It’s entirely possible that Natalie Grabow — who last weekend, at 80 years old, became the oldest woman to complete the Ironman World Championship course in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii — is just getting started.
Consider these facts:
Grabow, who lives in the northern New Jersey town of Mountain Lakes, didn’t start running competitively until she was in her 40s.
She didn’t know how to swim until she was 59.
She was 60 when she did her first Ironman triathlons, first completing the 70.3-mile half-Ironman distance, then quickly bumping up to the full, 140.6-mile race that includes a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile cycling leg and a full 26.2-mile marathon.
“The swim is still probably my weakest part, but I was able to figure it out pretty much,” Grabow said during a video interview from her home.
Pretty much …
It’s been a whirlwind few days for Grabow, who completed the hot, taxing, iconic course across the volcanic fields of Hawaii’s Big Island in 16 hours, 45 minutes, 26 seconds, a little more than 14 minutes ahead of the cut-off time of 17 hours.
Setting out on the marathon, the last leg of the Ironman, on a sweltering afternoon when temperatures were in the low-80s and the humidity was at 70 percent, Grabow knew she had about seven hours before officials ended the race and pulled stragglers off the course. She knew what she had to do — and what was on the line — and was determined to make some history.
“I was gonna beat it,” she said, without a hint of doubt about following in the steps of Hiromu Inada, who was 85 in 2018 when he became the oldest person to complete the race. The only other person over the age of 80 to complete the Ironman World Championship is Lew Hollander, who did so in 2012 at the age of 82.
She did have some experience to work with. This was her 11th time competing in Kona, and make no mistake, she was competing, because that’s the only way she knows how to approach her athletic endeavors.
Raised in New Jersey in the era before Title IX, the groundbreaking 1972 civil rights legislation that opened the door for women to compete in sports just as men always had, Grabow spent her childhood unable to do what now drives her.
“When you grow up and you don’t have those options, you know, you just watch the boys doing stuff and you’re just the cheerleader,” she said. “It was just thrilling once I could do my first 5K and race and ride a bike with other people.”
She played tennis in women’s doubles leagues when she was raising her two young daughters, but once they were in high school, she returned to work as a software developer at Bell Labs. That left less time for tennis. So she took up running several times a week with some of her friends.
They started to do triathlons when Grabow was in her mid-50s because the cross-training helped prevent repetitive stress injuries. Grabow wanted to join them, but she had a problem. She didn’t know how to swim.
Still, her friends convinced her to sign up for a short local triathlon in 2004. Grabow convinced one of her daughters to do the swim for her and then hand off the racing chip to her so she could do the bike and the run.
“It was just such a great atmosphere, and I just love competition, always have,” she said. “So I was just hooked in and I said, ‘I gotta learn to swim.’”
You can do this♥️
Our oldest female athlete Natalie Grabow🇺🇸 about to start her race at the age of 80😤#IMWC #Kona2025 #IRONMANtri pic.twitter.com/vVe8AeeFmI
— IRONMAN Triathlon (@IRONMANtri) October 11, 2025
Just after her 49th birthday, she started trying to figure out how to blow bubbles and then how to swim. She read books, watched videos and asked friends and the local YMCA for tips. The following spring, she did her first sprint triathlon without her daughter’s involvement.
“The swim wasn’t pretty,” she said. “It was a lot of flailing around, but I made it through.”
By the end of 2005, she had completed her first half-Ironman. The next year, she did well enough at the half distance to earn a spot in the world championships at the full distance. She took it and completed the first of her 16 Ironman races on the famed Kona course, which she has now finished 11 times.
“It’s really hot, it’s windy, it is humid, and all things that make it very, very hard,” she said. “I like it very cold. My favorite races are any time when I’m shivering beforehand. So it’s a struggle. You have to just try to manage the conditions and stay as cool as you can.”
A solid training regimen helps. Grabow trains nearly every day. Sometimes her coach insists on a rest day. She listens, but she doesn’t like it very much.
She never runs more than about 18 miles in a week, with her longest run topping out at about 2 hours, 15 minutes. She swims roughly 3,500 yards three or four times a week and cycles on an indoor trainer at her home, also about four times a week.
She also loves to be outside, but she kept hearing stories of cyclists getting hit by cars on the busy roads of one of the country’s most congested states. Her cycling sessions, during which she is constantly monitoring her power output, can last more than five hours. Music — basic rock and pop — helps her keep going, though there is no specific artist that gets her especially pumped.
“I’m not motivated by music,” she said. “I’m motivated by hitting the numbers.”
She loves double sessions, the four days each week when she does two activities in one day.
And staying healthy. A daily strength and flexibility routine with lots of yoga poses helps with that. In fact, her biggest worry heading into the race was showing up on the starting line with her health intact. She said that is the hardest thing about triathlon racing.
Like everyone, she has suffered some bumps and bruises, but other than surgery for a tear in her rotator cuff, she has not suffered any major injuries or had any knees or hips replaced, as so many far less active people her age have.
This doesn’t figure to be her last milestone. She’s signed up for two half-Ironman races next year, one in upstate New York and another in Maryland. She might do a third at Jones Beach on Long Island.
“It’s the journey,” she said. “The day to day. ‘Oh, good, I get to bike today. Oh, good, I get to run today. Oh, good, I get to swim and bike today.’”
She’s not sure why her story astonishes so many people, why they struggle to wrap their heads around an 80-year-old woman completing Kona. She hopes some good can come of it.
“The important thing is that people see from my story that they can maybe push themselves a little bit, they can do a little more than they thought they could do, they can keep going longer than they thought they could go,” she said. “Movement is just so important to keep ourselves strong, mentally and physically. So if that helps people get going, then it’s great.”
