros took off but by 9:04 when I got in it was much more calm and the sun was coming out. I had new googles as mine broke in two last week and my right goggle filled pretty quickly. Ohh well I thought eye drops are saline solution and so is the sea. I swam with one eye for about 1200 meters. I then flipped on my back, cleared the right side, and restarted. I got hit, bumped, crushed and kicked a lot. I’ve learned to never get upset, touch those in your space and let them know you are there. I did swallow a huge mouthful of sea water and I felt sick to my stomach the rest of the day. My goal for the swim was 37:00 I got out in 39:00. It was a long transition and the wet suit strippers were not fast. The bike racks had numbering on the back side of the rack so I ran by my bike without seeing it at first. I rubber banded my shoes on the bike for a flying mount and after Finland where my chain fell off and I landed in the ground I hit this one perfectly. Off I went. The first 6 miles were flat and fast through the town. Then I got a 12% grade 3 mile climb. To say it got worse would be an understatement. The hills kept coming and got worse and worse. On the downhills I was able to hit 40 mph a lot and 47 two times. The course was crowded and the way it goes younger people leave after you and unless you are a former TDF cyclist. You get swallowed up by fast tall Europeans! To say it’s humbling would be mild. The issue is they see grey hair and they assume they will never see you again. Not true. My decents are fast. I passed many of them. I saw a terrible wipe out on one where the guy had to be going 40!

I made it to several downhills and hit crazy speeds. I never looked at the bike computer because at that stage the road is littered with bottles, inner tubes and nutrition and you need to steer around it. I did well to hit 3:30 where on a flat course I’m regularly at 2:35!

The run was flat and fast with big cheering and music and I had my great friend from my tri club in Cleveland and various other affiliations yelling to me. I’m humbled, I’m proud, 🥲 I'm spent. Next year I have Muscleman in New York, Jacksonville Full Ironman and Nice 70.3 World Championships - one more time at the 70.3 Worlds for my 5th time on the docket.

Here is my lesson to anyone that will listen. Do your workouts. Stick to everything you can. Some weeks I’m all green on Training Peaks, some weeks I travel for work and there is more red. I work really hard to try and get better at everything every day. My bike was 55 minutes slower but I did finish 114th in the world and let me say there are no slow people at worlds. My run was 2:00:00 but I was on that bike hammering hills you don't find in Ohio for 3:30:00. None of that was easy. I cried three times at the finish line and I quit the sport 50 separate times during that race. This sport sucks a lot, but it’s also great a lot and how many sports at 62 years old on your way to compete do you get propositioned?

Coach Cindy is a key part of my training and my life. I wish you all good luck and I’m here for any of you any time."