I stood on the shore at Alcúdia at 6am and looked out at the Mediterranean. The water was completely still. The sky was turning pink. And everywhere I looked — wetsuits, race numbers, nervous energy — was a sea of men.
I want to be honest about something: six months earlier, I never would have been there. Not because I didn't think I was capable. But because Ironman 70.3 wasn't something that had ever entered my world as a possibility. It wasn't on my radar. It wasn't in my plan.
And then Third Space asked.
I said yes before I'd thought too hard about it. Which, as it turns out, is exactly how the best decisions get made.
What a 70.3 actually is
For anyone who doesn't know: a 70.3 is a half Ironman. A 1.9km open water swim, a 90km bike, and a 21.1km run. Back to back. On the same day. In Mallorca, in May, with the sun already doing its best to remind you that you're not in London anymore.
I trained as part of a team. And that — the team — is what made the difference. Not the training plan. Not the gear. The fact that other people were showing up, and so you showed up too. The accountability, the shared suffering, the inside jokes about chamois cream and nutrition gels. Community doesn't just make things more enjoyable. It makes things possible that wouldn't be possible alone.
The start line
Standing in that bay, waiting to swim into open water with thousands of other people, I was aware of being one of very few women. Not in a way that made me feel small. In a way that made me feel something else — a quiet, certain kind of defiance.
We are not meant to be here in small numbers. We are not meant to be the footnote in a sport that belongs just as much to us. And yet here we still are — minority figures at the start line of events like this, in gyms that feel designed for someone else, in sports that were built without us in mind.
That has to change. And it changes when we push through anyway. When we show up even when the space doesn't look like us. When we stop waiting for an invitation and decide that our presence is the point.
Male-dominated spaces don't become less male-dominated by women staying away from them. They change when we walk in — wetsuit on, race number pinned, ready to go — and refuse to be the footnote.
So I'm saying it now.
You could do this.
I crossed that finish line having swum in the Mediterranean, cycled through the mountains of Mallorca, and run further than felt reasonable in the midday heat. I was exhausted in a way I'd never been before. And I was more proud of myself than I can properly put into words.
Not because I won. Not because my time was impressive. But because I said yes to something I'd never have chosen for myself — and it turned out to be one of the best experiences of my life.
The thing about saying yes
We wait until we feel ready. Until we feel fit enough, experienced enough, prepared enough. We talk ourselves out of things before we've even started, because the gap between where we are and where we'd need to be feels too wide to cross.
It isn't. I promise you, it isn't.
Find your team. Say yes to the thing. Show up to the start line — even if you're surrounded by men, even if you're nervous, even if you have absolutely no idea what you're doing.
That's where the best stories start.