Right, this is my first review of a race on Racecheck so i will try and make it readable.

I was very excited to hear when they announced that there was going to be an Ironman 70.3 race in Edinburgh because its long overdue and I normally bang on about how great the place is to anyone who will listen so it would be a great opportunity to show it off.

The race location itself was well planned as it had a great mix of countryside, city (old and new), a housing estate which we seemed to cycle straight through the middle of at one point? A challenging swim and to top it all off the run wrapped itself around Arthurs seat which was dare I say it, a little lumpy!

The swim was cut short due to the conditions and there were a few moans about this on the day but it was very quickly pointed out that this was for everyone, pro's included so it was pretty obvious that as it should be, safety was put first. The swim was described in a number of ways; brutal, challenging, choppy etc but I think the post race brief announcer described it best as 'hilly'. This is Scotland in July so i'm only surprised that it didn't start snowing for a bit.

Through transition and then onto the bike and this i presume is one of the places that Ironman can justify the hefty price tag, closed roads! It was bliss, belting along for the first maybe 7-10 km's with a tailwind without a care in the world. That is until we turned around and the next 80km or so was either into a headwind or at times, a very blustery crosswind. The course itself had a bit of everything, there were some quite tricky decents and technical sections which due to the weather and bits of the road still having some standing water it did catch out a few people. The penultimate sting in the tail was the last section into T2 which involved a loop around the back of Arthurs seat but the final decent was great fun and gave you a good opportunity to compose yourself before the run. 

Out of T2 and onto the run was great as you were right in the thick of it and the support from the crowd was fantastic. Everything from the ardent triathlon fans to bewildered tourists wondering what the hell was going on! The run itself was again quite lumpy apart from a small flat section past the finish, which as it was a 3 lap course you passed a couple of times. You just seemed to be either going up or down through the whole run. Another nice twist was the tunnel which was decked out with disco lights and some very cheesy pop tunes. the feed stations were well stocked with the usual water, isotonic, red bulls, cokes and food and they were every mile and a half or so. This was great as you just ticked them off each time you passed and the guys handing stuff out were very good and full of encouragement.

If I was to sum up the race as a whole I would give it a big thumbs up. It is definetley not a PB race so if you are looking for a fast flat race this is not the one for you but if you are looking for a challenge then it absolutely is. All in all I think it was very well organised and to get to race on closed roads is a treat you don't get very often. I can honestly say that I will be back again next year.