Basing it on the Hamburg time!
And the Lanza time!
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Good luck @Matthew_Spooner, I will watch with interest. You are clearly talented and with the time allow you have and if you stay injury free, you should get to the right ballpark. It is the mentality that impresses me most. 20+ hours a week, which I assume is what you are planning, mainly riding slowly on the bike is incredible.
Good luck Matt, you can definitely do this, but get in that bloody pool 
. Drop some cycling volume and start building up to 3-5km swim sets, 10k/week plus.
Explorer mentioned already that you want to be as fresh as possible getting on your bike. I suspect this is where your better bike split will come, if youāre more resilient to fatigue in the water.
Any strength and flexibility training planned?
Itās an exciting goal.
Christophe Bastie, thereās a name I remember.nice guy, but he still crushed my balls 
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Good luck! Huge lofty aspiration and for that you deserve the support given above - not strictly because itās the pointy end (although yes that does make it slightly more intriguing to many) but mostly because itās clearly pushing to the edge of potential which I think is relevant for everyone. With the progress over the past few years and drive to still improve Iām looking forward to following just for that alone. But with the same goal for a race 3 weeks earlier, with close to being the complete polar opposite approach, thereās a bit of extra intrigue there to follow along.
Opposite approach not because I think yours is wrong, but because weāre different people and Iām (also crowd-sourcing) based off what I think has worked for me in the last couple years. The general consensus/reports from most others doing similar times are far far closer aligned to what youāre doing, and Iām trying to get myself closer to that, whilst sticking in that listening to body and only doing training I can recover from. So as I said privately, I hope thereās some mutual support here.
For me, probably looking closer towards 48 and somewhere close to 5:05 if I have any chance. Will then need to give everything to (virtually) hunt you back down as you stay strong for your 3:10.
Iāve swam :49 4x before in lakes = every time Iāve done the distance. Confident I can go faster this year, but this time will be in sea which could change things if choppy.
Iāve ran 3:19. Iām confident I can get to better run condition, eg 3:05-3:10 IF I start the run as fresh, which will be a tough ask.
I biked 6:16 at IMUK, and 2:27 at a recent flat half. Seems a big ask to get that down to 5 hours in 6 months, but no point setting a goal of 9:10. Iām aiming big and will be just as proud if I know Iāve done what I could.
If race splits werenāt enough of a difference, I start the year with a CTL of 78, pretty much equal to my highest ever. I did my biggest ever (well, in the last 10 years) week of training between Christmas and NY at 17.5 hours, and was enough to come down with a stomach bug (I swear I only had one glass of wine NYE). My task is to lift the consistent, repeatable week from the current 9.5 hours averaged in the last 6 months, and start nailing down specific race pace sessions.
Final hurdle, potentially for both of us, is weather on the day, a problem with setting time based goals in an open environment. Roth could be anything from perfectly cool, to scorching hot. Cairns for me will be a humidity Iāve not experienced before, an unpredictable sea swim, and potentially heat with average temperatures of mid 20s, meaning could easily be in the 30s on a hot week.
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This will be exciting to watch. Good luck both.
Has any TTer ever gone sub 9 ? Aside from the occasional pro who dropped in to TT1.0 and then vanished before you could say Christopher Lessing?
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Savaloy and ttowel must have gone close?
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Daz carter went sub 9
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I will take time to respond more specifically later. However, I am completely blown away by the response and it is really inspiring
It will be fascinating to see how my journey compares with @Chriswim: I think that the difference on our approach could be really helpful to everyoneā¦ there is too much āmy approach is bestā in the literature, the reality is that we are all different and respond in different ways.
As for others going sub 9, include Hywel and Daz Carter. If I do it, I may be the first over 50 TTerā¦ but keeping an eye on @chickenboy
Interesting comparison with @chickenboy, I think that neither of us is super trim. I am never going to have the body of a Hollywood model. I am reminded of the Special K advert from the 1980ās ācan you pinch more than an inch?ā In my case I can probably pinch 2 inches
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I think Savaloyās high water mark was 9:02. Ttowel definitely did; maybe 8:46-ish in Austria one year perhaps.
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Haha, 2022 is all about being strong n chunky!!! Doing the skinfold test yesterday, the sports tech at the lab said I was āsolidā. Of course I took that as a compliment 
, but I think he meant: you fat bāstard!!!
Maccaās racing weight was 84kg, so Iām always reassured that big lads can still be age group fast. Iām only 20kgās off that!
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Macca didnāt look 84kg in 2010!
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TTowel went
8:50 at Frankfurt 53:32 4:44:42 3:05:49 8:50:44
8:54 at Barcelona 58:30 4:46:34 3:03:31 8:54:54
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Ah shit yeah, more like 80! Goddam
Pretty sure ttowel also went sub-9 at the DIY TTMan at Market Bosworth, too?
6 laps of a murky lake
6 x 30km loops
Out and back down a mucky canal path.
Transition and aid station was the boot of your car.
@SidSnot - ObsTri and the other one only go back ten or so years. He deffo has more than that. He was 44 for that Barca time (2018 wasnāt it?)
Hywel also has a couple of 2:30 marathons to his name.
And an indoor 100km rowing record.
And a double Ironman champ.
And a metal bar bender.
An undefeated at cross training for 7 years.
Quite a bit of info out there on him. Well worth a Google 
Savaloy didnāt go sub-9, but came very very close.
He was like @Chriswim - late to the Tri game, but a 48min swimmer. Like our Aussie dwelling friend, he also had a <75min half to his name. But he also went well under sub-4 at many 100TTs.
@Daz did the sub-9 at Roth and did the big boy splits of 1/5/3 In essence, the rounded athlete.
Also, @Matthew_Spooner , it was Daz who helped me get my swim time down massively (HINT: It also includes gym work)
I think there was a couple of other lurkers/infrequent posters who did it, too?
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There was zero chance Macca was 84kg in 2010 
Heās 182cm (5ft 11in)
Iād say heās much closer to 70kg here
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āMcCormackās normal weightāthe weight he returns to when heās not actively seeking his racing weightāis 185 pounds. When he claimed his second Ironman World Championship victory last October, he was just 175 pounds.5 Jul 2011ā
Yep, he doesnāt look 175 pounds
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Hywel did 8:52 in Austria 2008; just looked.
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Is that taking into account how full of shit he is?
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