As we wave goodbye to 2025 and welcome in 2026, it’s the time of year to reflect back on the past 12 months. Scrolling through social media, you’ll see many people looking back on their major highlights, accomplishments, and achievements for the year. It’s a digital highlight reel of medals, personal bests, and perfectly lit finish line photos.
Being a professional triathlete and endurance coach, my Instagram feed is filled with posts from athletes reminiscing about their experiences of the Ironman World Championship in Kona. I figured I’d jump on the train and relish in reflections about my “Kona”.
My “Kona” is Different
My “Kona” isn’t in a tropical paradise with Mai Tais and Piña Coladas waiting for me beyond the finish line. There isn’t a fancy expo, loads of media crews, aid stations, or thousands of other athletes surrounding you to inspire you to keep moving forward. There’s no red carpet finish line, no prize money, no finisher medal, and no one to see you suffer.
Instead, you are thrown into the most remote, untamed, brutal, and beautiful parts of God’s creation. There are no cheering crowds. Instead, you will suffer alone for hours in silence, left only to your own thoughts, which can be quite scary during those dark moments. You don’t do this race for the fame, the money, or the media exposure. You do it to challenge yourself, push yourself to the limits, and discover what you are made of.
This is real. This is raw. This is not for you. Or is it?
More Than a Race
Norseman XTRI World Championships is my “Kona” and my heart beats for this insanely brutal, raw test of your mental and physical limits. It’s so much more than a race. It’s a pilgrimage.
As a 2 time Norseman blackshirt finisher, I know that this is an experience to be shared with your support crew, an opportunity to build new relationships that expand beyond country borders and language barriers, and an absolutely overwhelming experience of God’s presence.
As awesome and incredible as this race experience is, it’s also not to be taken lightly. Embarking on this endeavor is not for the faint of heart and the preparation should be approached with seriousness and respect for the distance, terrain, and conditions. If Norseman training itself doesn’t break you, the race will.
Norseman training is nothing like training for an Ironman. In standard triathlon training, we focus on metrics: times, power, paces, and heart rates. In Norseman training, those metrics still matter, but we add a new layer: resilience engineering. We train to fix flats with frozen fingers. We train to eat when our bodies are rejecting food. We train to keep moving forward when there’s 100km to go and the wind is blowing 40mph in our face. In this race, mental toughness is just as important as physical strength and endurance. We don’t just train the body; we harden the mind.
The Reality of the Course
Executing a successful Norseman race means preparing for the most extreme conditions on the planet. It requires a shift in perspective from “racing” to “surviving efficiently.”
The Swim: 4km of Cold-Water Resilience
A pre-dawn jump off a car ferry into a dark, sub-50°F fjord starts the 4km swim back to shore against a tidal current. The shock of the cold water takes your breath away in an instant. You are engulfed in darkness above and below you. And for the first few hundred meters, you are fighting the panic response as much as you are fighting the water. It is just you and the 4,200 ft deep fjord.
The Bike: Mastering the winds of the Hardangervidda Plateau
Unimagined winds, rain, and temperature changes work to break you mentally and physically, as you ascend 11,000 ft through the Norwegian mountains. You traverse the Hardangervidda plateau, a barren landscape where the wind has nowhere to hide and snowpoles stretch high into the foggy sky. You aren’t just riding; you are battling crosswinds that threaten to throw you off the road, all while managing layers of clothing because sweat quickly turns to ice at this altitude. And after hours of grueling climbing, you end the 180km bike with a technical descent featuring tight switchbacks down a mountain while the driving winds test your balance and bike handling skills.
The Run: Conquering Zombie Hill and Mount Gaustatoppen
This is not just a marathon. This is a journey that begins with 25km of flat asphalt, but then breaks you on “Zombie Hill”, a relentless 10km and 8% grade uphill grind that crushes your soul before you even reach the rocky, unstable footing at the base of Mount Gaustatoppen. The 42km run finishes with a technical scramble to the top of Mount Gausta, where you are greeted with even more unpredictable weather and little to no visibility.
The Support Crew: Your XTRI Lifeline
No aid stations means your support crew is your lifeline during this point-to-point race. This is perhaps the most beautiful element of XTRI. You are not alone; you are a team. Your crew isn’t just handing you a bottle; they are reading your eyes to see if you are lucid. They are your psychologists, your mechanics, your medics, and your safety net. Because you go through war together, the bond forged between athlete and support during Norseman is stronger than iron(man).
Embracing the Elements
When coaching for XTRI, I remind athletes that they might experience all four seasons (or more) throughout this journey. It’s not uncommon to experience rain, wind, sleet, sun, and even snow at various points throughout the race. In fact, I’ve even gotten sunburnt and hypothermia within a few hours of each other during this crazy race.
You cannot fight the Norwegian weather; you can only endure it. When the fog rolls in on the mountain top and visibility drops to essentially nothing, you realize just how small you are. That realization is terrifying to some, but exhilarating to those who live for events like this.
There’s clearly a reason for Norseman’s tagline: “This is not for you.”
It’s not a statement. It’s a challenge, a call to action. It’s for those who seek to push themselves to their limits. It’s for those who long to battle their own inner demons in search of their potential. It’s for those who are tired of the sanitized, predictable, commercialized nature of modern racing and crave something wild, raw and a little bit terrifying.
Life is too short. Forever be in pursuit of whatever sets your heart on fire! My heart beats for Norseman, and I’m already dreaming about my third Norseman next August. If you are ready to start your own Norseman training, remember that the preparation is just as transformative as the race itself.
I’d rather be swimming in Eidfjord in the dark.
I’d rather be biking the ascent to the Hardangervidda plateau against a headwind.
I’d rather be running on Zombie Hill when my legs are screaming to stop.
I’d rather be summiting Mount Gausta when I can’t even see the top.
