Squadron Racing Takes On the Ironman World Championship – 2025

After qualifying for the Ironman World Championship at Ironman Texas, Bryan Chacon and Anzae Alexander take on the biggest stage in the sport — the 2025 Ironman World Championship in Nice, France.

From brutal Texas heat to climbing the French Alps, this is the story of training together, racing hard, and inspiring others to take on the challenge of racing.

Squadron Racing is an athlete-owned triathlon and cycling brand built around one mission: to bring more people into the sport of racing.

Shop the gear: www.squadronracing.com

Follow the journey on Instagram:
@squadron_racing
@chacacon
@zae_alexander2

#IronmanWorldChampionship #IronmanNice #Triathlon #IronmanTexas #SquadronRacing #Triathlete #GoRace

My name is Andre Alexander. I’m Brian Shicone. I qualified for the Iron Man World Championship. I qualified for world championships at Iron Man Texas. At Iron Man Texas this year, this training season has been very dialed in with no major injuries. I feel like my fitness has improved overall. Just brutal days in the summer heat. It’s been a long hot summer, but training with the squadron has really helped me. Going into this race, I feel great about the swim and the run. I just have to be really careful not to blow up my legs on the climbs and also not to crash my bike on the downhills on the French Alps. How I feel about knees? Um, I’m feeling great, but I am dealing with a hamstring injury right now. I’m hoping to take it easy this week and get it really stretched out and get it going. I’m really excited to be out there and um, yeah, I’ll just see you all there. I think it’s going to be awesome and see you in France. [Music] Quick bike check. Let’s go. [Music] Heat. Hey, Heat. Yeah. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] I did. We wanted you the mustache to get the No, that’s what we’re not going to do, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Everybody. Yeah. Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Yes, sir. Let’s go. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] You are me now. [Music] Max all celebrating the friends you [Music] thank you bro you are an Iron Man, congratulations on that. Put that champ [Applause] for the Galactic Galactic Iron Man. I’m pretty sure I’m in like 100th place or something or like here. Yeah. No, I’m happy, man. Like that. That took everything. We’re talking about how the car lasts for long, right? We got a contract. That one time when I asked I actually said I was done before. How did it go? All right. Definitely wasn’t prepared for that course. We did not do enough climbing. Me and Ryan, we should have done a lot more climbing. you are. But yeah, that was that was tough. I was not expecting that. And that’s hardest thing I’ve ever done for sure. But uh I’m just glad we finished and it’s just beautiful out there. The views were insane. Happy with my performance and it’s only my second Iron Man and we’re only going to go up from here. So yeah, squadron out. All right, we’re back from Nice, France. We wrapped up the championship and it’s good to be home. Uh, we just wanted to go over our thoughts about the championship, um, postra thoughts and just everything we thought about each step of the race. So, on what were some of your initial thoughts once you got over there to Nice? Yeah. So, yeah, we landed in East France, a little bit jet jetlagged and trying to get catch up on some sleep before the race. Um, it was very beautiful out there. The vibes were just amazing. Many people competing in this race. Some heavy competition out there for sure. So, going into race morning, how’d you feel uh starting out that day getting everything set up? your maybe your breakfast and then getting to the race. Yeah. So, I got about like six hours of sleep. Um, not too bad. Uh, what I had in the morning, I just had a few pieces of toast with jelly, had a coffee, had a yogurt and a banana, and that was that’s all I needed. Um, in the morning, I kind of just warmed up, made sure my bike was good. Um, they actually announced no wet suits in the morning. Of course, we knew it was going to be close, but I thought thought they were going to let it slide, but of course, it’s world championships, so they got to make it hard. Of course. Yeah, I felt like it was very surreal start um because you are surrounded with athletes and then you all step into the water together and you can hear the announcer, you can hear the countdown. Um, but in the moment you are trying to stay afloat and it’s not that it’s difficult to do that, but it’s just you’re so packed together that sometimes you know like stretching your arms to to keep your head up like it gets tight. Um, but you know the feeling of you’re about to start is there. Um, and everybody’s very excited, like he said, like there was a bit of a chant going on. And then once the countdown got really into like the 3 2 1, everybody started splashing. And once you heard zero, it was just chaos to kind of get a position into the water. Um, and really, I’m sure you were thinking the same thing of just like protecting your goggles from from like arms and legs and feet. Uh, cuz if you lose those goggles, then you’re in a bad bad situation. Yeah. Um but yeah, it was a very physical race. Um I think at every moment you’re kind of looking for for that line that’s kind of clearing up ahead of you or like you’re kind of taking contact from from your side. Um it was like that for me like the whole the whole way. Um I was trying to like kind of stay in the pack because the pack was also uh closer to the shortest line. So it was kind of nice to to find like some room in there between all the swimmers. Mhm. And yeah, like you said, the the shape of the swim course was in an M. Um each each outer point being kind of like a double turn. So it was a lot of maneuvering. And for me in those turns is when like I caught a lot of contact just from everyone trying to get like the shortest inside line. Um but it was beautiful. I thought, you know, I could hear the the helicopters and you’d look up sometimes and they were just like circling above. It was surreal. Um, and then you know sometimes when you were swimming like parallel to the city, you could just see how big the city and the mountains looked. I don’t know if you were thinking about Yeah, I was I was looking a little bit a little bit at the at the helicopter and then just the scenery cuz like throughout the race you just want to look for a second like man like you’re just in the moment and you’re like I’m really here in need France doing the world championship. So that was really surreal experience. How’d your bike leg start out? Yeah. So, I started out like hammering on it. Yeah. Cuz Brian got the swim like I think a minute ahead of me. So, then as soon as I got out, I just started hammering more than I should have. And I just saw this I passed with this guy. He was like probably like, “What the hell?” Well, I was I knew you were back there cuz we Yeah. Like we left transition, first transition pretty close. Um and once I got on the bike, I started hammering down like I don’t know. some mid20 pace like you know so it felt good. Um but once we started hitting those hills is when it didn’t take long for you to just like shoot past me. Yeah. Yeah. As soon as I got in the hills I just I don’t know. I was just feeling really good. I’m like ahead of myself. And as soon as we got like more up in the climb that’s when I was really thinking like man I really need to save my legs for this run cuz I’m just if I’m at this pace the whole time I’m just gonna destroy myself. So, I definitely had to take let off, take it a little bit easier. I’m glad I did that because I would have just I probably wouldn’t have had a good run at all. So, I’m glad I did that. Yeah. So, after I don’t know 2 3 hours, you start to get kind of like to the top, right? Yes. Where you start you stop climbing as much and it’s more of a rolling Yeah. up the mountain on the plateau. We definitely were facing some headwind there. It was very windy up there and I was not expecting that. But I’m like hills now I got to face a headwind. I’m like what the heck? But that’s true. You stop climbing, you think it’s going to be kind of a relief and then the headwind kind of kicks in. Yeah. I mean the views out there on those mountains were just gorgeous. I mean that’s definitely like the ultimate bike course right there. It’s like a tour to France course, you know? It’s just amazing. But um yeah, the climbs and then we also hit the descents, started hitting the descents and as I was going seen a few people crashed out on the side just laying out there and I’m like man it kind of gives you that like feeling of like fear fearful for sure because and that could be you in that position if you’re not careful enough and you just as I was going through I was taking it easy at first. I was like, man, I just need to kind of get the hang of it first. And then as I continued going down, I got more comfortable with it. And I had a road bike, too. So, it was more easy to maneuver and everything like that. So, after a little bit, I was pretty crushing it on those descents. I got really comfortable. Probably a little bit too ahead of myself, but it was pretty exhilarating. Yeah, it was. It was. Yeah, it was awesome. You know what I mean? Going into into T2, I felt like my legs were just in shambles, but I knew I knew I was like, man, I’m going to have to really push through this marathon. I mean, it’s a world championships. You just want to do the best as possible, but um yeah, I did about 7 minute pace starting off. Um felt comfortable with that for a little bit. Um my goal was 730 uh pace minute per mile, but um as I went on my I could just feel my quads just getting tighter and tighter and I’m like man like and it was about four laps around that thing. So once you did that first lap, you’re like, man, I got to do this three more times. What were your experience with the crowds and like the energy from the spectators? Yeah, I felt like um the energy was there. It was definitely there. It was like pretty like everybody was cheering. They’re playing music and yeah, the people are friends. They know they know how to celebrate, man. Yeah. Loop three was amazing to get out of, you know, and that last loop is just like this is the last one. The last one, right? Every single mile, you know, I go, it’s going to be the last one. So, you know, I kept looking at my watch, it’s like, okay, mile 20, mile 21, mile 22. And you know, each mile you go, it’s like it just kind of lifts that like weight off your shoulders. It does for sure. And then you just start think about all the training you did and just think start thinking about your family and just a lot of emotions on the last lap, especially the final mile. You just think about everything that you’ve done to train for it. So yeah, just the energy going into the finish line. I was just kind of hyping the crowd up. I was just I was just super pumped to finish. just relieved like oh my gosh I’m finally done through that finish line man is just amazing just surreal like experience for sure especially in the world championships and I got to see my dad finishing at the finish line it kind of made me tear up a little bit and I know he was super proud of me to see me there on that stage so yeah we just trained basically for 4 months straight you know every weekend just getting bike sessions and swims and runs together uh all the way to the championship. Um, which for me it helped a lot just because some days, you know, are brutal and it’s hot, but just having, you know, a a training partner right there that’s that’s also pushing forward is super nice and helpful. So, uh, what’s next? Like, what are you focusing on, you know, here in the next few weeks or do you have any plans to continue racing different Iron Mans or maybe different, um, disciplines such as like a marathon run or swim races or anything like that? What’s that look like? Definitely want to do another full Iron Man next year to qualify for Kona. I’m going be going for that Kona slot. I know it’s going to be a bit tougher to qualify. So, a lot of work has to be done for sure. But yeah, I think a few 70.3s and just an Iron Man and hopefully Kona. I’m excited to continue working on Squadron Racing just to to reach more people, you know, have the the brand um be shown or be worn in in more races, more cycling events, and and just spread our mission to to more people that are looking to get into racing or looking to improve their fitness um you know, for the better so they can take on um this lifestyle, which I think is pretty great. You know, pretty beneficial. you know, you you train as much as you as you can and then um down the line, you know, you do a race that’s very fulfilling or, you know, just very special. So, um definitely focused on on spending some time working on that. Yeah. I mean, triathlon changed my life for sure. Keeps you healthy, keeps you fit, keeps you out of trouble. I mean, you just Yeah. All you do is just train, work, sleep. I mean, it keeps you disciplined for sure. And even you can transfer it to other aspects in life. And I think that’s a really great thing about triathlon. Yeah, absolutely. Mhm. All right, man. Well, nicely done. Thanks uh thanks for doing this and good job out there at the championship. You know, it’s very memorable and yeah, hopefully we can take on another race together soon. Yeah, for sure. We’ll do it. All right, man. All right, man.