2000 enter Iron Maori event

Pandora Pond came alive as hundreds of swimmers took to the water. Photo / Paul Taylor

More than 2000 "stand-out competitors" entered this year's quarter Iron Maori on Saturday.

Iron Maori began in 2008 with just 300 competitors.

This year's event saw competitors from as young as 16 to older than 70 completing the 1km swim, 45km bike ride and 10.5km run.

Mrs Skipworth said competitors usually decided to get involved after watching in previous years.

Most competitors first began in teams but moved to the individual competition soon after, she said.

With 800 individual entries this year, Mrs Skipworth said the number of teams entering had declined. She said it was a "sense of achievement" that encouraged competitors to challenge themselves individually.

It was Anthea Toheriri's second Iron Maori and she was pleased with the outcome.

Although she did not complete it in the time she wanted, she was not far off and swam her fastest ever time. She said she was relaxed and felt that also helped her performance.

The keen competitor said there was a "bit of a head wind" which slowed things down but she had previously trained in similar conditions which helped.

Miss Toheriri was nervous about the swim because she had not felt comfortable in Pandora Pond previously, but the biking proved to be the difficult this time.

She is planning to compete in the half Iron Maori on December 5 and will need to get her bike refitted before then.

She said a highlight of the day was seeing all the smiles on people's faces when they crossed the finish line. "I didn't see one person give up, all shapes and sizes competed, it was just awesome."

Mrs Skipworth said many competitors underwent huge weight losses and total lifestyle changes through training for the event.

-Further details about the Iron Maori competition can be found at http://www.racetecresults.com/Results.aspx?CId=16394&RId=68.