Name: Gerd Weber ADVERTISING Name: Gerd Weber Age & Occupation: 66 years old, management consultant Quotable: “Eat all you can. I love food.” Six years ago, a 60-year old Gerd Weber embarked on an IRONMAN challenge like no other. To
Name: Gerd Weber
Age & Occupation: 66 years old, management consultant
Quotable: “Eat all you can. I love food.”
Six years ago, a 60-year old Gerd Weber embarked on an IRONMAN challenge like no other. To commemorate each decade of his life, Weber decided to compete in six different IRONMAN events throughout six continents — North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa and Australia.
Testing the limits of what his body could accomplish, Weber successfully completed it all in one year. Six became his lucky number.
“It was fun,” Weber said. “I had a great time and traveled a lot that year. I remember IRONMAN Malaysia was super hot. But after doing all six, I felt that I was done with it. I decided that I wouldn’t do anymore IRONMAN’s and just stick to the half IRONMAN distances.”
Now, six years later at age 66, Weber is practically eating his words.
“Why am I doing this,” he joked when asked about his thoughts heading into October’s big event. “I’ve always questioned it. But it’s a challenge and I enjoy racing. So when I got a slot, I thought I might as well do it since it’s the world championships. This race is different from some of the other races that I’ve done because the temperature is definitely higher.”
After finishing May’s IRONMAN 70.3 Hawaii, Weber along with eight friends decided to put their names into the Big Island Drawings that selected 24 Big Islanders to compete in next month’s world championship event.
“At first I was cheering because I didn’t see my name on the list,” Weber laughed. “Then my wife told me that it’s at the bottom because the list was in alphabetical order. It’s the first time I tried for it. My philosophy before was, if I can qualify in Honu when they had qualifying Big Island spots, then I would take the slot. But somehow, I was convinced that I should do this one and put my name in. Then out of our group of eight, I was the only one — or unlucky one — that got in.”
Weber’s witty sense of humor and advantage of knowing the course on his home turf may just be what he’ll need to cover Kona’s grueling 140.6-mile distance — 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike, followed by a 26.2-mile marathon. Although he has competed in 13 other IRONMANs around the globe, next month will mark his first Kona IRONMAN World Championship event.
“I know they will all pass me,” said a smiling Weber. “But I know the course and it all comes down to the day. If you have a good day, the weather is good, the winds are down, then it’ll be okay. If there are big winds then it will be a challenge all day long.”
Weber says he is self-coached and as far as training for next month’s “Big Dance,” he plans to stick to his usual program with a positive attitude of “just go out and have fun.” He also works out 3-4 times per week doing body sculpting and GRIT series at the Fitness Forever Training Center in Kailua-Kona.
“I swim three times down at the Pier, ride my bike with a bunch of friends, and then just try to survive the running,” he said. “My goal is to not get injured before the race so that I’ll be able to run the marathon the entire way and hopefully not do this ‘run/walk’ kind of thing.”
Weber added that doing Saturday’s Out N Back 19.5-mile training time trial helped to incorporate some speed work in what would have been just another Saturday long ride. Weber placed 7th overall in a time of 55 minutes and 39 seconds.
Lighter wind conditions helped Germany’s Malte Bruns blaze the course in an impressive time of 45:39, with Todd Marohnic edging out Malik Mariano for second place, 48:00 to 48:16 respectively. In the women’s division, Kelly Hudik claimed victory in 1:01:23, while Greta Friesen took second in her time trial debut at 1:09:28.
With the Kona IRONMAN World Championship race just two weeks away, Weber who is employed as a management consultant for a Canadian company hopes to finish within the 12:30 – 13:30 hour range, and looks forward to the “catered buffet” happening at the aid stations along the course.
“The goal is to finish. And if I can do it within that time range then I’m good. Hopefully I have a good bike and keep it together on the run. I’ll try to eat everything that I can. On race day it’s like a big buffet. I always eat a ton on race day and not have any trouble. In fact, after the race I’ll go and have a big hamburger because I’m always hungry. But that’s what works for me.”
Coming Up:
Sunday: Team Mango presents the Pre-Ironman Triathlon Challenge at the Kailua Pier. Start time is 7 a.m. for the 1.2-mile swim, 15-mile hilly bike loop, and 6-mile run. Pre-race registration will begin onsite at 5:30 a.m. For more information and registration details contact Carl Koomoa at 324-7252 or visit teammangoraces.com.
