After nursing senior Kaitlin Bowman’s second practice with the Texas A&M triathlon team, she overheard her teammates refer to a competition she’d never heard of: IRONMAN triathlon, a behemoth endurance event consisting of a 2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike ride and 26.2-mile run.
“All the older members were like, ‘Oh yeah, I’m going to do a half IRONMAN this year. Or I want to do a half IRONMAN by the time I graduate college, or I want to do a full IRONMAN by the time I’m 25 or whatever,’” Bowman said. “And when I joined, I had no clue how long any of those were, and so when they were telling me how long it was, I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, there is no way I’m ever doing a half IRONMAN or a full IRONMAN.”
Fast forward a few years and thousands of miles of swimming, biking and running, and Bowman has not only completed a pair of IRONMANs, but qualified for the World Championship in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, after winning her age group at IRONMAN Chattanooga in Tennessee.
“During the race, I had no clue where I was in relation to the other girls in my age group,” Bowman said. “I think it was at mile 16, my mom saw me, and she goes, ‘You’re winning, but like, you got to go.’ And I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I don’t know what that means. Do I have, you know, 30 seconds on whoever’s behind me? Do I have 20 minutes?’ I had no clue.”
Bowman’s secret weapon? Her fiance, Nathan Groves, Class of 2025. The couple met at A&M and compete together on the Aggie triathlon team.
Groves completed his first IRONMAN at the age of 18 in his hometown of Waco after hearing one of his middle school teachers discuss the competition. Bowman says Groves was the one who encouraged her to give IRONMANs a try in the first place.
“Every race we do together, I’m a faster swimmer than Nathan, but he’s an insane biker and an insane runner,” Bowman said. “So it’s always him saying, ‘Oh yeah, I’m gonna catch you.’ Like, making bets on where he’s gonna catch me. And so that pushes me to go faster. I know it pushes him to go faster.”
It’s about more than just being someone to race against, Groves said. It’s about having someone to train with on the days when they get out of class exhausted and still have to go on a two-hour bike ride or 10-mile run.
“Everyone talks about the race, but no one talks about the six months of training before,” Groves said. “And so being able to do that with somebody allows you to push yourself because you aren’t just doing it alone.”
Bowman completed her first IRONMAN a year ago in Chattanooga and qualified for the World Championships in Nice, France — but she turned down her spot because she wanted to race Kona, the “pinnacle of the sport.”
But her second attempt at a full IRONMAN was nearly over before it began: Due to Hurricane Helene, the swim portion of the race was canceled — a major disadvantage to Bowman, who grew up swimming and felt that was her strongest event.
“We were really upset,” Bowman said. “We were at dinner and I didn’t want to talk to anybody. And I was like, ‘God, this is the worst. I’m not gonna qualify.’ Later that night, I was telling Nathan, … ‘I’ve trained for this. Like, I’m a good biker, I’m a good runner, the swim, whatever. Nobody else is doing the swim. We’re all equal in this. I’m just gonna do my best, and if I don’t qualify, don’t qualify.’”
A silver lining of the swimless race was that Groves and Bowman got to start the race together, biking and running together at various points before Bowman took off to chase down the victory.
“I told her, ‘Just go ahead, like you need to. You’re here to qualify. Keep going.’” Groves said. “So she left and took off running. And when I saw her take off running, she looked like she was getting faster, going uphill. So I was pretty confident that she was gonna win the age group and qualify.”
That success doesn’t come without difficulty, Bowman says. Yes, an IRONMAN is as painful as it sounds.
“I knew it was gonna hurt, but not that much,” Bowman said. “ … You just finished swimming and biking a total of 114 miles, and you get off your bike and you’re like, ‘Dang, I’ve still got to run a marathon.’ That’s a hard pill to swallow.”
But the opportunity to train and compete with Groves certainly helps make things a little less exhausting.
“Knowing that someone is just as crazy as I am and wants to do this is really supportive,” Bowman said. “And Nathan and I both have a very competitive, driven personality. And I think we push each other to want to go for bigger goals. … We spend a ton of time together, but if we can go bike ride together, run together, it’s a lot of fun that we’re able to do something like this together.”
Next, Bowman sets her sights on the World Championship in Hawaii in just over a year — and her wedding to Groves just two weeks after that.
“I think it shows how much triathlon has impacted our lives,” Bowman said. “We weren’t willing to give up either the World Championship race nor the wedding. I’m just glad I’ll have some time to recover.”
