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Lionel Sanders heads to Ironman Canada as he preps for Kona

Canadian star outlines yet another new approach to his Kona preparation

Photo by: Kevin Mackinnon

After finishing third at Ironman Lake Placid in July, Canadian Lionel Sanders will compete at Ironman Canada on August 25 as he looks to hone his long-distance race skills for the Ironman World Championship in Kona, Hawaii.

Trevor Foley shocks the field with huge win at Ironman Lake Placid, Lionel Sanders finishes third

Sanders finished second in Kona in 2017, and was also the runner-up at the Ironman World Championship St. George in 2022, but has struggled to be as consistent over the full-distance as he has been over the 70.3 distance. Sanders hasn’t won an Ironman race since Ironman Arizona in 2017 – in that time frame he’s amassed 16 half-distance wins.

In his latest video update (see below), Sanders outlines some new training strategies he’s developed after being outrun by his former training partner, Trevor Foley, in Lake Placid.

“I don’t think it’s valuable to me to train with people,” Sanders said. “It impairs my capacity to listen to my body. I’ve been out here with Trevor a million times and he’s running away from me and I’m pushing too hard. It’s too hard, it’s maladaptive stimulus, it’s too much stimulus … You can’t train where you want to be, you have to train where you are.”

Sanders also expressed what he thinks are realistic goals for his race in Kona. Rather than try to predict whether or not he can win the race, he has some ideas of what a best-case scenario might entail.

“I’m done with saying ‘I want to win,’ I want to achieve what is possible,” Sanders said. “I think I can swim low 50s, I think I can push 310 to 320 (watts) on the bike and I think I can break 2:40 on the run. I think that’s within me. That’s the limits of my capacity.”

Getting the win by “only” breaking 2:40 (yes, we know how crazy-fast that is) might be a long shot. The last time the men raced in Kona, Norway’s Gustav Iden ran a 2:36:15 marathon to take the title. At last year’s world championship in Nice, Germany’s Patrick Lange ran 2:32:41, which wasn’t enough to get him the win – he finished second to France’s Sam Laidlow.

Sanders’ best swim in Kona is his 52:22 split from 2022. That swim put him more than five minutes behind eventual champion Jan Frodeno, who was just three seconds behind swim leader Josh Amberger. Whether or not averaging 310 to 320 watts for the 180 km bike ride would be enough to get Sanders up to the front of the race will be the big question.

First things first, though – Sanders will put his latest training approach to the test in Canada. His most likely rivals for the win in Penticton include fellow Canadian Cody Beals and Australia’s Sam Appleton. You can see the full entry lest for Ironman Canada here.