80-Year-Old Becomes Oldest Woman to Finish Ironman

Kailua-Kona, Hawaii —(Map)

On October 11, over 1,600 athletes took off swimming in the 2025 Ironman World Championship Triathlon. After their long swim, they biked for over 100 miles. Then they ran a marathon. Sixty athletes never finished the race. But 80-year-old Natalie Grabow did, setting the record as the oldest woman ever to finish the race.

A triathlon is an extremely challenging three-part race that tests swimming, biking, and running skills. But a triathlon mainly tests an athlete’s ability to keep going for hour after hour. The swimming contest is 2.4 miles (3.8 kilometers) long. Next comes a 112-mile (180-kilometer) bike ride. Finally, the athletes run a full marathon – 26.2 miles (42 kilometers).

The Ironman World Championship is the most famous triathlon, and one of the hardest. It takes place in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. The heat, the winds, and the uphill sections of the course make it very difficult even for young athletes.

On October 11, over 1,600 athletes took off swimming in the 2025 Ironman World Championship Triathlon. After their long swim, they biked for over 100 miles. Then they ran a marathon (above). Natalie Grabow, 80, set a new record as the oldest woman ever to finish the race.

Natalie Grabow may act young, but she’s also an 80-year-old grandmother. Still that didn’t stop her from running the race – or finishing it. In fact, Ms. Grabow has completed the Ironman 11 times in total. That’s pretty impressive for a woman who couldn’t swim until she was 59.

Ms. Grabow has long been athletic. But when she was growing up, girls were more likely to be seen as cheerleaders than as athletes. When her kids were young, she began playing tennis. She took up running when she went back to work as a software developer.

After a while, some of her running buddies began to take part in triathlons. They believed that doing different activities lowered their chances of getting injured while exercising. Ms. Grabow was also interested, but she had never learned how to swim.

She decided she would have to learn. It took time. She wasn’t good at it at first, but she improved.

In 2005, she took part in a half-Ironman for the first time. (A half-Ironman is the same kind of race, but the distances are half as long.) In her early sixties, she was good enough to make it to the Ironman World Championship.

Now Ms. Grabow has completed the Ironman 11 times in total. The only thing different this year is that she ran the course as an 80-year-old. There was no one else in her age group.

Ms. Grabow ran the same course as everyone else – in the same heat, and up the same hills. She never thought of stopping. “I was going to beat it,” she told the New York Times. It took her 16 hours, 45 minutes, and 26 seconds. But she made it across the finish line (above).

But she ran the same course as everyone else – in the same heat, and up the same hills. She never thought of stopping. “I was going to beat it,” she told the New York Times. It took her 16 hours, 45 minutes, and 26 seconds. But she made it.

As she finished, the announcer called out, “Absolutely incredible!”

Ms. Grabow was extremely tired, but she was also pleased. “I am so happy and grateful that I can still race in this sport at my age,” she said.

And she’s not done yet. She’s planning on running at least two half-Ironman races next year.

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Did You Know…?
Two men have also managed to finish the race in their 80s: Hiromu Inada (85) and Lew Hollander (82). Cherie Gruenfeld held the women’s record before Ms. Grabow. She was 78 when she finished the race in 2022. Ms. Gruenfeld was given a special honor at this year’s race. And on October 11, she was at the finish line to congratulate Ms. Grabow.